Iraq

Insurgent’s relatives arrested

American troops today captured two men suspected of helping the suspected organizer of the insurgency remain at large.

The military said the two arrested early this morning in the central Iraqi city of Samarra are nephews of former Iraqi Vice President Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri, the one-time right-hand man of Saddam Hussein who now has a $10 million bounty on his head.

Lt. Col. David J. Poirier told an Associated Press reporter who observed the raid that they hunted down the nephews in hopes of zeroing in on al-Douri.

“One of these days his head will rise up above the water, and we will be able to capture him as well,” Poirier said.

San Francisco

Anti-Bush ad chosen

An advertisement showing images of children toiling on a grocery line and in a tire factory coupled with a simple line of text — “Guess who’s going to pay off President Bush’s $1 trillion deficit?” — was chosen by a liberal advocacy group that invited people to enter a contest to create their own anti-Bush commercials.

The ad was chosen as the winner of the “Bush in 30 Seconds” television ad campaign sponsored by the online political organization MoveOn.com.

“I wanted to point out how the Republican administration are big spenders, and it’s my children and your children who are going to be footing the bill,” said the winner, Charlie Fisher, a former Internet advertising executive.

Fisher’s ad and some of the runners-up will air on CNN from Saturday through next week, when Bush delivers his State of the Union address.

Lawrence resident Mike Cuenca was one of the 15 finalists.

Houston

Ex-Enron exec to plead guilty

Former Enron finance chief Andrew S. Fastow and his wife have agreed to plead guilty for their roles in an accounting scandal that destroyed the energy giant in 2001, sources told The Associated Press on Tuesday.

The two sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said an impasse that erupted last week over a judge’s refusal to give Lea Fastow only a five-month prison sentence had been resolved.

Fastow will become the highest-ranking executive to plead guilty in the federal government’s criminal investigation into the Enron collapse.

The Fastows were expected to enter pleas today in federal court.