Posted on 03/28/2005 10:35:02 AM PST by FlyLow
A businessman who has been dubbed the "Dutch Chemical Ali" is being held in jail in the Netherlands, accused of selling ingredients for lethal non-conventional weapons to ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
Frans van Anraat faces the charge of genocide in a Dutch court for supplying chemical weapons to Saddam, who then used them in his war against Iran during the 1980s and in poison gas attacks on Iraqi Kurds.
A spokesman for the prosecutor's office in Rotterdam said this was the first time a Dutch citizen was being prosecuted for genocide. "If he is convicted, the maximum sentence could be life imprisonment," said Wim de Bruin.
The 62-year-old businessman appeared in court earlier this month to hear charges against him, and his request to be released from prison was denied.
Van Anraat is accused of selling thousands of tons of chemicals that were then used by the Iraqi military to make mustard gas and nerve gas.
Some 5,000 Iraqi Kurds were killed in an attack on the town of Halabja during 1988. Van Anraat has been accused of continuing to deliver the chemicals even after he saw horrific pictures of what Iraq was doing with the items he supplied.
Defense lawyers say van Anraat did not know that his chemicals were being used to make poison gas with which Saddam attacked civilians.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnsnews.com ...
But the MSM insisted Saddam did not have and never did have chemical weapons!
Well, quite a bunch of the chemicals are legit intermediates for insecticides and pharmaceuticals - to pin him down would require demonstrating his knowledge of the intended use.
Gee, how could this be? Saddam never had WMDs. The media said so.
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