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View Full Version : Saddam being Fed Thru a Tube...Bush considers cutting Vacation short to join Congress



LoungeMachine
07-24-2006, 02:37 AM
Mon. Jul. 24, 2006. |

Saddam tube-fed in hospital
On hunger strike for over two weeks

Violence surging as 60 killed yesterday
Jul. 24, 2006. 01:00 AM
BASSEM MROUE AND ROBERT H. REID
ASSOCIATED PRESS


BAGHDAD—Saddam Hussein was in hospital yesterday and fed with a tube on the 17th day of a hunger strike to ensure he is healthy enough to continue with his trial as it nears a verdict, the chief prosecutor said.

Also in Iraq yesterday, bombs killed more than 60 people and wounded more than 200 in Baghdad and the northern oil centre of Kirkuk — a dramatic escalation of violence as U.S. and Iraqi forces crack down on Iraq's most feared Shiite militia.

And Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki left for talks in Washington this week with U.S. President George W. Bush to discuss the sectarian violence, which has risen sharply since Iraq's national unity government took office two months ago.

Saddam's health had become "unstable because of the hunger strike," said prosecutor Jaafar al-Moussawi, adding he learned of the situation during a visit to the U.S.-run prison where the former Iraqi ruler and his seven fellow defendants are held.

"We took him to the hospital, and he is being currently fed by a tube," al-Moussawi said.

Al-Moussawi said the feeding tube had stabilized Saddam's health and the former president would appear in court as scheduled this week. Saddam was not scheduled to appear today, when the trial resumes after a two-week break, because other defendants are to give their final summations.

It appeared al-Moussawi had become concerned over the impact of pictures of a frail, weakened Saddam appearing in court and decided to check on the former president himself since the Americans were continuing to insist the 69-year-old man's health was unaffected despite two weeks without food.

The hunger strike was launched to demand better security for the defence team. Three of them have been assassinated since the trial began, most recently Khamis al-Obeidi, who was abducted and slain June 21. The defence rejected an offer to be housed inside the fortified Green Zone and instead demanded bodyguards.


A spokesman for the U.S. detention command would not say whether Saddam had been sent to hospital but said he was under medical supervision and was "voluntarily" taking nutrients through a feeding tube. "He's continuing to refuse meals," Lt.-Col. Keir-Kevin Curry said.

Saddam and the seven others have been on trial since Oct. 19 for the deaths of Shiite Muslims after a crackdown in the town of Dujail, which was launched after an assassination attempt there in 1982. They could hang if convicted.

The trial is ending against a backdrop of rising violence between rival religious and ethnic factions, punctuated by yesterday's attacks. A suicide driver detonated a minivan at the entrance to a bustling market in Sadr City, the capital's biggest Shiite district and stronghold of radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army militia.

At least 34 people were killed and 74 were wounded, the Iraqi army said in a statement. Eight more people died and about 20 were injured when a roadside bomb exploded two hours later at a municipal building in Sadr City, less than a kilometre from the car bombing, the army said.

In Kirkuk, 290 kilometres to the north, a car bomb detonated at midday near a courthouse. The courthouse is located among a cluster of wooden shops and stalls, many of which burst into flames, engulfing the warren of crowded streets in roiling black smoke.

Twenty people were killed and 159 were wounded, police said. The tally of injured was so high because many people were trampled as panic swept shoppers, police said. Others suffered burns when the initial blast triggered secondary explosions in shops that sold chemicals and flammable liquids.

Also yesterday, the U.S. military announced that an American soldier assigned to the 1st Armored Division was killed the day before in Anbar province, a bastion of the Sunni-dominated insurgency.