BEIJING, Feb. 28 (Xinhuanet) -- Germany denied on Monday that its intelligence officials obtained a copy of Saddam Hussein's defense plan for Baghdad and passed it on to U.S. commanders a month before the 2003 Iraq invasion.

    The claims first published in yesterday's New York Times and based on a dossier compiled by the US Joint Forces Command, disclosed that in February 2003, German spies handed Saddam Hussein's war plans to the Americans while their government was denouncing the planned attack.

    The paper said that a classified American military document referred to Saddam and his aides meeting in late 2002 to radically amend Iraq's war plans. They had wanted an invading army slowed and deflected by Iraq's military en route to Baghdad.

    The report said a German intelligence officer based in Qatar passed a copy of the Iraqi defence plan and a sketch of the operation to an official of the US Defence Intelligence Agency, a month before American troops entered Iraq.

    In reponse to the disclosure, German government spokesman Ulrich Wilhelm and the BND foreign intelligence agency both issued strong denials. Enditem

(Agencies)