Posted on 08/23/2006 7:31:48 AM PDT by Valin
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Cursing Saddam Hussein, a Kurdish woman told the former Iraqi leader's genocide trial on Wednesday she was horribly burned after aircraft bombed her mountain village with chemical weapons.
"I lost my sight. My children lost their sight ... My house was razed to the ground. May God blind them all," said Adiba Owla Bayez, pointing at the former Iraqi president and his six co-defendants on the third day of the trial.
Describing a spring evening in 1987, the 45-year-old mother of five said aircraft dropped bombs behind her house and she had immediately noticed a difference from previous attacks.
"We smelt a peculiar smell. It was rotten apple ... My daughter Nargis said she had pain in the stomach and in her eyes. She was vomiting. All my children were vomiting. I too felt like that and started vomiting," Bayez said.
The testimony was similar to the recollections of other witnesses to the events of April 16, 1987, nearly a year before the formal launch of the Anfal -- Spoils of War -- campaign in the Balisan valley, north of Sulaimaniya.
Bayez, the wife of the trial's first witness, Ali Mustafa Hama, said she suffered two miscarriages and had an infant die at the age of three months following the attack.
Saddam and his cousin, Ali Hassan al-Majid, are charged with genocide over the seven-month operation. Majid earned his nickname "Chemical Ali" after poison gas attacks in the north.
The other defendants, who argue the attacks were legitimate military strikes against Iraqi Kurds fighting with Iran against the regime in Baghdad, are accused of war crimes. Both charges carry a maximum penalty of death by hanging.
SKIN PEELED
Bayez said that once the bombardment ceased, a helicopter hunted the villagers as they fled into the mountains. Those that escaped took refuge in caves.
"We were wounded, sick, but still fled. By now I was vomiting blood. My children were blind. My skin on the body had peeled off," she told the court, speaking Kurdish and wearing traditional black dress.
Saddam's soldiers soon rounded them up, shipping them to Arbil, where they were held with no medical treatment until being moved again, she said.
"After nine days guards said 'all the wounded come to the courtyard of the detention center'. I was screaming as my leg was burned. I was unable to walk. My skin was peeled off, my children ... their skin was peeled," she said.
After photographing the captured Kurds, the men were separated and led away and the women and children were transported back to the countryside, where they were dumped.
The day's second witness, a Kurdish woman called Bahiya Mahmoud who lost eight family members, gave a similar account of the attack. But her cross-examination yielded a rare moment of levity during the otherwise grim proceedings.
Asked if she cooked with garlic, a defense lawyer reduced one of the prosecutors and Majid to outright laughter -- and even drew a flicker of a smile from Saddam -- by suggesting it was her kitchen, rather than any bombs, that she had smelled.
On Monday, Saddam refused to plead and called the court a tool of the U.S. occupation. The Shi'ite judge entered a not guilty plea on behalf of him and Majid, who also refused to enter a plea.
Unlike many witnesses in Saddam's first trial, for crimes against humanity over the killing of 148 Shi'ite men from Dujail, none of four heard so far have concealed their identity from the man who ruled Iraq through fear for three decades.
At least one defense lawyer has used a voice-distorting microphone and avoided appearing on television.
Three defense counsel in the Dujail trial have been killed, prompting critics to say a fair trial is impossible amid the sectarian and ethnic bloodshed ravaging Iraq.
A verdict in the Dujail trial is expected in October and Saddam faces the death penalty.
I wish this bastard was swinging at the end of a rope already.
Can't wait to see this on the network news tonight.
"Asked if she cooked with garlic, a defense lawyer reduced one of the prosecutors and Majid to outright laughter"
Yeah, bitch, the smell of garlic rendered my children and I blind, and caused our skin to slide off while we puked blood. I guess you're right, I'd like to drop charges.
OMG his freakin lawyers think this is a joke??? That poor woman. I hope he and his cohorts get a nice public hanging.
Do I detect a hint of sarcasm? :-)
Never in Saddam's wildest dreams, did he ever think he would be in court some day, having to give account for this.
I love that Kurdish commercial and just smile and say a prayer for them when I see those beautiful Kurdish children saying thank you to America.
One of the reasons this trial has gone on as long as it has is it sends a message to "leaders" of the area that this could happen to you, and this is not the old Iraq.
(One mans opinion, freely given & worth almost that much)
Always!
He wants him to have his arms and legs cut off, his eyes and tongue removed and his ears destroyed but left alive for a long time.
They really hate Saddam.
And justifiably so.
Remind me never to get this person angry with me! :-)
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