Posted on 4/27/2003, 1:27:04 PM by MeekOneGOP
Another Iraqi official in custody
Sunday 27 April 2003, 10:30 PM
US-led forces were Sunday holding the former head of Iraq's National Monitoring Directorate, who figures on a list of 55 wanted Iraqis, the US Central Command announced.
Amin, also known as Hossem Mohammed Amin al-Yasin, was the six of clubs on the US deck of cards listing the most wanted figures.
The general was among the key figures in Saddam's weapons programs and would have detailed knowledge of any illegal armaments, if Iraq still possesses them.
For more than a decade as head of the monitoring commission, the former air force communications engineer has earned a reputation as a loyal officer to Saddam.
Amin and his troops refused to allow UN inspectors into presidential palaces and other "sensitive sites" during the first round of UN inspections that ended in 1998.
He also was one of the few Iraqis authorised to comment on weapons of mass destruction. Like most of Saddam's most trusted lieutenants, he is from a prominent Sunni Muslim family from Mosul in northern Iraq.
Early in his career, Amin was assigned to different air bases and radar installations. His career took off when Saddam established the military's Technical and Scientific Committee, a weapons research and development think tank, in 1980.
Others on the committee included Gen. Amer Rashid, Iraq's minister of oil, and Amir al-Saadi, Saddam's senior weapons adviser who is also in coalition custody. The committee was later expanded into the Military Industrialisation Organisation, which produced all of Iraq's most lethal weapons.
Amin was also believed close to Saddam's son Qusai, who was the commander of the Republican Guard, and Saddam's personal secretary, Gen. Abide Hmoud.
That made Amin one of the best-connected insiders in the Iraqi ruling establishment.
Amin was also believed to have been among the Iraqi officials the Baghdad government claimed were encouraged by US intelligence agents to defect last year.
Iraq claims the attempt was made when an Iraqi delegation travelled to Vienna, Austria, last year to discuss the resumption of inspections with UN officials.
What the hell is that? And we think we have alot of bureaucrats? LOL!
head of Iraq's National Monitoring Directorate
What the hell is that? And we think we have alot of bureaucrats? LOL!
It's probably the head of the State police, kind of like the KGB.... to "police" teh domestic population
Tia
From the context, I believe this Directorate was responsible for liasing with the UN Weapons Inspectors.
Consequently, we should be able to learn from Amin who was tipping them off to the planned inspections. If not Blix himself, then which Frenchman, that is...
Tia
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