No subject

evidence about Hussein's regime, scooping up documents in houses
abandoned by fleeing Baath Party leaders and top officials of the security
establishment. They stumbled upon one trove when Chalabi went to
check out a house that had belonged to his sister before it was taken over
by the Iraqi secret police.

In an interview from Baghdad, Sethna said the documents now total 60
tons and are being reviewed by U.S. authorities at secret locations for
intelligence on Hussein's security services and the Baath Party.

But after perusing some of the documents, Chalabi has also come up with
ammunition against perceived adversaries in the news media and abroad.
He said in an interview on Abu Dhabi television that journalists for rival
channel Al-Jazeera had been infiltrated by Iraqi agents. He told
Newsweek that the files may contain incriminating information about the
Jordanian royal family, saying King Abdullah II is "worried about what
might come out."

The charge roiled an already-tense relationship between Chalabi and
Jordan, where officials describe the exile leader as a fugitive from justice
and a divisive figure.

While helping U.S. forces search for Hussein and other top members of
the regime, Chalabi has also set out to confound the skeptics who suspect
him of being a U.S. puppet and those, including some officials in the State
Department, who feel he will be unable to build support inside the country
and have criticized his ability to unite Iraqi opposition factions.

He has championed Iraqis who want to see a "de-Baathification" of Iraqi
institutions and criticized U.S. officials who have encouraged Baath Party
members to return to work to jump-start the Iraqi government and services.

"We don't have civil or governmental authority, but we can push ORHA,"
said Sethna, referring to the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian
Assistance. For instance, the INC relayed information from Iraqi electrical
workers that the problem with the power supply was not the electrical
plants but downed power lines.

Meanwhile, Chalabi is "trying to build tribal and Shia links," said Glen
Rangwala, a Middle East specialist at Cambridge University.

Randy Scheunemann, a former foreign affairs adviser to Lott who now
runs the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, said doubts about Chalabi
in Washington stem from an entrenched belief among Arab-world
specialists in the CIA and State Department that democracy can't succeed there.

"They argue against democracy. Their careers are vested in 'stability,'"
Scheunemann said.

Amid the sudden blossoming of new and revived political movements in
Iraq, analysts are wary of assessing Chalabi's chances of establishing
himself as a durable political force.

Kenneth Katzman, a Middle East specialist at the Congressional Research
Service, said that "many experts see his [political] base as the U.S. military."

"As the U.S. military draws down, the ballast under Chalabi would appear
to erode," Katzman said. By contrast, Shiite leader Ayatollah Mohammed
Bakr al-Hakim, who crossed into Iraq from his long exile in Iran this past
weekend, "has a true power base that one can see and measure. It's
visible and it's going to be there."

The INC's Sethna counters: "We have the best philosophy - pluralism,
democracy, rule of law, and civil and political rights." Chalabi has
declared he doesn't want to be prime minister or even to lead a
transitional government, but, Sethna said, "If it emerges that he is a pivotal
figure, that there is something he can do in pulling people together, and his
presence in some job is necessary, I think he will do it."

----

12) Chalabi well placed for Iraq power despite controversies
AFP
May 14, 2003

BAGHDAD (AFP) - One of the men who could be Iraq (news - web
sites)'s next leader, Ahmad Chalabi, has the strong US backing that could
leave him well placed for political power but remains a controversial figure for
many Iraqis.

The leader of the Iraqi National Congress (INC) has recently let fly with a series of grave
accusations against neighbouring Jordan,where he was convicted in absentia more than
a decade ago for fraud and embezzlement.

Despite holding a seat on the US-anointed council which is preparing a national congress
to select a new Iraqi government, he remains an unknown quantity for many after only recently
returning after 45 years of exile.

"Many dislike him," said an official from the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian
Assistance (ORHA), the Pentagon run entity which is overseeing the rebuilding of post-war Iraq.

"But at the same time, they cannot come up with any other name," said the official, who
asked not to be identified.

Chalabi has long occupied pride of place among the former opponents of Saddam Hussein
preparing a new Iraq, and his INC umbrella group has won strong support from the United States.

The INC's militia, the Free Iraqi Forces (FIF), was established in the run-up
to the war by the Pentagon and includes volunteers from around the world.

But the INC has been keen to allay the image of being a tool in the hands of
the Pentagon, and describes its relations with the United States as an
alliance that has its own occasional problems.

"The United States is our ally and as an ally sometimes we have differences
and sometimes we have agreements. In fact we can describe ourselves as
difficult allies sometimes," said INC spokesman Entifadh Qanbar.

The group has undertaken a campaign to clear Chalabi's past in Jordan,
where he was sentenced to 22 years hard labour in 1992 after being tried in
absentia over the disappearance of 60 million dollars from the Petra Bank,
which he set up in 1977 and which crashed in 1989.

The group blames a conspiracy between the Jordanian royal family and the
ousted Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein.

On Tuesday, the INC accused Jordan of channelling 450 million dollars to
Saddam's intelligence services before the US-led war began on March 20.

A Chalabi advisor, Zaab Sethna, charged that the money went through the
Jordan National Bank, owned by the family of Jordanian Foreign Minister
Marwan Moasher.

Meanwhile US magazine Newsweek this month published an interview with
Chalabi in which he claimed to have taken possession of 25 tons of
documents from Saddam's secret police.

"It's a huge thing. Some of the files are very damning," Chalabi told
Newsweek in an interview, implying that some of the most incriminating
material concerned Jordan's King Abdullah II.

The monarch, who has ruled Jordan since 1999, "is worried about his
relationship with Saddam. He's worried about what might come out," Chalabi
told Newsweek, although he failed to provide further details.

One of the main disputes between his INC and the United States is the role
of former members of Saddam's Baath party in the new, post-war Iraq.

The INC has openly criticised the US appointment of Baath members at
some relaunched government ministries, a move being undertaken by the
coalition to speed up the rebuilding process.

"The formal policy of the United States of America is de-Baathification of
Iraq. That some Baathists returned to high position is not acceptable," said Qanbar.

One Iraqi commentator said the INC effort to distance itself from the
United States was also intended to keep the group from having to
shoulder any of the blame aimed at the US coalition over the chaos that
has reigned in post-war Iraq.

"The population blames the lack of security, electricity, cooking gas and
gasoline on the Americans," said the commentator, who asked not to be
named. "And that's not good for Chalabi," he said.

----

Former Iraqi General Khazraji in Iraq, Son Says
Tehran Times
May 21, 2003

COPENHAGEN -- A former Iraqi Army chief who in March
escaped house arrest in Denmark where he was suspected of
committing war crimes is in Iraq and is politically active, his son
told Danish daily Politiken on Tuesday.

Nizar al-Khazraji, a former head of the Iraqi Armed Forces, fled
Denmark on March 17, reportedly with the help of the CIA. He
had been under house arrest in Denmark since November 2002
on charges of taking part in chemical weapon attacks on Iraqi
Kurds in the 1980s.

"We have learned that he is in Iraq, that he is doing well, and that
he is involved in political work," his son Ahmed said as carried by AFP.

He said he had not spoken directly with his father, but that he
had received the information from people he trusted.

"When he wants to speak to us, he will contact us. Now we are
happy to know he is alive," Ahmed said, denying rumors that
Khazraji was killed in Basra at the end of the Iraq war.

The general was head of the Iraqi Armed Forces during the
invasion of Kuwait in 1990 but fled to Jordan in 1995. He
received political asylum in Denmark in 1999.

Danish newspaper BT said on March 22 that Khazraji, believed
to be the highest ranking officer to have defected from Iraq and
touted by U.S. media as a possible successor to ousted Iraqi
president Saddam Hussein, had escaped with the help of the CIA.

Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen said last week
however that the United States was not planning to give Khazraji
a role in the new interim administration in Baghdad.

Danish Justice Minister Lene Espersen, who came under fire
from the opposition for Khazraji's disappearance, has on two
occasions written to U.S. authorities asking for any information
on his disappearance and whereabouts.

She has yet to receive a response.