Posted on 04/14/2003 8:06:59 AM PDT by Paul Ross
Reprinted from NewsMax.com
Russia Gave Iraq Assassin List
NewsMax WiresBritain’s Telegraph reported Sunday that top secret documents discovered by Coalition forces in Baghdad “show that Russia provided Saddam Hussein's regime with wide-ranging assistance in the months leading up to the war, including intelligence on private conversations between Tony Blair and other Western leaders.”
Monday, April 14, 2003
Incredibly, Russia’s government also provided Iraq with “lists of assassins available for ‘hits’ in the West and details of arms deals to neighbouring countries.”
The Telegraph said the documents detailed “the extent of the links between Russia and Saddam” and were obtained from the heavily bombed headquarters of the Iraqi intelligence service in Baghdad Saturday.
The paper continued:
“The documents, in Arabic, are mostly intelligence reports from anonymous agents and from the Iraqi embassy in Moscow. Tony Blair is referred to in a report dated March 5, 2002 and marked: ‘Subject – SECRET.’ In the letter, an Iraqi intelligence official explains that a Russian colleague had passed him details of a private conversation between Mr Blair and Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, at a meeting in Rome. The two had met for an annual summit on February 15, 2002, in Rome.
“The list of assassins is referred to in a paper dated November 27, 2000. In it, an agent signing himself ‘SAB’ says that the Russians have passed him a detailed list of killers. The letter does not describe any assignments that the assassins might be given but it indicates just how much Moscow was prepared to share with Baghdad."
Also, on Sunday, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that “a Moscow-based organization was training Iraqi intelligence agents as recently as last September – at the same time Russia was resisting the Bush administration's push for a tough stand against Saddam Hussein's regime, Iraqi documents discovered by The Chronicle show.”
The paper said that “documents found Thursday and Friday in a Baghdad office of the Mukhabarat, the Iraqi secret police, indicate that at least five agents graduated Sept. 15 from a two-week course in surveillance and eavesdropping techniques, according to certificates issued to the Iraqi agents by the ’Special Training Center’ in Moscow."
Russia has repeatedly denied offering terrorist and military assistance to Iraq. Still, Iraq has been considered a Russian client state for decades, and the new documents show the extent of that relationship.
Yeh, not the brightest piece of sand in the desert.
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