Sycophant may be US tipster

In an interview on Wednedsay, Thahir said Zaidan told his story on Tuesday while sitting in a US military Humvee, about two hours after the bodies of the Hussein brothers were removed from the remains of Zaidan’s house.

The deaths caused soldiers to break out cigars, but the episode posed a difficult dilemma for a 46-year-old man, who had made a career out of hanging around the Husseins. ‘‘Nawaf was always bragging that he was a good friend of Saddam’s family,’’ said Thahir. He and a Muslim cleric added Zaidan was known as a businessman who specialised in import-export work, but mainly his business was loyalty to Hussein’s family, whose officials kept him supplied with government contracts and goodies in return.

Thahir said he recalled being at Zaidan’s house about two months ago when members of Hussein’s extended family arrived. He said there was talk about them giving 200 million dinars, about $140,000, to Zaidan to oversee construction of a new mosque. The money was more likely payment for some service Zaidan had provided — perhaps for a safe house in the future.

Zaidan’s neighbours are surprised, but not shocked, to hear that the Hussein brothers were found in his house. Lately, they said, Zaidan had been acting different lately. Normally, they said, Zaidan would set out plastic chairs on the sidewalk in front of his house every night, and neighbours would collect to chew over current events. Then just over three weeks ago, Zaidan stopped putting out the chairs. About four days ago, Thahir said, a strange BMW showed up at the house.

US military spokesman has said they were acting on a tip, that a ‘‘walk-in’’ came to them on Monday night with information about the Hussein brothers. They have not identified the informant, but said the $15 million bounty on the Hussein brothers will be paid. Thahir and the cleric said they strongly suspect that Zaidan was the informant. (LAT-WP)