Symbol of a sunken regime

SCORCHED and bomb-blasted, it is one of the last pathetic defiant symbols of Saddam Hussein’s sunken regime.

The Iraqi tyrant's massive presidential yacht was still afloat yesterday, and drifting aimlessly with the tide on the Shatt-al-Arab waterway beside Basra's dockyards.

Local bystanders counted 16 different bombs, shells and missiles plough into it during the two-week siege of Iraq's second city.

But no matter how hard the coalition tried, they still couldn't sink it.

Nonetheless, the invaders' psychological point was well made, and the great floating hulk of twisted metal is now of use to nobody.

The yacht's name still visible in blue paint on its stern together with a singed Iraqi flag hanging from a bent mast, were all that was left to identify the liner's once proud owner.

Ironically, Saddam Hussein had christened it Al Mansur, which in Arabic means The Victor.

When it was launched in 1982, it was one of the largest and most impressive private yachts in the world.

Built by a Finnish firm, the eight-deck-tall yacht was for a long time the largest vessel in the Iraqi Navy despite having no military use.

It was designed to Saddam's personal specifications and sumptuously decorated all over in marble, exotic woods, and with silver and gold fittings. Measuring 350 feet long, the boat weighed 7,359 tons and looked more like a smart cross-Channel ferry than a private yacht. In the yacht's middle was a broad glass atrium, under which as many as 200 guests could be seated for dinner. It also contained five expansive state cabins for Saddam and his family's personal use, and a secret escape route that descended down from the tyrant's own room into an underwater submarine launch pod.

The entire central section has all but disappeared after a bomb tore straight through it a week ago. A series of subsequent fires has also left much of the less damaged parts of the ship covered in a thick layer of black soot.

The little of what could be viewed in its exterior indicated the opulent tastes of the yacht's former owner.

Well-polished mahogany railings lined the ship's exterior and internal passages.

And the very few panes of glass still left in the yacht's windows were all bullet-proofed. There was a bathroom, again coated in soot, along with a bidet and a large Jacuzzi bath and rows of beauty lights surrounding a large mirror, all decorated in the style of a plush Arab hotel. In another larger room was an untidy heap of velvet-lined dining chairs, with the remains of a table tennis table thrown on top of them.

And through the last door along the lop-sided middle deck corridor was the remains of what appeared to be Saddam's private operating theatre.

Modern-looking surgical equipment, electronic scanners, packets of medicines and plastic gloves were scattered around a black leather operating table. While the rest of Iraq suffered from a chronic shortage of medical supplies since the Gulf War in 1991, Saddam's personal on-board stash appeared to have been unused for years.

The boat was permanently staffed by 120 crew from the elite Special Republican Guard, who worked 24-hour shifts in case Saddam decided to pay a visit.