Posted on 06/30/2004 4:46:00 AM PDT by kattracks
BAGHDAD, June 30 (Reuters) - Saddam Hussein, who brutalised Iraqis for decades, said good morning and sought to ask some questions when the United States handed him over to Iraqi justice on Wednesday, a witness said.Saddam, who was captured hiding near his hometown of Tikrit in December, looked in good health as he appeared before an Iraqi judge in the first legal step towards a trial for the cruelties he inflicted during his 35 years of power.
"Saddam said good morning and asked if he could ask some questions," Salem Chalabi, a lawyer leading the work of a tribunal that will try the former dictator, told Reuters.
"He was told he should wait until tomorrow," said Chalabi, who was in the courtroom where Saddam and 11 of his former lieutenants were turned over to Iraqi legal custody.
But many of the other former Iraqi officials were nervous and agitated, said Chalabi, who has received numerous death threats since taking on the task of helping amass evidence against Saddam and preparing a special tribunal to try him.
Saddam, 67, is accused by Iraqis of torturing and killing hundreds of thousands of people with the help of officials in his Baath party. Saddam became president in 1979, but had already been Iraq's strongman since a Baathist coup in 1968.
His former lieutenants appeared nervous and some were hostile as they were told they would be charged on Thursday.
Ali Hassan al-Majid, known as "Chemical Ali" for his role in poison gas attacks, including one that killed about 5,000 Iraqi Kurds in Halabja in 1988, appeared especially rattled.
"He looked very scared. He was shaking," said Chalabi.
Saddam will remain in the physical custody of U.S. forces. He and the 11 others are to be charged on Thursday.
Saddam fled when U.S. forces entered Baghdad on April 9 last year after making a final defiant public appearance near a mosque in the capital. He was then filmed, looking disoriented, unkempt and with a bushy beard, as U.S. military doctors examined him after his capture on December 13.
Among others to be handed over were former Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz; Barzan Ibrahim Hasan al-Tikriti, Saddam's half-brother and adviser; Abid Hamid Mahmud al-Tikriti, his secretary; Sabawi Ibrahim, Saddam's maternal half-brother; Watban Ibrahim Hasan al-Tikriti, Saddam's half-brother and adviser; and Aziz Salih Numan, Baath Party regional commander and head of the party militia.
These men and others among the 55 most wanted Iraqis on a U.S. list are seen as witnesses who could help prove a chain of command linking Saddam to crimes against humanity.
Saddam will be charged with ordering the 1988 massacres of Kurds, the 1990 invasion of Kuwait and the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, according to Chalabi.
Probably hanging.
A firing squad would be good if photographed and sent around the Arab streets with these comments, "Who is Next?"
You mean they should move him to Democrat National Party headquarters, or maybe Hollywood, where most of his current supporters live.
Public hanging on video would be very effective. Make the drop short as that makes the process take longer with kicking and twitching and such.
Why don't we hand over McDermott and other treasonous democrats. Perhaps the Iraqis could try them better than we.
In Iraq, a nice doggie doing its thing on the hanging body would be a great final touch.
They ought to be scared. As long as they remained under US control, they were fairly certain that they would remain alive and well. Once they are turned over to the Iraqis, they know that their fate is sealed.
; )
Why not stoning with members of the victims' families casting the first stones?
I wonder if the execution will be public and, therefore, taped for our internet viewing pleasure.
When is Ramsey Clark going to assume his duties as Saddam's attorney?
"...Well I hope Saddam doesn't commit suicide. I want him executed in some heinous manner..."
How about taking a page from Mason Verger's plan for Hannibal Lecter. Anyone who has read the book will know where I'm going with this. A possible fitting end to Sodamned Insane.
Your poster name is the Starship Enterprise?
I think Hussein will be acquitted and wind up teaching diplomacy at Columbia.
Rommel commited suicide after being implicated in the failed plot to assasinate Hitler with a briefcase bomb. It was that or his family...
It was Hess who defected to Britain in an Me 110 early in the war. He died in Spandau about a decade or so ago of old age.
This guy desrves death as well. He made a deal with the devil.
LOL!
"Visibly rattled"
They know they had it good while in US custody.
Now they have a good chance of having their heads publicly cut off in a village square.
Or Berkley
Welcome to FR. Did you have anyone specific in mind?
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