Saddam Hussein's Son Plotted London Assassination Attack

Saddam Hussein's son Uday plotted to send hit squad into UK

Before the Iraq war, Uday Hussein ordered an elite team to carry out murders

and bombings in Britain

Saddam Hussein's son Uday hatched a plot to assassinate the leader of the

Iraqi opposition in London in April 2000, according to a new Pentagon study

based on documents seized during the Iraq war.

The abortive conspiracy called for an elite recruit in the Fedayeen Saddam

paramilitary group to kill Ahmed Chalabi, head of the Iraqi National

Congress, who was based in London.

The plot is outlined in Iraqi memos that detail Saddam's support for a wide

network of Middle Eastern terror groups, including Islamists linked to

Al-Qaeda. They include a 1993 cooperation deal with Egyptian Islamic Jihad,

headed by Ayman al-Zawahiri, who became second-in-command of Al-Qaeda when

the two groups merged in 2001.

There is, however, no evidence of the firm link to Osama Bin Laden that the

Bush administration had claimed as one of the justifications for attacking

Iraq: "This study found no 'smoking gun' [ie, direct connection] between

Saddam's Iraq and Al-Qaeda."

A British official said this weekend: "Nothing we have seen has changed our

prewar position that there was no link between Saddam and Bin Laden."

However, there was strong evidence of Uday Hussein planning to order the

Fedayeen, which he set up in the 1990s as answerable only to himself or his

father, to carry out assassinations and bombings in London.

In a possible recognition that Britain would be one of the most difficult

targets to attack, officials ordered that only the best recruits should be

based there.

One memo from a senior Fedayeen official refers to orders given by Uday at

two meetings in May 1999. The dictator's son had ordered officials to "start

planning special operations in the centres of the traitors' symbols in the

fields of London / Iran / self-ruled areas [Kurdish northern Iraq]".

The operations were to be known by the codename Blessed July and would be

backed by the Iraqi intelligence service, the Da'irat al-Mukhabarat al-Amah.

Agents in London were to carry poison suicide capsules, with orders to use

them if captured.

The official then listed Uday's orders on how to prepare the recruits:

"Select 50 Fedayeen martyrs according to the required specifications. Admit

them to the Intelligence School to prepare them for their duties.

"After passing their tests they will be selected for their targets as

follows. The top 10 will work in the European field - London. The next 10

will work in the Iranian field. The third 10 will work in the self-ruled

area."

The plot to attack Chalabi in April 2000 is the only example of a specific

attack planned in London. It called for a Fedayeen operative to make his way

across Europe "for the purpose of executing a sanctimonious [sic] national

duty, which is eliminating hostile agent Ahmed Chalabi".

The Fedayeen was later to prove one of the few Iraqi forces that offered

tough resistance to the 2003 invasion, but on this occasion its operation

failed because the agent was unable to obtain a visa to enter Britain.

The documents show that officials at the Iraqi embassy in London had a stock

of weapons that Saddam had ordered them to destroy in July 2002. The embassy

asked Baghdad for advice "regarding how to destroy weapons in London, which

include seven Kalashnikov guns, 19 other guns with ammunition, and

silencers".

Saddam had extensive cooperation with Middle Eastern terrorist groups. One

memo refers to an agreement with Egyptian Islamic Jihad during the 1991 Gulf

war for attacks against Hosni Mubarak, the president of Egypt, which was

taking part in the operation to free Kuwait. The memo, dated March 1993,

says that whereas Iraq had promised to finance and train Egyptian Islamic

Jihad for the attacks, it was now prepared only to provide the group with

finance.

The study's assessment of Iraq's lack of links to Al-Qaeda represents a

final acceptance by the Pentagon that it was wrong to make such claims.

MoD in 'secret justice' over deaths

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has been accused of operating "secret justice"

after issuing a court gagging order to conceal how Whitehall cost-cutting

might have caused the deaths of 10 servicemen in Iraq.

The MoD has demanded that key parts of the inquest next week into the crash

of an RAF Hercules in Iraq in 2005 be held in secret on grounds of "national

security".

Nine British servicemen and one Australian airman died in the tragedy. It

was the largest single loss of life of British forces in Iraq.

Their lawyers said they might challenge the gagging order in the coroner's

court this week because its real purpose appeared to protect the government

from political embarrassment.

The secret MoD papers are understood to cover its decision not to spend an

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