UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — U.S. troops and U.N. inspectors didn't find much when they searched Iraq for weapons of mass destruction. But they needn't have searched so far and wide: Turns out, according to the New York Post, Saddam Hussein was committing crimes against humanity right here on the Upper East Side.

When Hussein's regime took control of Iraq in 1979, a "secret torture chamber" was built in the cellar of the Permanent Mission of Iraq to the United Nations, located at 14 East 79th St., the Post reported. Two anonymous Iraqi officials told the Post the chamber was used to detain and torture Iraqis living in NYC.



The ornate mansion at 14 East 79th, located along the only single block of Fifth Avenue's Upper East Side section free of buildings over six levels high, was built in the early 1900s as one in a pair of two massive, neo-Georgian-style homes belonging to the Ogden family (of real estate fortune). The building's twin, 12 East 79th St., is currently on sale for around $40 million. It was described in a recent real estate listing as "one of ten extraordinary residences in a row forming a uniform ensemble uninterrupted by taller buildings." Its block, the listing said, is "reminiscent of the great residential enclaves of London and Paris" and is "flooded with sunlight and offers urban vistas unlike any other street on the Upper East Side." Hussein's chamber in the Ogdens' old cellar was a "dark room" with reinforced doors that could be locked from the outside, the officials said.

Soundproofing wasn't necessary: "You're not going to hear someone screaming down there," one official told the Post. Detainees were tortured by Iraqi agents known as the Mukhabarat, who would use torture techniques involving copper wire, rubber hoses and wooden planks, according to the report.



"Mukhabarat does whatever the hell Mukhabarat needs to do," one official said. "They are the last people you ever wanted to meet during the Saddam era."



The mansion at 14 East 79th St. was raided when the U.S. declared war on Iraq in 2003, and all evidence of the torture chamber was removed, the Post reported. The building itself is still occupied by the mission; however, as of 2014, the cellar area has reportedly been renovated into a kitchenette.