Son of captain in Saddam Hussein's military is allowed to stay in Britain after judge ruled he could be killed in Iraq because of his father's reputation

By ROBERT FOLKER, NEWS REPORTER Published: 11:30, 21 May 2026 | Updated: 11:35, 21 May 2026 The son of a Captain in Saddam Hussein's military has won the right to live in the UK after it was ruled he could be killed in Iraq because of his father's reputation. The 25-year-old fled the Middle Eastern country when he was just five, after his uncle was kidnapped and his family received death threats. His father had been a Captain in the late Iraqi dictator Hussein's security forces and a member of his Ba'ath party of Sunni Muslim socialists before it was deposed by the US invasion in 2003. The threat that then emerged from Shia Muslim paramilitary groups in the region caused the family to flee, and the Captain's son has now claimed asylum in the UK after studying in Glasgow. Upper Tribunal Judge Paul Lodato, sitting at the British asylum court, ruled that the migrant, who was granted anonymity, cannot be deported because 'there is a real risk that the threat to his life will be acted on by Shia militia'. The region has been marked with violence between groups of Shia and Sunni Muslims since the death of Islam's prophet Muhammad in the seventh century.  The asylum seeker's father served as a Captain in Hussein's own army under the Ba'athist Sunni Muslim regime in Iraq. When that regime fell in 2003, the officials of Saddam's army and Sunni Muslims began to be preyed on by various paramilitary groups. Saddam Hussein (arriving in shackles and under Iraqi custody in 2004) was executed in December 2006 aged 69 for crimes against humanity The son of a Captain in Saddam Hussein's military has won the right to live in the UK after it was ruled he could be killed in Iraq because of his father's reputation. Pictured: Upper Tribunal Immigration and Asylum Chamber in London This included Badr, a Shia paramilitary group now part of the Iran-backed PMF, which threatened the young boy's family and even kidnapped his uncle. After the kidnapping in 2006, the family fled to the UAE, while the refugee was just five years old He has not been back to the country since, and while the family home in Baghdad has been sold, 'threats from Shia militia have been delivered to that address'. A threat that included the young man had been delivered as recently as 2020. He has no family left in Baghdad, and while some relatives remain in the Iraqi city of Kirkuk, the different sides of the family have fallen out and are no longer in contact. In 2018, the young man travelled from the UAE to Scotland to study aeronautical engineering at Glasgow University. He had a valid passport and student visa and claimed asylum when his degree finished in 2022, claiming that 'he fears Shia militias in Iraq'. The Upper Tribunal has now granted him refugee status because of the dangerous 'profile' he has from his father being connected to Hussein, who was executed in December 2006 aged 69 for crimes against humanity. Judge Lodato said: 'We conclude that [the Iraqi] is a single man with no dependants. 'He is known as the son of a Ba'athist. Both [the young man] and his father had been threatened by PMF. '[He] has not lived in Iraq since he was five and a half years old.  'Then, he was protected from the surrounding violence, upheaval, and threats, by his family. 'If [he] returns to Iraq today, he will be alone. He has neither family nor a network of support available in Iraq. [He] will return to a country he is unfamiliar with. 'When he left Baghdad, he was a little boy who was entirely dependent on his Ba'athist parents. He will rapidly be noticed. 'With that profile, there is a real risk that the threat to [his] life will be acted on by Shia militia.' The judge added there would be 'very significant obstacles to his reintegration in Iraq' and therefore allowed his appeal. 'The appeal is allowed on Asylum grounds.' The comments below have not been moderated. The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.