US Troops Seize Top Iraqi Scientist

05/05/2003| IslamWeb

The US says it has captured one of Saddam Hussein's most senior biological weapons scientists, Dr Huda Salih Mahdi Ammash. Dr Ammash, 49, was number 53 on the US list of 55 most wanted Iraqi leaders, and was one of the few women in Saddam Hussein's inner circle. In addition to allegedly helping rebuild Iraq's biological weapons program after the 1991 Gulf War, she was a regional commander of the ruling Baath party. She was seized in Baghdad on Sunday, according to US officials speaking on condition of anonymity. She is believed to have played a key role in Iraq's suspected biological weapons programme, "although no weapons of mass destruction have been discovered in Iraq so far". Dr Ammash graduated from the University of Baghdad and later served as its dean. She earned a masters degree in microbiology from Texas Woman's University and did doctoral work at the University of Missouri-Columbia. **PHOTO CAPTION*** Iraqis buy newspapers in a street of Baghdad, Iraq, Monday, May 5, 2003. (AP Photo/Samir Mezban)