Saddam journal reveals prison AIDS fear

Saddam Hussein, the ousted Iraqi dictator who was hanged in 2006 for crimes against humanity, feared he would pick up sexual diseases while he was in US custody, according to extracts from prison writings published in an Arabic newspaper.

Saddam said he asked his prison guards not to put their washing on the same line as his, fearing he could contract "young people's diseases," the London-based Al-Hayat newspaper reported, citing his journal.

"My main concern was to avoid contracting a sexual disease in a place like this, and AIDS," he said.

"Americans were the most to fear when it came to contracting diseases," Saddam said, Al-Hayat reported, without saying how it obtained the documents.

"What can the Americans and other invaders... bring to an [invaded] country apart from dangerous diseases?"

Some of the writings were published in the newspaper in the form of dated letters, or poems written by Saddam himself, the Middle East's most notorious strongman of the late 20th century.

Saddam was hanged on December 30, 2006, after an Iraqi court found him guilty of crimes against humanity for ordering the execution of 148 Shiites from the town of Dujail after an assassination attempt against him in 1982.

He was sent to the gallows at the age of 69, three years after being captured by US invading forces who found him, long-haired, bearded and bedraggled, in a hole near his hometown of Tikrit.