The pro-reform daily Yase No splashed with the headline "Saddam Runs Away", with a photograph of young Baghdadis trampling on the portrait of the toppled President Saddam Hussein.

"Dictators leave, but the people stay...the future will show that Iraqis will not miss Saddam just like the Germans did not regret Hitler's suicide or the Iranians did not cry for the exile of Reza Shah," said the paper.

Reza Shah, father of the last Shah of Iran, was exiled by British and US forces in 1940.

The majority of the pro-reform dailies like Hamshahri et Nassim Saba had the headline "The Dictator's Fall" or "The Fall of Baghdad" with photographs of the toppled statute of Saddam Hussein.

But the mood was completely different in the conservative press, which talked about a deal between Saddam and US President George W. Bush to hand over Baghdad.

Just a few days before these same papers were trumpeting the difficulties being faced by US-British forces in Iraq with some even predicting a "possible" victory for the Iraqis.

The ultra-conservative Javan daily's headline was "The Suspicious Fall of Baghdad."

"Baghdad Occupied Without Fighting," was the more subdued headline in Ressalat, which said "Russian intelligence had information about a secret deal between Iraqi leaders and the United States to avoid a battle in Baghdad."

The more radical Jomhuri Eslami went further and spoke about a US-Russian deal that allowed the Iraqi leadership to flee Baghdad.

It also cited the head of the Iran-based Shiite opposition, Mohammad Baqer Hakim, as saying that "we will fight the US military regime in Iraq."

SPACE.WIRE