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May 3, 2004

"Iraq claimed to have information about the OK City bombing," said [Former press secretary for Illinois Senator Carol Mosely Braun, Susan] Lindauer.

"In a letter to you?" asked ABC7's Chuck Goudie.

"In a formal letter that they sent by diplomatic pouch which I then communicated to the White House," said Lindauer.

Lindauer says shortly after a mammoth fertilizer bomb tore through the Murrah Federal Building here in Oklahoma City, Iraqi intelligence agents uncovered a fundamentalist Muslim link to the bombing.

"I know they have identified specific individuals who were tied to it and the financing mechanism for Oklahoma City," said Lindauer.

In meetings at the United Nations and in Baghdad following September 11th, Lindauer says Iraqi officials told her that Oklahoma bomber Timothy McVeigh was carrying out the orders of violent Arab radicals. Lindauer says the Iraqis actually learned of the Islamic terrorist plot against Oklahoma City years ago.

"That they previously had tried to give to the Clinton administration and had been rebuffed," said Lindauer.

"These are Iraqis who were identified?" asked Goudie.

"The Iraqi intelligence service identified them. I do not believe they are Iraqi," said Lindauer.

...

Lindauer claims she sent the Oklahoma City information in a letter to her second cousin, White House Chief Of Staff Andrew Card. When Lindauer was arrested in March on spy-related charges, she says the FBI seized the actual letter from Iraqi diplomats that laid out the Oklahoma City plot.

Goudie: Did you believe it then?

Lindauer: Yes

Goudie: Do you believe it now?

Lindauer: Yes I'm absolutely convinced. At one point we were going to invite the chief of police of Oklahoma City to Baghdad.

Lindauer, 40, was born in Oklahoma. She grew up in Alaska, graduated from Smith College and the London School Of Economics. Before politics, she worked as reporter for U.S. News, Fortune and the Seattle Post.