Saddam sentenced to death
hippiemom
Posts: 3,326
BAGHDAD, Nov. 5 — An Iraqi special tribunal today convicted Saddam Hussein of crimes against humanity and sentenced him to death by hanging for the brutal repression of a Shiite town in the 1980’s.
As the chief judge read aloud the verdict, a defiant Mr. Hussein shouted, “Long live the people! Long live the Arab nation! Down with the spies!” He thrust his finger emphatically into the air as he spoke, then repeatedly chanted, “God is great!”
The judge, Raouf Rasheed Abdul Rahman, tried to calm Mr. Hussein down. “There’s no point,” Mr. Rahman told him.
The verdict, under Iraqi law, will immediately be submitted to an appellate court, which will begin its review within a month, officials said.
Still, today’s verdict represented a moment of triumph and catharsis for many Iraqis after decades of suffering under Mr. Hussein’s tyrannical rule.
Spontaneous celebrations broke out across Iraq in spite of an around-the-clock curfew imposed on the capital and other regions. People fired pistols and assault rifles into the air in a common gesture of jubilation. Residents of Sadr City, a Shiite bastion in northeastern Baghdad, flooded the streets in defiance of a curfew, whooping and dancing and sounding car horns. Even some Shiite police officers joined in the revelry, firing their weapons in the air.
“I feel happy,” said a 31-year-old Shiite shop owner, who was smoking apple-flavored tobacco on the sidewalk in Karrada, a well-to-do neighborhood in central Baghdad. “I think he got his punishment. There was no Iraqi house that didn’t have damage because of Saddam Hussein.”
But a darker mood settled over predominantly Sunni Arab areas. Immediately following the verdicts, fighting broke out between gunmen and the Iraqi Army in the Sunni neighborhood of Adhamiya in northeastern Baghdad, according to an Interior Ministry official. American forces swarmed the district, however, suppressing the violence, the official said.
In the Sunni Arab city of Samarra, a stronghold of support for the Sunni-led insurgency, hundreds of demonstrators marched through the streets in violation of the curfew. They carried photographs of Mr. Hussein, who was born in the same region, and fired guns in the air in anger.
“The ground will be burned,” they chanted. They were escorted by Iraqi police officers, who provided some of the demonstrators with rides through the city, witnesses said.
Iraqi and American security forces had been bracing for a violent reaction among Mr. Hussein’s armed supporters, who constitute a significant corps within the insurgency. A ban on cars and pedestrians was imposed in the capital and other areas, Iraq’s security forces were put on high alert and American jet fighters circled high above the capital throughout the day today.
In a nationally televised address following the verdict, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki said Mr. Hussein “is facing the punishment he deserves.”
“His sentence does not represent anything because executing him is not worth the blood he spilled,” he said. “But it may bring some comfort to the families of the martyrs.”
In recent days, Mr. Maliki publicly expressed his hope that Mr. Hussein would receive the death sentence, saying it would help to dissipate the insurgency.
The American ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, hailed the verdict as “an important milestone in the building of a free society” in Iraq.
“Although the Iraqis may face difficult days in the coming weeks, closing the book on Saddam and his regime is an opportunity to unite and build a better future,” he said in a statement.
The long-awaited verdict today came nearly three years after Mr. Hussein was hauled from an underground hideaway by American troops and more than a year after he and seven co-defendants first appeared in an Iraqi court to face charges of orchestrating what the prosecution called a “widespread and systematic persecution” of the townspeople of Dujail, 35 miles north of Baghdad.
The case centered on the execution of 148 men and boys from the town after a purported assassination attempt against Mr. Hussein by men firing from a nearby orchard on July 8, 1982. Mr. Hussein’s lawyers contended at the trial that the would-be assassins were Iranian-backed Shiite militants, and that he was justified in ordering the crackdown on the town because Iraq was at war with Iran at the time.
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As the chief judge read aloud the verdict, a defiant Mr. Hussein shouted, “Long live the people! Long live the Arab nation! Down with the spies!” He thrust his finger emphatically into the air as he spoke, then repeatedly chanted, “God is great!”
The judge, Raouf Rasheed Abdul Rahman, tried to calm Mr. Hussein down. “There’s no point,” Mr. Rahman told him.
The verdict, under Iraqi law, will immediately be submitted to an appellate court, which will begin its review within a month, officials said.
Still, today’s verdict represented a moment of triumph and catharsis for many Iraqis after decades of suffering under Mr. Hussein’s tyrannical rule.
Spontaneous celebrations broke out across Iraq in spite of an around-the-clock curfew imposed on the capital and other regions. People fired pistols and assault rifles into the air in a common gesture of jubilation. Residents of Sadr City, a Shiite bastion in northeastern Baghdad, flooded the streets in defiance of a curfew, whooping and dancing and sounding car horns. Even some Shiite police officers joined in the revelry, firing their weapons in the air.
“I feel happy,” said a 31-year-old Shiite shop owner, who was smoking apple-flavored tobacco on the sidewalk in Karrada, a well-to-do neighborhood in central Baghdad. “I think he got his punishment. There was no Iraqi house that didn’t have damage because of Saddam Hussein.”
But a darker mood settled over predominantly Sunni Arab areas. Immediately following the verdicts, fighting broke out between gunmen and the Iraqi Army in the Sunni neighborhood of Adhamiya in northeastern Baghdad, according to an Interior Ministry official. American forces swarmed the district, however, suppressing the violence, the official said.
In the Sunni Arab city of Samarra, a stronghold of support for the Sunni-led insurgency, hundreds of demonstrators marched through the streets in violation of the curfew. They carried photographs of Mr. Hussein, who was born in the same region, and fired guns in the air in anger.
“The ground will be burned,” they chanted. They were escorted by Iraqi police officers, who provided some of the demonstrators with rides through the city, witnesses said.
Iraqi and American security forces had been bracing for a violent reaction among Mr. Hussein’s armed supporters, who constitute a significant corps within the insurgency. A ban on cars and pedestrians was imposed in the capital and other areas, Iraq’s security forces were put on high alert and American jet fighters circled high above the capital throughout the day today.
In a nationally televised address following the verdict, Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki said Mr. Hussein “is facing the punishment he deserves.”
“His sentence does not represent anything because executing him is not worth the blood he spilled,” he said. “But it may bring some comfort to the families of the martyrs.”
In recent days, Mr. Maliki publicly expressed his hope that Mr. Hussein would receive the death sentence, saying it would help to dissipate the insurgency.
The American ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, hailed the verdict as “an important milestone in the building of a free society” in Iraq.
“Although the Iraqis may face difficult days in the coming weeks, closing the book on Saddam and his regime is an opportunity to unite and build a better future,” he said in a statement.
The long-awaited verdict today came nearly three years after Mr. Hussein was hauled from an underground hideaway by American troops and more than a year after he and seven co-defendants first appeared in an Iraqi court to face charges of orchestrating what the prosecution called a “widespread and systematic persecution” of the townspeople of Dujail, 35 miles north of Baghdad.
The case centered on the execution of 148 men and boys from the town after a purported assassination attempt against Mr. Hussein by men firing from a nearby orchard on July 8, 1982. Mr. Hussein’s lawyers contended at the trial that the would-be assassins were Iranian-backed Shiite militants, and that he was justified in ordering the crackdown on the town because Iraq was at war with Iran at the time.
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"Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." ~ MLK, 1963
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