TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/091790/0917010.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 1.7 KB | 38 lines

                                                                                THE GULF, Page 35

Saddam's VIP Guests



    Among the spoils of war that fell into Iraq's hands when its
troops stormed Kuwait were 17 prisoners who had been serving
sentences ranging from five years to life in a Kuwait City
jail. The convicts turned out to be a valuable prize. The 17,
all linked to the Shi`ite terrorist group Islamic Jihad, were
convicted for killing six people in the 1983 bombings of the
U.S. and French embassies and other targets in the Kuwaiti
capital. Islamic Jihad, which has ties to Iran, has repeatedly
demanded freedom for the 17 prisoners as one of the conditions
for the release of Western hostages held in Lebanon.

    The most common theory is that the prisoners are being kept
in a Baghdad hotel, where they are free to come and go but not
to leave the city. There were unconfirmed reports last week
that two Lebanese members of the group had already returned to
Lebanon. Western terrorism experts believe Saddam could be
especially interested in one of the prisoners, Mustafa
Badreddin, a Syrian-trained explosives expert who is the
brother-in-law of Imad Mughniyah, a Lebanese terrorist and
suspected kidnapper identified as the mastermind behind the 1985
hijacking of TWA Flight 847. Originally scheduled to fly from
Athens to Rome, the plane was eventually taken to Beirut, where
Robert Dean Stethem, a U.S. Navy diver who was a passenger on
the flight, was beaten and shot to death. Saddam conceivably
could try to enlist Mustafa and his colleagues in terrorist
acts against the U.S., release them to Iran as a goodwill
gesture or keep them as a trump card in negotiations with the
West.