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Bremer: 'We are going to get Saddam'Grenade attack kills U.S. soldier Saturday
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- The U.S. civilian administrator in Iraq predicted Saturday that Saddam Hussein will be tracked down but warned that the threat from "foreign terrorists" infiltrating the country would persist even after Saddam is captured and the remnants of his regime are hunted down. L. Paul Bremer said tipsters are "coming forward in increasing numbers" to alert troops to militants. "In the most famous case, someone told us where to find Uday and Qusay," said Bremer, referring to Saddam's sons, killed July 22 in a firefight with U.S. forces in Mosul. "Within hours they were dead." Their bodies -- along with Qusay's 14-year-old son Mustafa -- were buried in Ouja, the tribal seat of their family, on the outskirts of Tikrit. (Full story) The informant was paid $30 million for information leading to the brothers, and he and his family were relocated to another country. Bremer said the ransom payment was made swiftly, an indication that the U.S. government is taking the process seriously. "We are going to get Saddam, too," Bremer said. "The only question is who is going to get $25 million and move to another country." Bremer also said the capture of Saddam and the deaths of his sons would have a "beneficial effect" in reducing attacks aimed at U.S. forces. "Saddam Hussein is finished" in Iraq, he said. In answer to a question, he said he thought increasing the bounty for information leading to Saddam would make little difference. The United States released digitally altered images that show how Saddam might look after months on the run, picturing the deposed leader alternately with a full beard, gray hair, moustache and kaffiyeh, or traditional Arab headdress. (Full story, Gallery: Digitally altered images) Another set of images of the former Iraqi leader is being distributed only to members of Task Force 20 -- the elite military group charged with finding Saddam. Those images, which have not been released to the public, are CIA-generated artist's sketches that depict a more haggard Saddam. Bremer blames Baathist 'deperadoes,' 'trained killers'Bremer also said strides are being made to hire local police and soldiers who will help secure the country in the face of guerrilla warfare being waged against coalition troops. One U.S. soldier was killed and three were wounded in a rocket-propelled grenade attack on their convoy north of Baghdad early Saturday, a U.S. military spokeswoman said. The incident, involving soldiers from the Army's 4th Infantry Division, brings to 53 the number of U.S. troops killed in hostile action in Iraq since President Bush declared an end to major combat operations May 1. A total of 250 U.S. troops have been killed in Iraq since the start of the war, 167 of those from hostile fire. (Interactive: Troop deaths in Iraq) An Iraqi woman was killed Friday when U.S. soldiers shot back in self-defense during an attack in the Manseur district, U.S. Central Command said. The woman was standing near the spot where unknown assailants dropped an explosive device from a highway overpass on a six-vehicle convoy. Iraqi police and soldiers from the 1st Armored Division responded and secured the site. The residents took the woman to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead.
Bremer said attacks against coalition forces are coming from "desperadoes from the Baath Party," and "trained killers" of the Fedayeen Saddam and the many former intelligence services of Saddam's. He said there is evidence of connections between the former regime and al Qaeda and evidence that Ansar al-Islam, a group based in Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq that the United States has linked to al Qaeda, was "reconstituting" itself inside Iraq after its base was attacked early in the war. Members of the group escaped Iraq during the war and are trickling back, Bremer said. He said there is evidence that others have made their way into the country, using the example of a raid about six weeks ago in western Iraq near the Syrian border in which "70 foreign terrorists" were killed and many weapons were found. People at the camp were carrying Saudi, Yemeni and Syrian documents and papers. "The camp had at least the looks of an al Qaeda-type-operation," he said. "In any case, they were certainly foreign terrorists, and we dealt with them." Other developments• The U.S. Army has dispatched a team of medical experts to Iraq to investigate a spate of serious pneumonia cases among U.S. troops. Two have died and more than 100 have been sickened, Reuters reported. (Full story) • Al-Jazeera television broadcast another audiotape Friday purportedly recorded in recent days by Saddam. On the tape, the speaker counsels the Iraqi people to be patient. Friday afternoon, CIA officials said there's a "high likelihood" that the voice on the tape is that of the deposed Iraqi leader. (Saddam tape) • A British judge leading an inquiry into the death of British weapons expert David Kelly said Friday that he would question Prime Minister Tony Blair and Defense Minister Geoff Hoon. Kelly, 59, who apparently committed suicide last month, was at the center of a dispute over Iraqi weapons that has rocked Great Britain. The top U.K. judge said the testimony of Blair and Hoon would be part of his inquiry into how Kelly's name became public as the source of a BBC report that the British government had "sexed up" claims about Iraq's weapons programs. (Full story) CNN Baghdad bureau chief Jane Arraf and correspondents Barbara Starr, Nic Robertson, Harris Whitbeck and Rym Brahimi contributed to this report.
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