Ms Ammash handed herself in to coalition forces on Sunday, according to US officials who refused to give more details.

However, reports last month suggested the former dean of Baghdad University's College of Science had fled to Syria, and the announcement that she was in custody followed a visit by the US secretary of state, Colin Powell, to Damascus where he claimed to have won concessions from the government.

Ms Ammash's detention comes as the Bush administration is searching for the weapons of mass destruction which it used as the justification for the war.

Ms Ammash is the only woman among the 55 Ba'ath Party officials on the US "most wanted" list, on which she is ranked 53.

She is a US-trained microbiologist suspected of managing a secret biological weapons program that included the weaponisation of anthrax, smallpox and botulinum toxin.

She was also the only woman in the top ranks of Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Party, and appeared in uniform alongside the Iraqi dictator and his son, Qusay in a regime video released a week into the war.

Ms Ammash was trained by Nasir al-Hindawi, who is viewed by United Nations inspectors as the father of Iraq's biological weapons program. He was captured last month.

(China Daily May 6, 2003)