According to excerpts of Saddam Hussein’s prison writings, the dictator feared catching AIDS or other "young people's diseases" from the U.S. soldiers that were guarding him.

The quotes from Saddam’s prison writings were published on Monday by Al-Hayat, an Arab London-based newspaper. The article said the portions of Saddam’s writings were obtained from U.S. authorities and the U.S. military confirmed the release of the writings.

According to the writings recently revealed, Saddam asked the U.S. soldiers to stop using his laundry line to dry clothes because they were young and they could have “young people's diseases."

"My main concern was to not catch a venereal disease, an HIV disease, in this place," the dictator who was hanged in December 2006 wrote while being detained.

U.S. military spokesman in Iraq, Maj. Matthew Morgan said Saddam wrote thousands of similar pages while being imprisoned after the United States invaded Iraq. However, Morgan said he wouldn’t describe the pages as Saddam’s formal diary.

In his prison writings, Saddam also expressed his concerns about Iran. He wrote that “the spread of Persians” (the Iranians) are at least as dangerous as the “Zionist entity” (the Jews) are to the Arab nation and the Arab countries of the Gulf.

The former Iraqi dictator wrote that he found it very hard to ask for things and gave the example of when he had to ask the guards for a flower.

"It was a serious sacrifice from me to ask for the first time in my life," he wrote.

Saddam was captured by U.S. soldiers on Dec. 13, 2003, just a little over eight months after the American invasion had started.