US wants Saddam to be tried by Iraqi people

The Times ^ | April 8, 2003 | Richard Beeston

[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.”

[MadIvan]

I was just eating dinner and listening to a report on what Saddam allowed one of his generals to do the people of Basra. Firing squad might be too fast.

That's OK, the Times said yesterday that the people of Basra were attacking Saddam's people with lynch mobs, and everyone was getting a fist in. We can assume this behaviour will be repeated everywhere but Tikrit.

Regards, Ivan

[William Terrell]

Oh, I like this. I had been worried about the issue of giving credibility to that world court travesty.

[hchutch]

Great loophole?

This I gotta hear...

[68skylark]

So are you saying that the British would tolerate a death sentence from an Iraqi court on Iraqi citizens who kill British POW's, but the British themselves would not give a death sentence to an Iraqi who is guilty of that crime?

On a related note I remember reading about the early 1800's when both the U. S. Navy and the British Navy were trying to supress piracy in the West Indies. I read that U. S. officers got frustrated at how long it took to prosecute pirates in U. S. courts, so they would sometimes just drop off those they'd capture with British ships. They knew there would be a quick hanging within 24 hours or so -- and not too many formalities! Maybe in the coming days and weeks the U. S. military can sort-of return the favor to the British, if the British military cares to drop off their worst suspects with our guys.

[RightOnTheLeftCoast]

Good.

They can use the Ceausescus' trial as an example.

[Brian Allen]

<< Are the British going to overcome their reluctance to impose the death penalty? >>

The British won't have any say in the initial military government of Iraq. That -- as will be the bringing of American Justice to Iraq's war criminals and terrorists -- will be American.

But the Brits, as they have gained weeks of experience down there, might be asked to help out the American-appointed mayor of the liberated bits of Basra.

[templar]

Ceaucescu or Mussolini style, I hope. ;)

I've forgotten the details over the years, but there was a NAZI official in one of the liberated towns after the war who was held accountable for his actions by the towns people. They hanged him. Then, as soon as he lost conciousness, the revived him. And then they hanged him again. Did this until they could revive him no more.

[BartMan1]

There was a description of just such an incident in Ambrose' Citizen Soldiers. The concentration camp survivors did this to the commandant: placed him on a table with his hands bound, put the rope around his neck and hoist it up until the tips of his toes were just barely supporting him. Leave him there until he grows tired and passes out from asphyxia, lower him to the floor, revive him, and start over.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

I'd like to see the Iraqis try Saddam. That skiffy bastard would get the Mussolini treatment before sundown on Day 1 of the trial.

[Kevin Curry]

Exactly right. Exactly appropriate.

[ChemistCat]

We say we want this, and then we drop four bunker busters. That's a little schizoid.....


But I'm cool with that. ;-)