Saddam Hussein's half brother, facing the gallows for his role as chief of the regime's security service, has died of cancer in a Baghdad hospital.
Sabawi Ibrahim al-Hassan, who had received several death sentences, was transferred to the hospital from prison as his health deteriorated. His body will be handed over to his family.
Al-Hassan, a maternal half brother of Hussein, had lived in exile for a period after the 2003 invasion.
He was suspected of directing and financing insurgency operations from Syria carried out by Saddam loyalists in Iraq since the fall of the regime.
A $1million reward was offered for information that led to either his capture or death.
In 2005 he was captured and deported to Iraq by the Syrian government.
Sources at the time said Syria acted under pressure from the international community, and that he was captured close to the Iraqi border. Iraqi troops then handed him over the the U.S.
Al-Hassan was No. 36 on the U.S. list of the 55 most-wanted Iraqis at the time. His photo appeared as the Six of Diamonds in decks of playing cards distributed featuring members of Saddam's deposed regime.
Under Saddam, al-Hassan served as head of the country's intelligence and security service, known as the Mukhabarat, during the 1991 Gulf War.
He then ran the general security service until 1996, when he took up his final post of presidential adviser to Saddam.
In March 2009, Sabawi Ibrahim al-Hassan was sentenced to death by hanging. Reports say that as his death sentence was read out, he stood up and proclaimed 'God is great' and that he was 'proud to be a martyr'.
His son, Ayman Sabawi Ibrahim, was arrested in Saddam's hometown of Tikrit and was sentenced to life in prison, but escaped in northern Iraq in late 2006.
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