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Tribe Would Protect Saddamâs Kin -- if Asked
EFLIraqi tribesmen near the Syrian border denied on Monday that they had given sanctuary to Saddam Hussein's wife and daughters â but said that if they did arrive and ask for protection, they would get it. The tribesmen said relatives of several senior Iraqis had passed through the northern region during the war. But they refused to say who they were, or where they had gone. Some media reports have said members of Saddam's family fled to Syria during the war and were later sent back to Iraq, where they were being sheltered by the Shamar tribe. Arabic channel Al Arabiya quoted sources as saying the group included Saddam's wife Sajida, and his three daughters â Raghd and Rana whose husbands he ordered killed in 1996, and Hala, whose husband Jamal Mustafa Sultan al-Tikriti surrendered to U.S. troops last week after returning from Syria. Fener Ahmed Sfook al-Faisal, a Shamar tribe sheikh in Rabia, dismissed the reports. "We heard this report on Arabiya television and were astonished. We deny this and if they stayed in this place we would know about it," he told Reuters. "We'd notice a bunch of hot babes!" But asked what would happen if Saddam's wives and daughters came to the tribe for protection, he said: "If they came here we would show them hospitality because that is our custom as Arabs. It is Saddam who is wanted, not his family." He added that U.S. officers had last visited the area about two weeks ago to meet tribal elders and local officials. I think we'd like to talk to them, but I don't think they'd face any charges. We should just wait for the media agents to track them down and offer them a movie deal. A member of the Shamar tribe attending a U.S.-backed meeting of prominent Iraqis in Baghdad said he had not heard reports that members of Saddam's family were under tribal protection. "But for us Arabs, if a woman and her children seek refuge, and especially if they are not accused of anything, we protect them," he said. Britain's Daily Mail newspaper quoted Haitham Rashid Wihaib, Saddam's former chief of protocol and a long-time exile in the West, as saying members of Saddam's family had been sent back to Iraq by Syria on Saturday. "Syria told Saddam's family they had to leave because they were worried about the effect their presence would have on Syria's relationship with the West," he was quoted as saying. "The Syrians made inquiries with other Arab countries to find out if anyone else would be prepared to take them in, but they all refused. So on Saturday the family were smuggled out of Syria back into Iraq using a border pass which takes them straight to the safety of the tribes in Iraq." Interesting, Syria seems to have been paying attention. Posted by: Steve 2003-04-28 |
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