A Shia Muslim nuclear scientist imprisoned for years in Abu Ghraib prison under Saddam Hussein is being tipped to lead Iraq's new interim government, according to US and Iraqi sources.

A State Department official told the Washington Post said that Dr Hussain al-Shahristani was one of three finalists being considered for the key post, but other sources quoted said that Dr al-Shahristani was expected to head the new caretaker government on July 1.

"The game has not played out yet, but Shahristani is the candidate to beat," a senior State Department official said.

Ghazi Mashal Ajil al-Yawer, the head of the Iraqi Governing Council, confirmed that Dr al-Shahristani was under consideration for the post.

"I think he's a nice guy and I'm not going to elaborate on this because he's a candidate and I should not do this," the council leader told reporters.

Before the war, Dr Shahristani, who has a degree from Imperial College, London, was among the Iraqi exiles who had insisted that Saddam maintained weapons of mass destruction.

In February 2003, he told CBS 60 Minutes that such weapons may have been hidden in tunnels for a Baghdad subway that never opened.

Despite his concerns about such weapons, Dr al-Shahristani said in London in 2002 that he was "extremely concerned of the consequences" of an invasion of Iraq on its people.

A Shia Muslim, he was chief of the Iraq Atomic Energy Commission until he was arrested in 1979, after refusing to help Saddam build a nuclear weapon. His arrest occurred at a time when the regime was rounding up Shia Muslims because of suspected links to Iran.

He escaped in 1991 after the US military bombed the Abu Ghraib prison during the first Gulf War, enabling him to head for Jordan.

Lakhdar Brahimi, the United Nations envoy to Iraq, is finalising a list of members of a transitional government that will assume sovereignty from the US-led occupation authority on June 30.

Diplomats from the 15 UN Security Council nations were today meeting in New York for informal talks on a resolution to underpin the restoration of sovereignty in Iraq.

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