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By Alastair Macdonald
TIKRIT, Iraq (Reuters) - An audio tape purportedly from former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) broadcast on Tuesday vowed to defeat the United States to avenge the deaths of his two sons by U.S. forces.
"I mourn to you the deaths of Uday and Qusay and those who struggled with them... America will be defeated," said the voice on the tape, aired by Dubai-based al Arabiya television.
"They...died martyrs in the name of jihad (holy war)," the voice said.
The speech was rambling, breaking off in mid-sentence on occasions, but a Reuters correspondent familiar with Saddam's voice said it sounded like the deposed dictator. The CIA (news - web sites) said it was trying to determine whether the tape was genuine.
A number of tapes purportedly from Saddam have been broadcast in the past few weeks, but this was the first to refer to the killing of his two sons by U.S. troops last Tuesday in a bloody raid on a villa in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul.
The U.S. military said troops hunting Saddam had captured three key figures loyal to the former Iraqi leader, including a top bodyguard, and were closing in on Saddam himself.
Major Josslyn Aberle told Reuters one of the captured Saddam loyalists put up a brief struggle and that two gunshots were heard as the raid began in the area of Saddam's home town of Tikrit, north of Baghdad. There were no U.S. casualties.
Television pictures filmed through a night vision lens showed a man being escorted from a building by U.S. soldiers, blood seeping through a blindfold.
U.S. troops believe Saddam may be hiding somewhere in the Tigris valley of dusty tomato fields and orchards.
U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said U.S. forces nearly captured Saddam in raids on Monday near Tikrit.
"I think most people feel...the noose is tightening pretty regularly around the neck of Saddam Hussein," he told CNN.
US SAYS INFORMATION FLOWING ON SADDAM
Officers say that after Saddam's feared sons were killed last week -- and Washington promised to pay an Iraqi informant a $30 million reward -- many more Iraqis were coming forward with information on Saddam himself.
The United States is offering $25 million for information leading to the arrest or proof of death of Saddam, toppled from power by U.S.-led forces on April 9.
Washington hopes finding Saddam would help end a guerrilla campaign that has killed 50 U.S. troops since President Bush (news - web sites) declared major combat over on May 1.
The U.S. military blames die-hard Saddam loyalists for the attacks, and some officers had said they hoped the killing of Uday and Qusay would demoralize anti-American assailants.
But 11 U.S. soldiers have been killed in attacks since Saddam's sons died in a barrage of machinegun fire, grenades, rockets and anti-tank missiles as they mounted a last stand with AK-47 assault rifles.
Washington hopes tentative efforts at self-rule will appease Iraqis who dislike the U.S. occupation, but the 25 U.S. appointees on an Iraqi Governing Council seem to have been making slow progress.
The Council agreed on Tuesday that its presidency would rotate among nine members, ending two weeks of heated discussion over who should be in charge.
A source at the Council said the decision, taken after a six-hour meeting, reflected the members' "wish to share responsibilities in this sensitive period."
Choosing a leader was supposed to be one of the first tasks of the Council, which held its first meeting on July 13 and is seen in Washington as a first step toward a democratic government in Iraq (news - web sites) after the war to topple Saddam.
The nine include Iraqi National Congress head Ahmed Chalabi, heads of two Kurdish parties, Iyad Allawi of the Iraqi National Accord, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim of the Shi'ite Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, Ibrahim Jaafari of the Da'wa Party and Muhsin Abdul Hameed of the Iraqi Islamic Party.
Adnan Pachachi, a former foreign minister who has returned from exile, and Muhammed Bahr al-Uloum, an Islamic scholar, are also on the list.
The Council has the power to name and dismiss ministers, approve the 2004 budget and decide policy on economic and electoral reform, but final control of Iraq still rests with the U.S. civilian administrator in Baghdad, Paul Bremer.
In Washington, Republican and Democrat members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee accused the Bush administration of not spelling out costs in Iraq and of focusing on its role in terrorism to the exclusion of other threats.
Echoing comments by a U.S. military commander this week that Iraq was becoming a magnet for foreign terrorists targeting Americans, U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said: "Right now it is where (the war on terror is) being fought..."
Maybe the little pansy will come out and fight now.
Nah.
. 
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