Hijazi is accused by Washington of masterminding the 1993 attempted assassination of former President Bush in Kuwait

WASHINGTON, April 25 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – Iraqi former intelligence chief Farouk Hijazi was captured by U.S. forces near the borders with Syria, a U.S. official announced on Friday, April 25.

Hijazi is accused by Washington of masterminding the attempted assassination of former President Bush in Kuwait in 1993, when he was the third-ranking Iraqi intelligence official, CNN quoted U.S. officials as saying.

The plan was to kill Bush with remote-controlled car bombs but Kuwaiti authorities broke up the plot and the explosives that were to be used were allegedly traced to Iraq.

The United States retaliated in June 1993 by firing 23 sea-launched cruise missiles at the headquarters of the Iraqi intelligence service, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Many observers had argued that among the reasons behind the invasion of Iraq was a personal desire by incumbent U.S. President George Bush to retaliated the attempted attack on his father’s life.

On Thursday, September 26, Bush himself personalized the conflict with Baghdad, saying that Saddam Hussein "is the guy who tried to kill my dad."

The former chief is not on the list of 55 most-wanted Iraqi leaders, but former CIA Director James Woolsey said that omission does not minimize his importance.

"It's a big catch, and this man was involved we know with a number of contacts with al-Qaeda, so this would be an interesting development, the biggest catch so far, I would say, of any of the people that we've got," Woolsey said.

Haidar Ahmed, spokesman for the opposition Iraqi National Congress in London, was quoted as saying Hijazi served as ambassador to Turkey from the late 1990s until soon after the Sept. 11 attacks.

He was then summoned to Baghdad following reports linking him to bin Laden, and was sent to Tunisia as ambassador in the last six months.

Iraq denied any links with al-Qaeda network.

Hijazi was now in American custody after being picked up near the Syrian border on Thursday, April 25, said another U.S. official without elaboration on the circumstances of the arrest.

Last week, Washington said it believed Hijazi was in Syria amid mounting accusations that Damascus was harboring members of Saddam Hussein's government who had fled the country in the wake of the U.S.-led invasion.

Earlier this week, U.S. President George W. Bush said that Syria had taken some measures to seal its border.

Saddam's Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz is also in the custody of American forces with conflicting reports on whether he was arrested or had turned himself in.

Of the more than a dozen top Iraqi officials taken into U.S. custody so far, several were intelligence officials.

They include Barzan Ibrahim Hasan al-Tikriti, Saddam's half-brother, who was the former head of the intelligence service and a presidential adviser; Zuhayr Talib Abd al-Sattar al-Naqib, the director of military intelligence; and Salim Sa'id Khalaf al-Jumayli, the chief of the Iraqi Intelligence Service's American desk.