Tariq Aziz

Tariq Aziz, also Tareq Aziz, (born 1936) is the former Foreign Minister
(1979-1991) and Deputy Prime Minister (1979-2003) of Iraq and was a close
advisor to President Saddam Hussein for decades.

Aziz was born in Mosul, in northern Iraq. Originally called Michael Yuhanna,
he was the only Christian (a Chaldean Catholic) in the Iraqi leadership.

Yuhanna studied English at the Baghdad College of Fine Arts and later worked
as a journalist, before joining the Ba'ath Party. He changed his name to
Tariq Aziz, which means "Glorious Past". In 1980 he survived an
Iranian-backed assassination attempt.

On February 14, 2003, Aziz had an audience with Pope John Paul II and other
officials in Vatican City, where, according to a Vatican statement, he
communicated "the wish of the Iraqi government to co-operate with the
international community, notably on disarmament". The same statement said
that the Pope "insisted on the necessity on Iraq to faithfully respect and
give concrete commitments to resolutions of the UN Security Council, which
is the guarantor of international law".

On March 19, 2003, reports surfaced from Iraq that Aziz had been shot dead
while trying to enter the Kurdish part of the country. The rumor was quashed
rather quickly when Aziz held a press conference assuring the world he was
still alive and well. After the fall of the Saddam Hussein regime, he
surrendered to United States forces on April 24, 2003. He was the 43rd of 55
most-wanted Iraqi leadership members sought by U.S. forces after the Fall of
Baghdad in the 2003 Iraq War, identified as the eight of spades in the most
wanted Iraqi playing cards. Before the war, Aziz claimed he would rather die
than be a U.S. prisoner of war.

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