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New York: Captured former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein has denied his Government possessed weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) and said he had no direct role in commanding Iraqi insurgents or in planning attacks after he went into hiding, a media report said today (Dec 16, 2003).

Interrogators began questioning Hussein just hours after American forces captured him, officials told the 'New York Times'. An early focus of the interrogation, they said, has been anything he knows about the guerrilla war, in hope of quickly gleaning information that might help prevent attacks and disrupt or dismember cells responsible for the attacks.

Hussein, the report said, has also been quizzed about programmes to develop unconventional weapons, but he has so far denied the existence of such weapons.

Officials told the paper that his denial was in line with statements of other top Iraqi officials who have been captured in recent months, and who still maintain that Baghdad did not have unconventional weapons.

American interrogators, the 'Times' said quoting officials, took the somewhat unusual step of immediately asking Hussein about substantive issues, in part because he appeared mentally and physically fatigued, and thus his resistance to interrogation seemed low.

Yet intelligence and military officials still said they were discounting much of the little information that Hussein had offered so far. The officials based in Washington who spoke about his interrogation were all referring to reports in briefings transmitted from Iraq, the paper said.

They said it might take weeks or months for him to face up to the reality of his situation and begin to answer questions more candidly.

"He's the king of denial and deception," said Senator Pat Roberts, Republican and chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

One administration official told the 'Times', "Obviously, there are a whole lot of answers we need on a whole lot of topics. He is compliant in the sense that he is responding, as opposed to being obstinate and not speaking at all. But he is not helpful."

Another senior administration official said Hussein "has given no indication that he will be a helpful person in getting information". But, the official said, "that is what we expected".

Still another official who has been briefed on the first days of his captivity told the paper that "he is denying any direct involvement in the insurgency".

Several officials said they were not certain whether Hussein had said anything yet concerning possible Iraqi involvement in the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center (WTC) and the Pentagon.

However, they said he had denied any knowledge of the fate of a US Navy pilot who has been missing since the Persian Gulf War in 1991. Lieutenant Commander Michael Scott Speicher, an F-18 pilot, was shot down on the first day of the air war in Iraq in 1991. He is the only American still officially listed as missing in action from the first war with Iraq.

PTI



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