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Defector can't

topple Saddam's

rule

BAGHDAD: Iraq said on Sunday there was no way for a senior government official who fled to Jordan last week to change President Saddam Hussein's government in Baghdad.

The official media said remarks by Hussein Kamel Hassan, a son-in-law of Saddam and the brains behind Iraq's military and civil industries, that he would work seriously to remove his father-in-law were wishful thinking.

It also told those providing refuge for Hussein Kamel and attempting to cooperate with him that they would be disappointed if they thought the defector will help them in bringing about a change in Baghdad.

"Those regarding the fall of traitor Hussein Kamel as a God- sent opportunity and (who) have started to hatch schemes will be like those chasing a mirage," declared the ruling Baath party newspaper al-Thawra.

Thawra's was the first reaction to remarks by Hussein Kamel in a press conference he held in Amman on Saturday, where he called for the overthrow of the Iraqi leader.

"Iraq's leader Saddam Hussein is like a mountain and will not be shaken by yellow winds blowing slowly," Thawra said.

Iraqi officials at the ministry of culture and information ridiculed Hussein Kamel's statements that security was tense in Baghdad and that units of Republican Guards, Iraq's elite force which he set up in the 1980s, were present in every street.

A Reuter cameraman roamed the streets of Baghdad on Sunday with his television camera and found no evidence of the troops.

The official press carried a telegram to Saddam from his cousin Ali Hassan al-Majeed, former defence minister, in which he said that Hussein Kamel's family have decided to permit "the shedding of his blood with impunity."-Reuter