Allawi, Ayad (1945– )

Iraqi industrialist and politician, prime minister of the interim Iraqi government from 2004. A member of the Shia Muslim majority and a former member of Iraqi president Saddam Hussein's Ba'athist party, he was exiled to the UK in 1971 after falling out with Hussein and developed connections with the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the British intelligence service MI6. He survived an assassination attempt in London, England, in 1978 and in 1996 was among those involved in a failed plot to overthrow Hussein. He returned to Iraq in 2003 after Hussein was removed from power by US-led forces in the Iraq War, and became a member of the US-appointed Iraqi Governing Council. His priority was to rebuild Iraq's police, military, and intelligence forces, but he also stressed his government's right to determine the future of foreign troops in Iraq.

Born into a prominent Shia Muslim merchant family close to the royal family that ruled before Saddam seized power, Allawi's grandfather helped negotiate Iraq's independence from the UK. He is related by marriage to controversial Iraqi politician Ahmed Chalabi. Allawi trained as a neurologist and joined the Ba'ath party underground movement as a young man. In 1991, in Jordan, he co-founded the Iraqi National Accord (INA) party, which attracted disaffected former Ba'athists and military personnel, and sought to promote a military coup against Hussein.