The Gulf: Saddam's Vip Guests

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Among the spoils of war that fell into Iraq's hands when its troops stormed Kuwait were 17 prisoners who had been serving sentences ranging from five years to life in a Kuwait City jail. The convicts turned out to be a valuable prize. The 17, all linked to the Shi'ite terrorist group Islamic Jihad, were convicted for killing six people in the 1983 bombings of the U.S. and French embassies and other targets in the Kuwaiti capital. Islamic Jihad, which has ties to Iran, has repeatedly demanded freedom for the 17 prisoners as one of the conditions for the release of Western hostages held in Lebanon.

The most common theory is that the prisoners are being kept in a Baghdad hotel, where they are free to come and go but not to leave the city. There were unconfirmed reports last week that two Lebanese members of the group had already returned to Lebanon. Western terrorism experts believe Saddam could be especially interested in one of the prisoners, Mustafa Badreddin, a Syrian- trained explosives expert who is the brother-in-law of Imad Mughniyah, a Lebanese terrorist and suspected kidnapper identified as the mastermind behind the 1985 hijacking of TWA Flight 847. Originally scheduled to fly from Athens to Rome, the plane was eventually taken to Beirut, where Robert Dean Stethem, a U.S. Navy diver who was a passenger on the flight, was beaten and shot to death. Saddam conceivably could try to enlist Mustafa and his colleagues in terrorist acts against the U.S., release them to Iran as a goodwill gesture or keep them as a trump card in negotiations with the West.