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CNN Live At Daybreak

International News Desk

Aired April 25, 2003 - 06:52   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: As you can see, Eli Flournoy, our senior international editor, has joined us to talk more about the surrender of Tariq Aziz.
And there's a lot of questions attached to this. For example, we just heard from Rula Amin that his family doesn't think he's been placed under arrest, he's just been brought in for questioning.

Do we know if that's true or not?

ELI FLOURNOY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL EDITOR: Well, the U.S. officials haven't said definitively one way or another. We know he's in custody, but we don't believe that he's in jail per se. Right now they want to talk to him. Clearly, they think they're going to get a lot of information from him. And there's a lot of indications that they have been in contact with him for a while.

They, it appears that they knew where he was, at his sister's house. There was some communication. There's an indication out of a "Wall Street Journal" report that there were satellite phone conversations between Tariq Aziz and an American friend of his, of his family, to broker this deal. And that's a big question, how long have coalition officials been in touch with Tariq Aziz?

COSTELLO: Yes, and why didn't they just go get him?

FLOURNOY: Well, that's a very, very good question because we want to know, you know, what is he going to say? And on there are a lot of...

COSTELLO: Or what has he said?

FLOURNOY: Yes, exactly, what has he said already. So there are some very interesting questions.

COSTELLO: But is there any real sense that he does know where Saddam Hussein is or if Iraq has or has had weapons of mass destruction?

FLOURNOY: Well, that's not clear, but he was essentially the number two person in the regime. So they believe he has a lot of good information and we will look forward to finding out about it.

COSTELLO: We'll see. Yes.

Eli, thanks very much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired April 25, 2003 - 06:52   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: As you can see, Eli Flournoy, our senior international editor, has joined us to talk more about the surrender of Tariq Aziz.
And there's a lot of questions attached to this. For example, we just heard from Rula Amin that his family doesn't think he's been placed under arrest, he's just been brought in for questioning.

Do we know if that's true or not?

ELI FLOURNOY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL EDITOR: Well, the U.S. officials haven't said definitively one way or another. We know he's in custody, but we don't believe that he's in jail per se. Right now they want to talk to him. Clearly, they think they're going to get a lot of information from him. And there's a lot of indications that they have been in contact with him for a while.

They, it appears that they knew where he was, at his sister's house. There was some communication. There's an indication out of a "Wall Street Journal" report that there were satellite phone conversations between Tariq Aziz and an American friend of his, of his family, to broker this deal. And that's a big question, how long have coalition officials been in touch with Tariq Aziz?

COSTELLO: Yes, and why didn't they just go get him?

FLOURNOY: Well, that's a very, very good question because we want to know, you know, what is he going to say? And on there are a lot of...

COSTELLO: Or what has he said?

FLOURNOY: Yes, exactly, what has he said already. So there are some very interesting questions.

COSTELLO: But is there any real sense that he does know where Saddam Hussein is or if Iraq has or has had weapons of mass destruction?

FLOURNOY: Well, that's not clear, but he was essentially the number two person in the regime. So they believe he has a lot of good information and we will look forward to finding out about it.

COSTELLO: We'll see. Yes.

Eli, thanks very much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com