A Moroccan man returned home to find his 11-year-old son hanging dead from the ceiling, a newspaper said on Thursday, the latest victim of a macabre game in which children mimic the death of Saddam Hussein.

The boy decided to copy the former Iraq leader's execution while playing with his younger sister at their home in Khemisset, 80 kilometers (50 miles) east of the capital of Rabat, newspaper Al Ahdat al-Maghrebia reported.

It's the new hip thing. All the kids are doing it.

Since then, several stories have emerged of children dying or being injured after being captivated by the manner of Hussein's death or by family conversations about the execution.

One 12-year-old Saudi boy died after using a chair and a metal wire to hang himself from a door frame, while another in Algeria was found hanging from a tree, papers reported.

Two boys in different regions of Azerbaijan hanged themselves at the weekend and may have been influenced by Hussein's execution, a security source in the country said.

The death of a 15-year-old boy last week in the Moroccan coastal city of Casablanca was also suspected of being the result of another re-enactment.

I'd venture to guess that in all these cases, the father fo the house was ranting the previous night about how Saddam was a hero...