US officials were grilling former Iraqi deputy prime minister Mr Tareq Aziz today after his overnight surrender in the hope that he would shed light on the fate of deposed president Saddam Hussein.
His capture, along with that of former senior intelligence official Farouk Hijazi near Iraq's border with Syria today, marked further progress on the US campaign to arrest former regime officials.
Mr Aziz, the highest profile member of Iraq's ousted regime to fall into US hands so far, "surrendered to coalition forces overnight," Lieutenant Yvonne Lukson said at the US Central Command's war headquarters in Qatar.
As the fluent-English speaking foreign minister during the 1991 Gulf War, Mr Aziz came to be one of the best known figures of Saddam's Iraq, but he was only 43rd on a list of 55 most wanted Iraqis and was not considered a member of Saddam's innermost circle.
"He is being questioned," said Lieutenant Herb Josey. "He was a long-term confidant of Saddam Hussein," he added, indicating that US forces hope Mr Aziz will help determine the ousted president's whereabouts.
"It's very possible he may know the status of Saddam and other regime officials, potentially the location of other regime officials, and where they may be hiding," said a Pentagon official, who asked not to be identified.
Saddam, who was personally targeted by at least two US air strikes amid the blistering three week bombardment of Baghdad, remains unaccounted for.
US President George W. Bush told NBC television that the United States was seeking to confirm evidence that Saddam was dead or "at very minimum was severely wounded" to be sure of the ousted leader's fate.
The capture of Mr Aziz, an urbane 67-year-old for years the international face of Iraq under Saddam, clearly pleased Mr Bush, who flashed a broad smile and gave a big "thumbs-up" when questioned by White House reporters about the capture.
Neighbours of Mr Aziz's sister-in-law in a Baghdad suburb described a lightning special forces raid which ended with several people being driven away in luxury cars. They said they believed the former minister to be among them.
Mr Hijazi - according to US intelligence involved in a 1993 plot to kill former US president George Bush - was in custody, "somewhere near the Syrian border," in Iraq, a US official said, who did not wish to be named.
He does not appear on the US "most wanted" list of former regime officials.
AFP