Hussein Orders Four Ailing U.S. Hostages Freed

Iraqi President Saddam Hussein on Thursday ordered the release of four more American hostages in the face of bitter U.S. charges of maltreatment of the captives.

The four men are sick and elderly, Information Minister Latif Jasim told a Baghdad news conference. He said Hussein had responded to a humanitarian plea from representatives of an Arab-American organization visiting the Iraqi capital.

Jasim identified the men as Randall Traini, Ramon Calles, Michael Bonner and Abdul Hamid Khanji, according to news reports from the Iraqi capital. He gave no further information on the hostages, nor did he name the organization that sought their release.

Early last week, 14 Americans were turned over to officials of the Washington-based American-Iraqi Foundation, and flown back to the United States. Jasim did not say when the four men ordered released Thursday will leave Iraq.

About 700 Americans remain captive in Iraq and occupied Kuwait, more than 100 of them held as “human shields” at potential military targets in the two countries.

Denying American charges that the diplomats and civilians were being treated roughly, Jasim declared in announcing the release of the four hostages: “All the Americans at (strategic) sites have complete freedom. They can watch TV, read books and read newspapers. They also enjoy the friendship of Iraqi forces.”

But French hostages released earlier this week told reporters in Paris that Iraqi guards had singled out U.S. and British captives for rough treatment. They were kept in vermin-infested rooms and provided filthy toilets, the Frenchmen said.

On Thursday, a U.S. diplomat in Baghdad gave reporters copies of two letters smuggled out from Americans held as human shields. “Please don’t forget the ‘guest’ hostages,” said the author of one, using the Iraqi euphemism for its captives. “I have been in the Iraqi gulag system for almost two months. We are virtually prisoners in Iraq.”

The second writer said he had been moved five times to different targets, received no mail or messages and lost 35 pounds during his detention.

Also Thursday, Iraq announced that family members would be allowed to visit Western hostages during the Christmas holidays.

President Bush, responding to the offer, said of Hussein: “I don’t think he’ll win the humanitarian-of-the-year award for that.”

Campaigning for Republican candidates in next Tuesday’s election, President Bush declared Thursday in Burlington, Mass., that the international community is “united in anger and outrage” over Iraqi treatment of the hostages, who number more than 2,000 Westerners and Japanese.

“They have committed outrageous acts of barbarism,” Bush said of the Iraqis, who denied the foreign civilians freedom to leave Iraq shortly after its Aug. 2 invasion of Kuwait. “Brutality--I don’t believe even Adolf Hitler ever participated in anything of this nature,” Bush said.

Bush has been particularly critical of the forced deprivation of American diplomats still holding out inside the U.S. Embassy in Kuwait city, saying he has “had it” with Iraqi treatment of them--a remark that raised fears in the Middle East that war is imminent.

The President has repeated his characterization of Hussein as another Hitler in recent weeks as the bitter exchanges between Washington and Baghdad increased.

On Wednesday night, Information Minister Jasim declared that there are “many signs that the United States is about to make a decision concerning war.”

Thursday’s edition of the government daily Al Jumhuriya threatened: “When the great military confrontation takes place, the gulf region will return a half-century back. . . . The Americans and other warmongers will be preoccupied with nothing but searching for the remnants of their dead bodies in the desert and the gulf.”

Baghdad newspapers said Wednesday that the Iraqi army has been placed on “full alert.”

Bush said in Burlington, a Boston suburb, “I desperately want to have a peaceful resolution to this crisis.” But he added: “Today I am more determined than ever. This aggression will not stand. The brutality against innocent citizens will not be tolerated and will not stand.”

Hussein has moved decisively to use the hostages to try to split the Western front opposing Iraq’s invasion and occupation of Kuwait. For the past three weeks, he has dribbled out small groups to foreign delegations and political figures that have gone to Baghdad with pleas for their humanitarian release.

Former British Prime Minister Edward Heath left Iraq last week with more than 30 hostages, and more than 260 Frenchmen were flown home to Paris this week. Groups of Finns, Irish and Portuguese have also been released.

According to a Swedish Parliament member, the practice of keeping “human shields” has caused even Iraqi officials to cringe.

Said Viola Furubjelke, who arrived in Amman on Wednesday with six released Swedish civilians: “Almost all the Iraqi ministers that we met have told us they are very embarrassed . . . because they know this is against international law. The Iraqis told us they really don’t want to keep the Swedes but they really think using the foreigners as a shield has prevented a war.” Seventy-eight Swedes remain behind.

Leaders of the European Community, meeting in Rome last weekend, agreed that no official envoys would go to Baghdad to seek the release of hostages, but Willy Brandt, a former West German chancellor, said Wednesday that he will go to Iraq next week as a private citizen to meet with Hussein. The Berlin government said Brandt’s mission is a “suitable way” to try to win freedom for nearly 400 Germans held captive.

Former Japanese Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone plans a similar trip.

U.S. officials have branded the Iraqi strategy of dealing out hostages to try to crack the wall of diplomatic isolation around Baghdad as cynical and inhumane. But no government has refused to receive its hostages.

In Baghdad, a U.S. Embassy spokesman said of the decision to release the four Americans: “It is good news. . . . Our top priority is to get Americans out.”

U.S. WEIGHS OPTIONS--Bush hopes to break stalemate without all-out war. A20