“Barzan is...an adviser to the former regime leader with extensive knowledge of the regime’s inner working. There were no friendly or enemy casualties,” US Army Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks told a news conference at war headquarters in Qatar.

There was, however, no trace of Saddam or his sons, though two Arabic newspapers said Baghdadis reported seeing the deposed Iraqi president hours before US forces took over the city.

The big powers resumed their diplomatic tussle over Iraq’s future after Washington urged an end to UN economic sanctions, so Iraqi oil could be sold again.

European Union leaders urged Washington, which is determined to dominate the reconstruction of Iraq, to let the United Nations have a strong say. “The UN must play a central role, including in the process leading toward self-government for the Iraqi people,” EU president Greece said in a statement.

Sanctions were high on the agenda of informal summit talks.

Anti-war members of the UN Security Council, which refused to back the US-led invasion four weeks ago, know their voices count if sanctions are to be lifted.

“For the Security Council to take this decision, we need to be certain whether Iraq has weapons of mass destruction or not,” said Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov. “This decision cannot be automatic.”

Sanctions banning most trade were imposed in 1990 after Iraq invaded Kuwait and are tied to Iraq being declared free of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons.

That was the task of UN arms inspectors whose work was cut short by the war, which US President George W. Bush justified by accusing Iraq of amassing such arms.

None has been found so far. US commanders say there could be up to 3,000 sites to check, but chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix said the Americans did not want his help.

Blix called for experts to go back to Iraq to hunt for banned weapons programs, and he is expected to address the UN Security Council on April 22 to appeal for their return.

“The alliance arrived as a liberator and an occupier and that can have its disadvantages. If their experts actually find weapons of mass destruction, their veracity could be doubted,” Blix told the German magazine Der Spiegel. “I can only note that the military alliance have turned down our help and have given no prospect of cooperation.”

The White House said it was not yet time to discuss the possible return of UN weapons inspectors because US-led forces are still engaged in military operations there. “At some point, UN inspections will be an issue that needs to be addressed, but at this point, the US and coalition forces are still engaged in actions,” spokeswoman Claire Buchan told reporters.

Despite the elusiveness of any “smoking gun”, Washington has stuck to its diplomatic guns over the danger of weapons of mass destruction. It is now taking aim at Iraq’s neighbor Syria with accusations it too has developed chemical arms.

More grim details of the anarchy and looting that erupted after US forces toppled Saddam last week seeped out. The International Committee of the Red Cross said looters of a Baghdad psychiatric hospital raped some patients.

In Qatar, Brig. Gen. Brooks said US-led forces are trying to arrange the surrender of the Iraq-based armed Iranian opposition group the People’s Mujahedeen, whose camps have been targeted by the coalition.

Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said Tuesday coalition air forces had bombed Mujahedeen camps in Iraq and that some fighters were expected to surrender soon. He said it was too soon to tell what effect the strikes would have on US relations with Iran. Iran, the United States and the European Union all consider the People’s Mujahedeen a terrorist organization.

The United Nations boosted the tempo of its aid deliveries to Iraq, bringing 100 trucks of food into the stricken country from Turkey and opening up a new supply route via Jordan.

An American official in Kuwait said the US Federal Reserve is flying in millions of dollars to pay Iraqi civil servants and start rebuilding Iraq. Using $1.7 billion in frozen Iraqi assets seized in the United States, Washington is set to start $20-per-head payments within days to up to 2.5 million Iraqi civil servants.

“When you are flying in planes that have millions on them, you don’t want to discuss timing or when and where,” the official said. “The money, and it is millions, is mainly to pay civil servant salaries, but some of it will go for reconstruction,” he added.

Analysts have said it could cost $100 billion to rebuild Iraq, a country battered by two wars in two decades and 12 years of United Nations sanctions.

Iraq, which sits on the world’s second largest oil reserves, needs quick infusions of cash because it cannot resume oil exports without legal sanction from the United Nations.

The US official said the Fed was in charge of providing the cash and could not say if more shipments were scheduled.