'Fugitive Iraqi minister is in Jordan'

Amman: A former Iraqi Cabinet minister who escaped from a Baghdad prison this month has arrived in Jordan, Jordan's prime minister said yesterday.

"Ayham Al Samaraie who escaped from his jail in Baghdad arrived in Amman as an American and on an American plane," Prime Minister Marouf Al Bakhit told reporters.

Al Samaraie, a former minister of electricity with dual US and Iraqi citizenship, was serving time for corruption when he escaped mid-December. On December 19, he called the Chicago Tribune and The New York Times and gloated over his escape, referring to US and Iraqi officials in Baghdad as "suckers."

He declined to tell the newspapers where he was, but said he was in a "a very safe place."

"Jordan did not receive any demand from the Iraqi authorities" for Al Samaraie's extradition, Al Bakhit said.

Al Samaraie told the New York Times he had managed to leave Iraq on a flight from Baghdad International Airport.

The prime minister did not elaborate on Al Samaraie's escape, but by "American plane" he appeared to be referring to a US military plane. The spokesman for the US Embassy in Baghdad, Lou Fintor, said yesterday that the US government was not involved in Al Samaraie's escape "in any way."

Al Samaraie told the newspapers it was easy to board a plane.

Free person

"So why I cannot take the airport? It's not because I am a smart cookie. Any Iraqi can do it," he was quoted as saying.

Al Samaraie said a "multinational" group helped him to escape "the Chicago way" - a reference to the film about Al Capone called The Untouchables.

US Embassy spokesman Fintor said the Iraqi government was investigating Al Samaraie's escape, "and we are vigorously supporting their effort."

Asked whether Al Samaraie, who has a home in Chicago, would be allowed to return to the United States as a free person, Fintor referred The Associated Press to the Department of Homeland Security.

In 2003, Al Samaraie became a member of the transitional Iraqi government set up after US-led forces overthrew Saddam Hussain's dictatorship. In August he was detained, convicted of corruption and sentenced to two years' imprisonment.