Saddam buried in northern Iraq 

Saddam Hussein was buried before dawn on Sunday in his native village of Awja, near Tikrit in northern Iraq, the head of his tribe said.

Ali al-Nida, head of the Albu Nasir tribe, told journalists the burial in a family plot took place in the early morning, less than 24 hours after the former president was hanged for crimes against humanity.

His sons Uday and Qusay, killed by US troops in 2003, are also buried in Awja, close to Tikrit, where tribal elders received the body on Saturday from Baghdad.

Al Jazeera television also quoted a family source saying Saddam was buried in Awja, despite a statement from the family late on Saturday saying the body might be taken from Tikrit to the western city of Ramadi for burial.

Iraqi officials in Ramadi said they were unaware of any plan to bury Saddam there.

Saddam, 69, was hanged at dawn on Saturday in a base in Baghdad once used by his own feared intelligence services.

He was shown on state television going calmly to his death on the scaffold. Grainy video later showed his body in a white shroud, the neck twisted and blood on a cheek.

Three decades after Saddam established his personal rule by force, it closed a chapter in Iraq's history marked by war with Iran and a 1990 invasion of Kuwait that turned him from ally to enemy of the United States and impoverished his oil-rich nation.

However, as US President George Bush said in a statement, sectarian violence pushing Iraq towards civil war had not ended.

Car bombs set off by suspected insurgents from Saddam's once-dominant Sunni minority killed more than 70 people in Baghdad and near the Shi'ite holy city of Najaf, in areas populated by Shi'ite Muslims oppressed for decades and now in the ascendant.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, his fragile authority among fellow Shi'ites significantly enhanced after he forced through Saddam's execution over hesitation from Sunni and Kurdish members of his government, has reached out to Sunni rebels.