Say good night, Saddam...if you're still alive.
Regards, Ivan
Posted on 04/07/2003 3:59:34 PM PDT by MadIvan
IF AMERICAN forces capture Saddam Hussein, they intend to see the Iraqi President tried by his own people for crimes against humanity, rather than face justice in an international tribunal.
According to senior Bush Administration officials, plans are well under way for a series of criminal prosecutions, ranging from the Iraqi leadership down to individual soldiers who may have committed war crimes against US and coalition troops in this war and in the last Gulf War.
The scale of the planned American prosecutions, which have not yet been agreed with the British, is breathtaking and could outstrip the dozens of trials that followed the civil wars in the former Yugoslavia in the Nineties.
Pierre-Richard Prosper, the American official responsible for prosecuting war crimes, said: “The day of Iraq’s liberation will also be the day of justice.” He accused Iraq of a pattern of abuses during the current fighting.
Mr Prosper denied that Washington proposed victor’s justice, but conceded that punishment for those convicted would range from “incarceration to the death penalty”. “There has been a complete disregard for the law by the regime, as well as a complete disregard for human life,” he told a press conference at the Pentagon.
His ambitious plans for punishing the regime could, however, cause friction with Britain and other members of the international community. While London has insisted that those responsible for crimes should be brought to justice, there is also a view that purging the present regime could harm efforts to keep the country running.
“Anyone guilty of a crime should be punished and there is no room for Baath party ideologues,” a British official said, “but some people may have joined out of necessity. It may be that we need their skills to keep the country going.”
Mr Prosper said that the Americans were preparing cases against numerous suspected Iraqi war criminals. In the present fighting, they are accused of: using human shields; fighting in civilian clothes; using ambulances to transport fighters; executing deserters and hiding weapons in schools, hospitals and mosques.
The Americans also intend to arrest and prosecute Iraqis who mistreat American prisoners or parade them on television, in contravention of the Geneva Conventions.
Washington believes that the cases could be heard in either American civilian or military courts. Since neither the United States nor Iraq are signatories to the new International Criminal Court in The Hague, it would not have jurisdiction over crimes committed in the war.
Some of the first prosecutions may be brought by the British against two Iraqi irregulars who were arrested last week near Basra, suspected of taking part in the killing of two British soldiers.
There could also be prosecutions for war crimes committed against British troops captured in the last Gulf War and the widespread violations of human rights against Kuwaiti citizens during the Iraqi military occupation between 1990 and 1991.
There are believed to be a few dozen political and military leaders in the Baath party regime who are directly implicated in the suppression of the Iraqi people. The Iraqi leadership is accused of killing thousands of its own people, in particular the massacres of Kurds in the Eighties during the Iran-Iraq War, and later the suppression of the Shia Muslims in 1991.
“For past abuses, past atrocities, it is our view that there should be accountability,” Mr Prosper said. “We will work with the Iraqi people to create an Iraqi-led process that will bring justice for the years of abuses that have occurred.”
Say good night, Saddam...if you're still alive.
Regards, Ivan
Enter the bureaucrat !
"C'mon folks, you need to prepare a bill of charges, and make those charges publicly, and allow his attorneys to question the evidence presented against him."
And then the judge will do some research on Texas justice, and discover the great loophole, and he will say to the American judicial advisors:
HE NEEDED KILLIN'!
That is a good question. Reports from 1991 say Saddam left Baghdad and was driven around in taxis, not limos, to avoid detection. He's like all cruel torturers, he fears because of what he has done to others. He obviously hasn't feared any god of his, but if he's alive, eternity is facing him. Good night, Saddam.
Some of the first prosecutions may be brought by the British against two Iraqi irregulars who were arrested last week near Basra, suspected of taking part in the killing of two British soldiers.
Are the British going to overcome their reluctance to impose the death penalty?
I am sure that even our officials will whistle and look the other way if Iraqi judges hang them.
Regards, Ivan
If he blisters it's mustard gas, if his pupils constrict and he starts twitching it's nerve gas, and if he gets bumps all over it's smallpox.
Ceaucescu or Mussolini style, I hope. ;)
Regards, Ivan
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