WELLINGTON, July 5 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - An airline engineer named as a stepson of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein has admitted he made a mistake trying to enter the United States on a tourist visa, the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) said Friday, July 5.

MFAT spokesman Brad Tattersfield said Saffi, a naturalized citizen of New Zealand, accepted he had made a mistake and would be deported back to New Zealand in the next few days, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.

He said Saffi contacted the New Zealand embassy in the United States.

“What’s happened is that overnight our time we contacted the Immigration and Naturalization Service in the U.S. and established that he is being held on visa irregularities.”

It appeared Saffi had entered the United States on a visa waiver intended for tourists but he planned to study. Visa waivers specifically ban study while traveling, Tattersfield said.

“We understand that the U.S. authorities, especially post September 11... have a zero tolerance policy on any breaches of the rules.”

Tattersfield said Saffi said he was being properly treated and understood he had made an error. “He accepts his situation and believes he has been fairly treated and is being returned to New Zealand.”

Air New Zealand spokesman Mark Champion said Saffi was on leave and he did not think the airline had been consulted about his flight training plans. “Whatever he was doing he was doing it on leave.”

The FBI said Thursday, July 4, it had no evidence linking a stepson of Saddam Hussein detained on immigration charges to terrorism.

Saffi, 36, a flight engineer with Air New Zealand, was detained Wednesday, July 3, on arrival at Miami, where he was to attend a course, apparently at the same aviation school, Miami’s Aeroservice Aviation Center, at which one of the September 11 terrorists had studied.

“We don’t have evidence” of terror links, said Judith Orihuela, spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in Miami.

“He didn’t have a proper visa, a student visa,” she said. Saffi entered the country on a tourist visa.

Saffi has admitted he made an error over his entry visa to the United States,

No date has been set so far for Saffi’s deportation hearing. However, a source with the Immigration and Naturalization Service said to CNN that Saffi will be sent out of the country in the next few days.

The U.S. daily newspaper, the Sun-Sentinel, reported that Ziad Jarrah, one of the suspected terrorists who commandeered Flight 93 that crashed over Pennsylvania on September 11 had studied at the same school where Saffi intended to follow a three-day flight maintenance course.

Saffi told immigration officials he was going to take a four-day “refresher” course for flight engineers in Miami, reported CNN.

The cable news network reported, however, that he intended to attend a four-day aviation course at to re-certify his license to fly Boeing 747s.

Immigration officials said it appeared suspicious that Saffi would travel half way around the globe to attend training he could have taken elsewhere.

Saffi, the son of Samira Shabandar, one of the Iraqi leader’s two wives, was detained at the airport on arrival from New Zealand via Los Angeles, and was taken to Miami's Krome Detention Center, used to hold illegal immigrants.

Saddam Hussein had an affair with Shabandar in the 1980s and Hussein persuaded her husband at the time, Iraqi airline executive Nour al-Din al-Saffi, to divorce her so they could marry. Nour al-Din al-Saffi was then promoted to the head of the airline, reports CNN.

The younger Saffi left Iraq after the Persian Gulf War, traveling first to Jordan, then to New Zealand, following an argument with his mother. The reason for the argument was not clear, but according to rumors in Baghdad, he and his father were afraid of Saddam’s wrath. The father is believed to be living in exile in Jordan since Saddam fired him from his airline post, news agencies reported.

In Auckland, Air New Zealand spokesman Mark Champion declined to comment.

“It is inappropriate to comment, there are privacy issues involved,” he said, and would not confirm or deny that Saffi was an employee.

Saffi, has been living in Auckland with his family for several years and is a naturalized citizen of New Zealand.

Visa requirements for those attending American flight schools were tightened following the September 11 attacks.

Saffi caught the INS’s attention when entering the U.S. for two reasons. First, was his relationship to Hussein. Second, was that Saffi was last in the United States on September 7 - four days before the attacks - when he was passing through on his way to London.