The story appears on

Page A3

April 18, 2015

GET this page in PDF

Free for subscribers

View shopping cart

Related News

Home » World

Ex-aide to Saddam ‘may have been killed’

EZZAT Ibrahim al-Douri, a former aide to late Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and a leader of Iraq’s Sunni insurgency, may have been killed by Iraqi forces and Shiite militias fighting the insurgents.

Douri was killed in a military operation, Raed al-Jubouri, the governor of Salahuddin province, told reporters. The pan-Arab television network al-Arabiya showed photos of a dead man who looked like al-Douri.

However, Khdhayer Almurshidy, a spokesman for Iraq’s former Baath party, said in comments to Iraq’s al-Hadath television that the reports were false. Al-Douri was a senior member of the party.

Al-Jubouri said that “a group of security forces went and surrounded the area and those terrorists were killed. Three of them were suicide bombers and blew themselves up. Amongst the bodies was Douri’s.”

He said the operation was carried out in the Hamrin area near al Alam in Salahuddin province, but that Iraqi forces did not know al-Douri was there beforehand.

Jubouri also spoke to al-Arabiya, where he described the operation as a major victory. He said al-Douri “is considered a mastermind for this terrorist group,” referring to Islamic State, an offshoot of al-Qaida which has taken swathes of Syria and Iraq.

“For sure, this will have an impact on them ... There will be a break among them,” he said.

Baghdad has mounted an offensive against Islamic State and former Baathists once loyal to Saddam Hussein to retake territory in Iraq’s Sunni heartland captured by jihadists last summer.




 

Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.

沪公网安备 31010602000204号

Email this to your friend