Melbourne, Mar. 23: Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein had an Australian aid worker killed as part of a state-sponsored terror program, and was also considering a plan to "eliminate" Australian-educated Martin Indyk, the former U. S. Ambassador to Israel.

According to The Australian, top-secret Iraqi documents confirm for the first time that Care Australia worker Stuart Cameron was shot in Iraq in 1993 as part of a government campaign against foreign aid workers helping Kurds in the country's north.

On the fifth anniversary of the US-led invasion of Iraq, which toppled Saddam's regime, the sweep of his terrorist activities and plotting have been revealed in millions of documents gathered by allied forces from Baath party offices and Saddam's palaces.

The documents, including correspondence between Baath party officials, paint a complex picture of Saddam's sponsorship of national and international terrorism and portray a leader willing to do anything to advance Iraqi hegemony in the region and beyond.

The documents are contained in a US Institute for Defence Analyses report released by the Pentagon, which says they provide "strong evidence that links the regime of Saddam Hussein to regional and global terrorism".

Cameron was a former Australian army major and a father of two at the time of his death.

The documents also detail correspondence from a terrorist operative in the Gaza Strip sent to Baath party officials in Baghdad, in which a plot is discussed to kill Mr Indyk, a world-renowned scholar on the Middle East who twice served as US Ambassador to Israel.

The letter was written on June 30, 2001, and spoke of Indyk's ability to interact with local identities in Gaza. The letter clearly indicated the modus operandi for resistance was to ensure that anyone trying to engage in mutual co-operation between Israel and the Palestinians was to be targeted for assassination.

The letter, heavily censored by the US military before its public release, was written in Gaza by Wafa Tawfiq al-Sayigh and suggests Mr Indyk should be "eliminated".

Indyk, who was born in Britain but attended school and university in Australia, was unaware of the letter or the plot until contacted by The Weekend Australian yesterday.

Shown a copy, he said the letter was written on the day he left Israel as ambassador, adding: "If they wanted to bump me off, they were a bit slow.(ANI)