Saddam Trial To Begin Shortly

[LoungeMachine]

Saddam trial could begin next month, lead judge says
Last Updated Thu, 14 Jul 2005 09:59:11 EDT
CBC News


Saddam Hussein could go on trial as early as next month and could face the death penalty if he's convicted of a 1982 massacre, a leading Iraqi judge says.


The trial could begin "in August or September, but we would like it to begin before that," said Raid Juhi, chief of the Iraq Special Tribunal.

Investigation has concluded on the massacre, which killed 50 people in the mainly Shia Arab village of Dujail about 80 kilometres north of Baghdad. Four other former Iraqi officials are also charged. The killings apparently followed an alleged assassination plot against Saddam.

Saddam's trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity will also focus on his alleged role in the persecution of northern Kurds and southern Shias.

Iraqi politicians have been angling to complete the trial before a referendum on a new constitution scheduled for October. Some want to pass new legislation that will speed up the trial process, check the 30-member tribunals for any sympathies to the deposed leader and reduce the court's ties to the U.S. to increase its credibility.



But U.S. authorities have said there's still a need to develop the country's new judicial system and complete the constitutional process before trying Saddam.

A trial will likely intensify sectarian strife between the ruling Shia majority and the Sunni minority that once benefited from Saddam's rule and is believed to be behind suicide bombing attacks against the new government and its allies.



That strife was evident again on Thursday as three suicide bombers attacked a checkpoint into the government security compound or Green Zone, and U.S. forces announced the arrest of a suspect in the kidnapping and murder of a senior Egyptian envoy.

Abu Seba, arrested last Saturday near Ramadi west of Baghdad, was also linked to attacks on senior diplomats from Pakistan and Bahrain.

"Seba served as a senior lieutenant of al-Qaeda in Iraq," the U.S. military said in a statement. The militant group targeted the diplomats of Muslim and Arab countries to weaken their support for the new Iraqi government, it added.

Two bystanders were killed and at least five wounded in Thursday's Green Zone attacks, but one bomber was shot and captured before he could detonate his explosives.

Government figures released Thursday show almost 1,600 civilians were killed in the first six months this year. Most died from car-bombings and suicide attacks, while others died in attacks by Iraqi and U.S. forces.

During the same time nearly 900 security forces died.

The death toll for the past 18 months was about 12,000 civilians, Interior Minister Bayan Jabr told The Associated Press.

Thursday's attacks came on a new holiday commemorating the July 14, 1958 , overthrow of the monarchy. The leader of that revolution later survived an assassination attempt by Saddam.

Saddam seized power almost exactly 10 years later, on July 17, 1968, but he has been locked up in a detention centre in Baghdad for the past 18 months.

[LoungeMachine]

Will he be allowed to testify?

Will it be open to the world press ?

Will it be sponsored by Doritos ?

[Warham]

Let's hope he gets a penalty similar to what the Democrats are looking at for Karl Rove....lifetime imprisonment or execution.

[LoungeMachine]

Originally posted by Warham
Let's hope he gets a penalty similar to what the Democrats are looking at for Karl Rove....lifetime imprisonment or execution.

Fine by me.


On both counts

[LoungeMachine]

Re: Saddam Trial To Begin Shortly

Originally posted by LoungeMachine


Saddam's trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity will also focus on his alleged role in the persecution of northern Kurds and southern Shias.

The Saddam in Rumsfeld’s Closet
by Jeremy Scahill

“Man and the turtle are very much alike. Neither makes any progress without sticking his neck out.”
—Donald Rumsfeld

Five years before Saddam Hussein’s now infamous 1988 gassing of the Kurds, a key meeting took place in Baghdad that would play a significant role in forging close ties between Saddam Hussein and Washington. It happened at a time when Saddam was first alleged to have used chemical weapons. The meeting in late December 1983 paved the way for an official restoration of relations between Iraq and the US, which had been severed since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.

With the Iran-Iraq war escalating, President Ronald Reagan dispatched his Middle East envoy, a former secretary of defense, to Baghdad with a hand-written letter to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and a message that Washington was willing at any moment to resume diplomatic relations.

That envoy was Donald Rumsfeld.

Rumsfeld’s December 19-20, 1983 visit to Baghdad made him the highest-ranking US official to visit Iraq in 6 years. He met Saddam and the two discussed “topics of mutual interest,” according to the Iraqi Foreign Ministry. “[Saddam] made it clear that Iraq was not interested in making mischief in the world,” Rumsfeld later told The New York Times. “It struck us as useful to have a relationship, given that we were interested in solving the Mideast problems.”

Just 12 days after the meeting, on January 1, 1984, The Washington Post reported that the United States “in a shift in policy, has informed friendly Persian Gulf nations that the defeat of Iraq in the 3-year-old war with Iran would be ‘contrary to U.S. interests’ and has made several moves to prevent that result.”

In March of 1984, with the Iran-Iraq war growing more brutal by the day, Rumsfeld was back in Baghdad for meetings with then-Iraqi Foreign Minister Tariq Aziz. On the day of his visit, March 24th, UPI reported from the United Nations: “Mustard gas laced with a nerve agent has been used on Iranian soldiers in the 43-month Persian Gulf War between Iran and Iraq, a team of U.N. experts has concluded... Meanwhile, in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, U.S. presidential envoy Donald Rumsfeld held talks with Foreign Minister Tarek Aziz (sic) on the Gulf war before leaving for an unspecified destination.”

The day before, the Iranian news agency alleged that Iraq launched another chemical weapons assault on the southern battlefront, injuring 600 Iranian soldiers. “Chemical weapons in the form of aerial bombs have been used in the areas inspected in Iran by the specialists,” the U.N. report said. “The types of chemical agents used were bis-(2-chlorethyl)-sulfide, also known as mustard gas, and ethyl N, N-dimethylphosphoroamidocyanidate, a nerve agent known as Tabun.”

Prior to the release of the UN report, the US State Department on March 5th had issued a statement saying “available evidence indicates that Iraq has used lethal chemical weapons.”

Commenting on the UN report, US Ambassador Jeane J. Kirkpatrick was quoted by The New York Times as saying, “We think that the use of chemical weapons is a very serious matter. We've made that clear in general and particular.”

Compared with the rhetoric emanating from the current administration, based on speculations about what Saddam might have, Kirkpatrick’s reaction was hardly a call to action.

Most glaring is that Donald Rumsfeld was in Iraq as the 1984 UN report was issued and said nothing about the allegations of chemical weapons use, despite State Department “evidence.” On the contrary, The New York Times reported from Baghdad on March 29, 1984, “American diplomats pronounce themselves satisfied with relations between Iraq and the United States and suggest that normal diplomatic ties have been restored in all but name.”

A month and a half later, in May 1984, Donald Rumsfeld resigned. In November of that year, full diplomatic relations between Iraq and the US were fully restored. Two years later, in an article about Rumsfeld’s aspirations to run for the 1988 Republican Presidential nomination, the Chicago Tribune Magazine listed among Rumsfeld’s achievements helping to “reopen U.S. relations with Iraq.” The Tribune failed to mention that this help came at a time when, according to the US State Department, Iraq was actively using chemical weapons.

Throughout the period that Rumsfeld was Reagan’s Middle East envoy, Iraq was frantically purchasing hardware from American firms, empowered by the White House to sell. The buying frenzy began immediately after Iraq was removed from the list of alleged sponsors of terrorism in 1982. According to a February 13, 1991 Los Angeles Times article:

“First on Hussein's shopping list was helicopters -- he bought 60 Hughes helicopters and trainers with little notice. However, a second order of 10 twin-engine Bell "Huey" helicopters, like those used to carry combat troops in Vietnam, prompted congressional opposition in August, 1983... Nonetheless, the sale was approved.”

In 1984, according to The LA Times, the State Department—in the name of “increased American penetration of the extremely competitive civilian aircraft market”—pushed through the sale of 45 Bell 214ST helicopters to Iraq. The helicopters, worth some $200 million, were originally designed for military purposes. The New York Times later reported that Saddam “transferred many, if not all [of these helicopters] to his military.”

In 1988, Saddam’s forces attacked Kurdish civilians with poisonous gas from Iraqi helicopters and planes. U.S. intelligence sources told The LA Times in 1991, they “believe that the American-built helicopters were among those dropping the deadly bombs.”

In response to the gassing, sweeping sanctions were unanimously passed by the US Senate that would have denied Iraq access to most US technology. The measure was killed by the White House.

Senior officials later told reporters they did not press for punishment of Iraq at the time because they wanted to shore up Iraq's ability to pursue the war with Iran. Extensive research uncovered no public statements by Donald Rumsfeld publicly expressing even remote concern about Iraq’s use or possession of chemical weapons until the week Iraq invaded Kuwait in August 1990, when he appeared on an ABC news special.

Eight years later, Donald Rumsfeld signed on to an “open letter” to President Clinton, calling on him to eliminate “the threat posed by Saddam.” It urged Clinton to “provide the leadership necessary to save ourselves and the world from the scourge of Saddam and the weapons of mass destruction that he refuses to relinquish.”

In 1984, Donald Rumsfeld was in a position to draw the world’s attention to Saddam’s chemical threat. He was in Baghdad as the UN concluded that chemical weapons had been used against Iran. He was armed with a fresh communication from the State Department that it had “available evidence” Iraq was using chemical weapons. But Rumsfeld said nothing.

Washington now speaks of Saddam’s threat and the consequences of a failure to act. Despite the fact that the administration has failed to provide even a shred of concrete proof that Iraq has links to Al Qaeda or has resumed production of chemical or biological agents, Rumsfeld insists that “the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.”

But there is evidence of the absence of Donald Rumsfeld’s voice at the very moment when Iraq’s alleged threat to international security first emerged. And in this case, the evidence of absence is indeed evidence.







SHOULDN'T RUMMY BE CALLED TO TESTIFY?

[Dr. Love]

I wonder if it'll get the same level of coverage as the MJ trial.

[LoungeMachine]

Originally posted by Dr. Love
I wonder if it'll get the same level of coverage as the MJ trial.

I was JUST thinking the same thing.

and will he need an umbrella ?

[thome]

Gucci suit or Arab attire? ET will LET US KNOW. I can hardly wait!

5 bucks sais it'll be that weird. Now im gonna go hurl.

[LoungeMachine]

First Criminal Case Filed Against Saddam Hussein
The Former Iraqi Dictator Will Be Tried Over Massacre of Shiites





BAGHDAD, Iraq (July 17) - The first criminal case has been filed against Saddam Hussein, stemming from a 1982 massacre of dozens of Shiite villagers in retaliation for a failed assassination attempt against the former leader, the head of an Iraqi tribunal said Sunday.

The date for the trial of Saddam and three others will be determined in a few days. If convicted, they could face the death penalty.

Raid Juhi, chief judge of the Iraq Special Tribunal, said the preliminary investigation into the July 8, 1982, massacre in Dujail, 50 miles north of Baghdad, has been completed, and the case was referred to the courts for trial.

"The date for the trial will be determined within the few coming days by the gentlemen in the criminal court," Juhi said.

The announcement roughly corresponds to an indictment in the U.S. legal system, legal officials said. However, Saddam and the others will be considered "charged" when they appear in court.

The court now has 45 days to announce a start date for the trial.

Saddam's co-defendants in the case are Barazan Ibrahim, intelligence chief at the time and Saddam's half brother; former Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan; and Awad Hamed al-Bandar, at the time a Baath party official in Dujail.

Iraqi officials previously have announced the imminent start of Saddam's trial before, only to have the proceedings delayed. The Americans privately have urged caution about rushing into a trial, saying Iraq must develop a judicial system first.

U.S. officials say there also are concerns that a trial could interfere with the process of writing a constitution and inflame sectarian tension. The Iraqi government must finish a draft by mid-August so it can hold a referendum on the charter ahead of December elections for a full-term government.

Saddam, 68, has been jailed under American control at a U.S. military detention complex near the Baghdad airport since his December 2003 capture near his hometown, Tikrit.

The tribunal will try the former dictator on war crimes charges stemming from 14 incidents, according to a list obtained by The Associated Press. Those incidents include the 1987-88 campaign to drive Iraqi Kurds from wide areas of the north and the 1991 suppression of a Shiite revolt in the south after U.S.-led forces removed Iraqi invaders from Kuwait.


07/17/05 08:18 EDT

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Lest we forget...