UNITED STATES: Leading Saddam Aide Caught

American soldier killed in Baghdad attack

Wednesday, June 18, 2003

(3:49 PM ET) (19:49 GMT)
The Cable News Network

CNN Correspondents Jane Arraf, Satinder Bindra, David Ensor, Jamie McIntyre, Barbara Starr and Ben Wedeman & CNN Producer Paul Courson contributed to this report

Also seized were Russian-made night vision goggles, sniper rifles, military uniforms, some 400 million in Iraqi dinar currency and an undetermined amount of cash in British pounds and euros. Odierno linked the huge stockpile of cash with what the United States believes is an effort by Saddam loyalists to pay people to attack U.S. troops.

The No. 2 most-wanted Iraqi official has been captured in Iraq, according to US television sources based in Iraq on Wednesday, June 18, 2003. Abid Hamid Mahmud Al-Tikriti, described by the U.S. as a presidential secretary to Saddam Hussein and charged with his security, was captured Tuesday by the U.S. military and the Central Intelligence Agency.

Image Credit: The Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- CNN
U.S. forces in Iraq have captured Gen. Abid Hamid Mahmud al-Tikriti, who was Saddam Hussein's personal secretary, national security adviser and senior bodyguard, Pentagon sources said Wednesday.

Mahmud is the ace of diamonds in the U.S. military's deck of 55 most-wanted Iraqis and No. 4 on the list behind Saddam and his sons Uday and Qusay.

Mahmud may know a lot about the location of Iraq's possible weapons of mass destruction and whereabouts of the former Iraqi leader, one official told CNN.

Pentagon sources said he was captured Monday in a raid by U.S. Special Operations forces near the north-central Iraqi town of Tikrit, along with other members of Saddam's special security forces.

The United States kept Mahmud's capture secret for a day, sources said, in case Saddam also was hiding in the same area.

Separate raids Tuesday on two farmhouses near Tikrit netted more than $8 million in cash and one of Saddam's other bodyguards, according to Maj. Gen. Ray Odierno, commander of the U.S. Army's 4th Infantry Division, in a videoconference from Baghdad.
(More: CNN.com)

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From the AP:
* U.S. Captures No. 4 Iraqi Official

By John J. Lumpkin

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