Family of Saddam deputy arrested

US troops arrested the wife and daughter of a top Saddam Hussein deputy suspected of masterminding attacks on US troops, and a major pipeline linking northern Iraqi oilfields to the country’s biggest refinery was ablaze today.

Hours after large explosions shook the centre of Baghdad near US headquarters, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw on a two day visit said Iraq would be a safer place once the US-British-led coalition handed over power to an Iraqi government.

Troops of the US 4th Infantry Division in Samarra, 70 miles north of Baghdad, arrested the wife and daughter of Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, a top Saddam associate, division spokesman Lt Col William MacDonald said.

Under Saddam, al-Douri was vice chairman of the ruling Revolutionary Command Council, and shortly before the war began on March 20, Saddam placed him in charge of defence in northern Iraq.

US officials have said they believe al-Douri has planned some of the attacks against US forces, and last week offered a £6m (€8.6m) reward for information leading to his capture. Al-Douri is No 6 on the list of 55 most-wanted Iraqis.

MacDonald said a man he identified as the son of a physician was also taken into custody in the raid on Tuesday.

Witnesses near the village of Sharqat, 170 miles north of Baghdad, said sheets of flame and thick black smoke were shooting from the damaged pipeline, only 30 miles from Iraq’s largest oil refinery.

There was no immediate explanation for the cause of the blaze, but guerrillas have repeatedly attacked pipelines in the general area.

Straw said a political transition to Iraqi rule would improve the security situation. More than five dozen US troops have been killed by hostile fire in November, more than any other month since the official end of major combat in Iraq on May 1.

“I’m absolutely sure that a more rapid political process will assist the security situation,” Straw said at a news conference.

“The more that we can give all Iraqis a stake in their future and a stable political architecture in which to work, the more I believe more Iraqis will become committed to that future and fewer will think that terror and quiescence in terror is the way forward.”

Straw said he met with members of the coalition-appointed Iraqi Governing Council to discuss the political process, in which the council is to hand over power to a new, transitional government by June 30.

“Iraq is a better place and will become a far better place as a result of that transition,” he said. “Life for a very large number of people in Iraq is considerably better … and will be infinitely better when we can get on top of the security situation.”

Three large explosions shook Baghdad last night, triggering a warning siren in the “Green Zone” housing the US headquarters. Capt David Gercken, a spokesman for the US 1st Armoured Division, said rockets hit a bus station, a propane station and an apartment building, wounding two Iraqis, near – but not in – the “Green Zone”.