Saddam's daughters 'to seek asylum in Britain'

Two of Saddam Hussein's daughters are reportedly planning to seek asylum in Britain.

Izzi-Din Mohammed Hassan al-Majid, a cousin of the former Iraqi president, says he's returning to London in a week to help Raghad and Rana obtain asylum.

If their asylum bids are rejected, the sisters would prefer to stay in the Arab world, living somewhere like Egypt, Qatar or the United Arab Emirates, he said.

Al-Majid said Saddam's fall from power has hit home for two of his daughters, who have gone from living in palaces to two cramped rooms in a humble Baghdad home with their nine children.

He said the two women now "wash clothes by their own hands, cook their own food and clean the house by themselves and live without electricity. They live in a severe psychological disorder".

Al-Majid said he met Raghad and Rana several times in the Iraqi capital last month, the pan-Arab daily Asharq Al-Awsat reports. He added neither he nor the two daughters knew of the whereabouts of Saddam and his two sons, who top the coalition's most wanted list.

He is also the cousin of the women's late husbands, brothers Lieutenant General Hussein Kamel and Saddam Kamel, who defected to Jordan in 1995. They were lured back in February 1996 and killed shortly after on the Iraqi leader's orders on suspicion of passing on information to Western officials.

Al-Majid also fled Iraq in 1995 and later settled in London. He returned to Iraq in late April after US-led forces swept Saddam's regime from power.

In a telephone interview with Asharq Al-Awsat, he said Saddam's daughters were "very enraged for what had happened to Iraq and I saw the tears in their eyes, especially when we talked about the war and the fall of the regime."

Raghad, Rana and their nine children, long accustomed to living in palaces and being served by hired staff, now lived in two rooms of a small house owned by a trusted middle-class family, al-Majid said. He said they blame Saddam's closest aides for betraying him before trying to obtain asylum in Britain or Arab states.