Saddam's Daughters Out of Touch With Former Iraqi Leader, Relative Says

CAIRO, Egypt – Saddam Hussein's fall from power has hit home for two of his daughters, who now live with their nine children in a humble Baghdad (search) dwelling without electricity, a relative said in remarks published Sunday.

Izzi-Din Mohammed Hassan al-Majid, a cousin of the deposed Iraqi president, met two of Saddam's three daughters -- Raghad and Rana -- several times in the Iraqi capital last month, the pan-Arab daily Asharq Al-Awsat reported.

Raghad, Rana and their nine children, long accustomed to palaces and servants, now live in two rooms of a small house owned by a middle-class family, al-Majid told the London-based Asharq Al-Awsat in a Saturday telephone interview from Baghdad.

Saddam's daughters "wash clothes by their own hands, cook their own food and clean the house by themselves and live without electricity," he said. "They live in a severe psychological disorder."

Al-Majid is also the cousin of the women's late husbands, brothers Lt. Gen. Hussein Kamel (search) and Saddam Kamel (search), who defected to Jordan in 1995.

The two were lured back in February 1996 and ordered killed by Saddam (search) on suspicion of passing information concerning Iraq's weapons programs to Western officials.

Al-Majid said the daughters believe Saddam's closest aides betrayed their father "at the last moment." The two daughters don't know where Saddam or his two sons are, he said.

Saddam's daughters were "very enraged for what had happened to Iraq and I saw the tears in their eyes, especially when we talked about the war and the fall of the regime," al-Majid said.

Saddam's third and youngest daughter, Hala, lived with her two sisters in Baghdad for a short time but left with her children to an unknown location, al-Majid said.

Al-Majid fled Iraq in 1995 and settled in London. He returned to Iraq in late April after U.S.-led forces swept Saddam's regime from power.

He said he would return to London in a week to try to help Saddam's daughters get asylum in Britain. If their asylum bids are rejected, the sisters want to stay in the Arab world, he said.