Saddam Hussein's Yacht Takes the Long Way Home
Saddam Hussein's 269-foot yacht, Basra Breeze, which has been on the lam since the 1980s, is back in Iraq. Now the country's transportation minister, who enjoys using Saddam's toilet and sleeping in his bed, wants to make it a museum.
Speaking to NPR, Transportation Minister Amer Abdul Jabar Ismail said he had a brush with another one of Saddam's yachts in the 80's when he was working as an engineer on an oil tanker: "The captain of this Saddam yacht told me, 'Please, I need some assist, we need repair.' I speak, 'Yes,' because I can't refuse." One of Saddam's guards then detained and interrogated Ismail, before letting him go with a warning: "If I see you again, I kill you."
Decades later, after the Basra Breeze was loaned out to the royal families of Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Oman and then renovated in Greece, Ismail is getting the last laugh:
But now, I stay here - in Saddam's position. You see? Now I receive Saddam's salon, Saddam's bedroom," he says. "I read in the Koran. I sleep in the bed. I use bathroom. I use everything here."
As one would expect from Saddam, the Basra Breeze boasts a minisubmarine, a helipad and gold-plated everything. And now Ismail, once threatened by the dictator's men, is shitting in Saddam's toilet and sleeping in his bed.
[Images via AP]