BEIJING, Nov. 14 -- Conflicting claims emerged Saturday over the reported death of Saddam Hussein's chief lieutenant - believed by the United States to have played the key role in organizing the insurgency and the highest-ranking fugitive at large from the former regime.

    A Baathist Web site reported his death Saturday, but another Web site, also purporting to carry statements from the banned party, maintained Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri was still alive and apologized for the death report. A relative in Iraq said the family was unsure.

File photo of Ibrahim. US will keep looking for Saddam Hussein's chief deputy Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, the US command said Sunday, casting doubt on a claim that the suspected architect of the Iraqi insurgency had died.

    "In the pure land of Iraq, the soul of comrade Izzat Ibrahim returned to God on Friday at dawn," one statement said. It described Ibrahim as the "field commander of the heroic resistance" and was signed by the Baath party's "political media and publishing office."

    That statement appeared Saturday on a Web site believed run by Salah al-Mukhtar, who was Saddam's ambassador to India and head of the External Information Department.

    The death announcement appeared to confirm an e-mail announcing the death of Ibrahim that circulated a day earlier. He was believed to be at least 62.

    But a later statement on a second Web site said "we apologize from our brothers and sisters for publishing a statement announcing the death of brother Izzat Ibrahim, may God extend his life."

    "We have learned a while ago from the dear brother Salah al-Mukhtar that the announcement of death was baseless and that warrior Izzat Ibrahim is fine."

    However, the Web site believed maintained by al-Mukhtar was still running the announcement that Ibrahim had died. During the years Saddam was in power, Baathist statements avoided using terms like "brothers and sisters" in favor of "comrade."

    Abdul-Rahman Mohammed Ibrahim, nephew and son-in-law of Ibrahim, said he had no independent confirmation of the death, but some people close to Saddam outside the country were treating it as accurate.

    Such confusion over Ibrahim's possible death was reminiscent of the numerous, erroneous reports of his arrest since he disappeared after the collapse of the regime in April 2003. The extent of his role in the insurgency has also been in dispute.

    U.S. officials believed Ibrahim, one of Saddam's oldest and closest associates, played a key role in organizing resistance against the U.S.-led coalition and was instrumental in forging links between remnants of the ousted regime and Islamic extremists.

    As the insurgency spread, the United States and its allies offered a US$10 million reward for information leading to Ibrahim's capture.

    Many Iraqis greeted the news of the death of Ibrahim, with happiness mixed with chagrin that he had yet again escaped justice.

    "I feel sad because he was not presented to the trial as his fellow criminals. He should have been captured alive. Everybody hates him, he was a big man in Saddam government, and he supported Saddam from the beginning," said Ihab Issa, 23, a civil engineer. "He made many crimes by his hands."

    "A very dirty page, a dark period in the Iraqi recent political history was wrapped up," said Ahmed Salman, a Baghdad engineer. "We got rid of a source of unrest. The death of this man and the expected execution of Saddam will leave the Baathists without a leader, and the violence will be much less."

    Terrorism experts called Ibrahim's death a blow to the insurgency. John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a Washington D.C.-based military affairs think tank, said that Ibrahim, a devout Sunni Arab, linked Islamist fighters with Baath Party insurgents.

    "I think that [al-Qaida in Iraq leader] Abu Musab Zarqawi would have had a very hard time doing what he was doing without Ibrahim and his circle of influence," Pike said.

    Ibrahim played a major role in guiding Hussein's religious overtures toward Sunni Arabs after the 1991 Shiite uprising following the Gulf War.

    He helped to move the Baath Party away from its secular roots by attracting fundamentalist Sunni Muslim clerics from around the Middle East and guiding a massive mosque-construction campaign. Hussein's efforts sufficiently solidified his Sunni base to fend off revolts by other sects and ethnic groups.

    Ibrahim was perhaps best known in the West for his infamous exchange with a Kuwaiti representative at an emergency conference of Middle East nations two weeks before the war began in 2003.

    "Shut up you monkey, you cretin!" he yelled. "Allah curse your mustache, you traitor!"

    Ibrahim's great wealth at the end of his life belied his hardscrabble origins as the son of an ice seller. Like Hussein, Ibrahim came from the Tikrit region and belonged to the same clan as the former president.

    Ibrahim, a small-framed, red-headed man, met Hussein in prison in the 1960s and thereafter participated in the Baath Party's bloody takeover of the government. Ibrahim's daughter wedded Hussein's son, Uday, but the couple later divorced.

    Hussein chose Ibrahim to be his northern military commander in the 1980s - a period when the regime killed thousands of Kurds with chemical weapons.

    When coalition forces took over Baghdad in 2003, Ibrahim was believed to be in the north of the country.

    It was unclear on Friday where he had been hiding, but many Iraqis believe he has been in Saudi Arabia or Syria, countries where he has good relationships with Baathist sympathizers.

(Source: Shenzhen Daily/Agencies)