Baghdad
One of Saddam Hussein's nephews, a top funder of the Sunni insurgency, escaped from prison this week. Ayman al-Sabawi is the son of Sabawi Ibrahim al-Tikriti, one of Saddam's many half-brothers. He left a prison near Mosul with the aid of a prison guard, who told colleagues that al-Sabawi was being transferred to another jail. Interior Ministry officials arrested the prison chief and his deputy. They are now frantically searching for al-Sabawi as well as the guard, who has disappeared along with his entire family. Al-Sabawi's father was head of the Iraqi secret service during the first Gulf War and head of the General Security Directorate from 1991 to 1996.
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