Jazeera TV Says Top Iraqi Baath Party Member Caught(Number 41 on the most wanted list)

ABC/Reuters/Al Jazeera ^ | Feb 15,2004 | NA

[Dog]

Jazeera TV Says Top Iraqi Baath Party Member Caught

Feb. 15 — DUBAI (Reuters) - Arabic television station Al Jazeera said Sunday a senior Baath Party member on the U.S. list of most wanted Iraqis had been captured. The report from Iraq identified him as Muhammad Zimam Abd al-Razzaq al-Sadun, who was Baath Party chairman and commander of the Baath Party militia in Baghdad and was number 41 on a list of 55 most wanted Iraqis. It gave no further details.

His capture, if confirmed, would bring to 44 the number caught by U.S. forces since the United States authorities issued their "most wanted" deck of cards portraying the faces of those it wished to capture.

Saddam's former lieutenant, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, is the highest-ranking official on the list who remains at large, coming in at No. 6.

[Dog]

Muhammad Zimam Abd al-Razzaq al-Sadun

He had $1 Million dollar bounty on his head.

[M Kehoe]

Good morning.

For some reason, I've got this silly song in my head: Another bottle of Ba'ath on the wall, another bottle of Ba'ath, take one down, pass it around, another...

5.56mm

[ChadGore]

Thank you GWB :)

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

Morning, Dog. Al Jazeera, lol? Just this once...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Arabic television station Al Jazeera said Sunday a senior Baath Party member on the U.S. list of most wanted Iraqis had been captured. The report from Iraq identified him as Muhammad Zimam Abd al-Razzaq al-Sadun, who was Baath Party chairman and commander of the Baath Party militia in Baghdad and was number 41 on a list of 55 most wanted Iraqis. It gave no further details.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Fact or fiction?

No official release yet from the DoD.

Stay tuned....

[governsleastgovernsbest]

Muhammad Zimam Abd al-Razzaq al-Sadun was number 41.

Then again, Al Jazeera TV is number 40.

[Peach]

Whoowee baby. What a way to start the day. One at a time...

[Dog]

I only find them...:-)

Morning!

[AdmSmith]

He was Baath Party Chairman & Commander Baath Party Militia Ta'mim & Ninawa Gov.

[ChadGore]

woohooo

[AdmSmith]

Pease update list.

[harpu]

All of these Iraqis still in hiding are praying for a demonRAT to win the Whitehouse so they can get back to business as usual! So Sad.

Thanks Mr. President.

[Oldeconomybuyer]

Iraqi police nab No. 41 on U.S. military list of most-wanted Iraqis -AP Breaking News
(02-15) 05:17 PST BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Iraqi police captured a former Baath Party chairman Saturday who was No. 41 on the U.S. military's most-wanted list, leaving only 10 fugitives from the list still at large. Mohammed Zimam A...

[hoosiermama]

**Another one bites the dust, and another one down!**

[RottiBiz]

Thanks for the link.

That he was captured by the Iraqi police seems to me to be a good indication of progress being made toward the eventual transferal of all security to the Iraqis.

[The Raven]

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Iraqi police on Sunday arrested a former Baath Party chairman who was one of 11 fugitives still at large from the U.S. military's list of the 55 most-wanted members of Saddam Hussein's regime, the Iraqi Interior Ministry said.

Mohammed Zimam Abdul Razaq, who was No. 47 on the list and the four of spades in the military's "deck of cards" of wanted men, was captured at one of his homes in western Baghdad, Deputy Interior Minister Ahmed Kadhum Ibrahim told journalists. MR. Abdul-Razaq didn't resist arrest, he said.

Mr. Abdul-Razaq was sitting next to Mr. Ibrahim, wearing a traditional black robe. Mr. Abdul-Razaq was the Baath Party regional chairman in the northern provinces of Nineveh and Tamim, which include the city of Kirkuk.

The U.S. military has offered a $1 million reward for all those still at large on the list.

During a ceremony to present Mr. Abdul-Razaq to reporters, Mr. Ibrahim appealed to the most sought after regime fugitive, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, to surrender. Mr. Ibrahim promised Mr. al-Douri, the former vice chairman of the ruling Revolutionary Command Council, to turn himself in and he would be treated with dignity.

Violence Continues

Two U.S. convoys were attacked less than a mile apart in Baghdad on Sunday, and U.S. soldiers in one of the attacks opened fire, killing one Iraqi driving nearby and wounding six others, witnesses and hospital officials said.

The violence in the capital came as Iraqi security officials were investigating who was behind one of the most sophisticated guerrilla attacks yet in Iraq -- a bold daylight assault by dozens of fighters on a police station in Fallujah, west of Baghdad, in which 25 people were killed, most of them policemen.

One U.S. Military Police soldier was among more than people wounded in Saturday's assault, said Col. William Darley, a military spokesman.

There were conflicting reports about who may have been behind the attacks.

Police said foreign fighters, either Arabs or Iranians, were involved and that two of four attackers killed in the battle had Lebanese identification papers. Rumors spread in the city that an Iraqi Shiite Muslim militia with links to Iran, the Badr Brigade, were to blame.

But a U.S. military officer in Baghdad said the attack's sophistication pointed to former members of Saddam Hussein's military. "This was something put together by people with knowledge of small unit tactics," he said, speaking on condition of anonymity. "It was a complex, well coordinated attack. This would not be the same tactics that al Qaeda would employ. These are military tactics."

The assault involved two simultaneous attacks -- one group of gunmen overran the police station, freeing dozens of prisoners being held there, while a second team pinned down Iraqi security forces at a nearby compound with a half-hour barrage of fire to prevent them from helping the policemen.

On Sunday, a roadside bomb went off as a U.S. military patrol passed by in western Baghdad, causing no injuries. The American soldiers opened fire wildly in response, shooting three vehicles, witnesses said. One Iraqi was killed and six wounded, hospital officials said.

"I was driving near the U.S. convoy when I heard an explosion. Then the U.S. soldiers randomly opened fire," said Kadhum Salih, a teacher who was wounded in the left hand.

About a half-mile away, gunmen attacked a U.S. convoy on a highway at about the same time, setting one of the vehicles ablaze. Witnesses said U.S. soldiers pulled three wounded foreigners from the stricken SUV. The witnesses couldn't tell if the casualties were dead or alive.

The convoy was made up of a military Humvee and two sport utility vehicles, the sort used by American civilians and officials in Iraq. The SUV was heavily burned, its hood pockmarked with bullet holes.

Also on Sunday, the military said an 82nd Airborne Division paratrooper died when his vehicle overturned near Baghdad a day earlier. The soldier's name wasn't released.

Insurgents have launched a series of bloody attacks in the past week, thought to be part of an escalation aimed at wrecking U.S. plans to hand over power to the Iraqis on June 30.

The handover has hit political storms as well, with the U.S. under heavy pressure to change its method for picking a government to take power on the target date. U.S. administrators want local councils to pick a legislature, which in turn would name a government that would rule until elections in 2005.

A prominent Kurdish leader said Saturday that he expects the U.S.-picked Iraqi Governing Council to take power June 30 if elections for a legislature can't be arranged.

"We think that elections are the best way to express the opinions of the Iraqi people," council member Jalal Talabani said. "We expect the Governing Council to receive sovereignty if no provisional government is established or no elections are held."

Mr. Talabani spoke after meeting with Iraq's top Shiite Muslim cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Husseini al-Sistani, who has demanded elections be held.

The demand by Mr. al-Sistani, who holds enormous influence among Iraq's Shiite majority, prompted a U.N. mission to explore whether elections were possible. A spokesman for the U.N. team sided with the U.S. and said it was unlikely a vote could be organized by June 6.

But the head of the team, Lakhdar Brahimi, said major changes were needed in the U.S. plan for picking a government to satisfy Iraqi leaders.

U.S. officials say they're open to changes in the regional caucuses formula but haven't said how far they are willing to go.

When it transfers sovereignty, the U.S. wants to give Iraqi security forces greater responsibility in battling the insurgency. But Saturday's attack in Fallujah raised questions about how prepared the Iraqis are to face the guerrillas, who have kept up attacks despite the Dec. 13 arrest of Saddam Hussein.

The attack occurred at the end of a bloody week in which about 100 people were killed in suicide bombings at a police station in Iskandariyah and an army recruiting center in Baghdad. Those attacks as well as the Fallujah raid suggest a campaign by insurgents to strike at key institutions of the U.S.-backed Iraqi administration.

Copyright © 2004 Associated Press

[blam]

I wonder why this appears in one AP story but not in the one above?

"In Qaim, near the Syrian border about 200 miles northwest of Baghdad, U.S. troops backed by tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles clashed Sunday with Iraqi gunmen. There were no reports of casualties. Residents said gunmen attacked the Americans in retaliation for a U.S. operation against suspected smugglers the day before."

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Thanks for the ping!

Good news ping!

[Alamo-Girl]

Bump!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

That he was captured by the Iraqi police seems to me to be a good indication of progress being made toward the eventual transferal of all security to the Iraqis.

I think that is a huge accomplishment!