AMMAN, 21 August 2007 — The Jordanian government yesterday ruled out the extradition of Raghad, the eldest daughter of the executed Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, to the Iraqi authorities.
“The extradition (of Raghad) is totally excluded at this juncture, because her presence in Jordan is for purely humanitarian reasons,” the government’s official spokesman Nasser Judeh said at a weekly media briefing.
Judeh was responding to an Interpol arrest warrant against Raghad that was published in Baghdad on Saturday. The Iraqi authorities accused Saddam’s daughter of performing acts of “terrorism” against Iraq. “She is living in Jordan under the pledges of refraining from media and political activity and she abides by this pledge,” the Jordanian official said.
“However, there are Arab and international procedures and conventions that govern the extradition issue,” he added. Raghad fled to Jordan along with her sister, Rana, and their children four months after the US-led invasion of Iraq and the collapse of Saddam’s regime in 2003. Since then, Saddam’s two daughters and their children have been regarded as “guests” of King Abdallah’s Hashemite royal family.
Judeh cited traditional Arab protection of a woman guest living in the country as the reason, but Iraqi officials contend the daughter deserves trial because she is funneling money to violent Sunni militants in Iraq. However, Judeh would not rule out the possibility that Raghad, 38, who enjoys asylum in Jordan, could be handed over to Iraqis at some later date.
The issue is one of several things that have caused tension between Iraq and Jordan in the last few years, as Shiite-Sunni tensions inside Iraq and across the region have grown.
Jordan has rejected requests by two successive Iraqi prime ministers, including the current Nuri Al-Maliki, to hand over Raghad. Raghad’s asylum in the Hashemite kingdom was granted on humanitarian grounds, Judeh said. Privately, government officials have said that to hand her over would violate Arab codes of honor and would be embarrassing for Jordan.
Judeh would not say whether Raghad was mentioned during last week’s high-level security talks with Iraq’s security adviser Mouwaffak Al-Rubaie in the Jordanian capital.
But Jordan’s independent Al-Arab Al-Yawm daily reported yesterday that Rubaie handed Jordanian officials a “list of wanted people, with Raghad at the top.”
Citing unnamed members who were part of the Iraqi security delegation, the Arabic-language newspaper said the wanted among others also included Raghad’s two cousins, Iraqi Sunni opposition leader Mishan Al-Jubouri; a prominent journalist in Iraq, and the eldest son of Saddam’s Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz, who is now in US custody.
