Saddam's ex-deputy in Syria: report

23 April 2008 - 18H00

Izzat Ibrahim al-Duri, who tops the Iraqi government's list of most-wanted fugitives, is in Syria from where he leads the insurgency in Iraq, an Iraqi official said in remarks published Wednesday.

"We have precise and definite information. Izzat al-Duri is in Syria, we know it. He funds several terrorist groups and leads a Baath group," national security adviser Muwaffaq al-Rubaie told the Saudi daily Asharq Al-Awsat.

"We spoke about this to the Syrians several times. They deny his presence (in Syria) despite the evidence we have," he said.

Duri, the most senior official in the ousted Saddam Hussein regime to be still on the run, heads a 41 most-wanted list released by the Iraqi government in 2006 with a 10-million-dollar bounty.

He was Saddam's number two under the former Baath regime and is considered an operational leader with close ties to anti-US insurgents.