October 28, 2005

THE TRIAL OF SADDAM HUSSEIN AND HEADS OF HIS REGIME. RESIDENTS OF DUJAIL DEMAND THE EXECUTION OF SADDAM AND HIS AIDES. THE GENERAL PROSECUTOR INFORMS SADDAM ABOUT HIS CRIMES. FRANCE CALLS FOR UNVEILING THE TRUTH ABOUT SADDAM'S CRIMES. THE DETENTION OF YASSER SABAWI AND AL-QAEDA REPRESENTATIVE IN AL-ANBAR. The trial of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein on charges of crimes against humanity has been adjourned until November 28. The decision has been made by the trial's Kurdish judge, following a request by Saddam's Iraqi lawyer for a three-month delay. The case centres on the killing of more than 140 Iraqi Shiites, in revenge for a failed assassination attempt against Saddam in 1982. A frail-looking Saddam Hussein was led into the Iraqi Special Tribunal inside Baghdad's fortified Green Zone. Presiding judge, Rizgar Mohammad Amin, then asked the former dictator to identify himself. "I would like to say I refuse to answer these questions," Saddam said. Clashing several times with the judge, Saddam repeatedly attacked the legality of the court. "I do not recognise the authority which was given to you by the invaders. Whatever is built on an illegal foundation is itself illegal," he said. The judge then charged Saddam and seven of his former officials with murder, torture and forced expulsion. Saddam Hussein pleaded not guilty to charges of murder and torture as his long-awaited trial began with him arguing about the legitimacy of the court and scuffling with guards. The first session of the trial lasted about three hours, and the judge ordered the adjournment until Nov. 28. Saddam and his seven co-defendants could face the death penalty if convicted for the 1982 massacre of nearly 150 Shiites in the town of Dujail. They are being tried in the former headquarters of Saddam's Baath party. At the trial's opening, the ousted Iraqi leader stood and asked presiding Judge Rizgar Mohammad Amin, a Kurd: "Who are you? I want to know who you are." "I do not respond to this so-called court, with all due respect to its people, and I retain my constitutional right as the president of Iraq," he said, brushing off Amin's attempts to interrupt him. "Neither do I recognize the body that has designated and authorized you, nor the aggression because all that has been built on false basis is false." Amin tried to get Saddam to formally identify himself but Saddam refused and finally sat. Amin read his name for him, calling him the "former president of Iraq," bringing a protest from Saddam, who insisted he was still in the post. Later, Amin read the defendants their rights and then read the charges, which are the same for all, and told them they face possible execution if convicted. Saddam sat slumped low in his chair and occasionally wrote notes on a yellow pad throughout the hearing. Amin then asked each for their plea. He started with the 68-year-old ousted dictator, saying "Mr. Saddam, go ahead. Are you guilty or innocent?" Saddam holding a copy of the Qur'an he brought with him into the session and held throughout replied quietly, "I said what I said. I am not guilty," referring to his arguments earlier in the session. Amin read out the plea, "Innocent." The confrontation then became physical. When a break was called, Saddam stood, smiling, and asked to step out of the room. When two guards tried to grab his arms to escort him out, he angrily shook them off. Saddam and the guards shoved each other and yelled for about a minute. In the end, Saddam was allowed to walk independently, with the two guards behind him, out of the room for the break. The Dujail trial is the first of around a dozen cases prosecutors intend to bring against Saddam and members of his inner circle in an attempt to bring accounting for a 23-year regime that saw tens of thousands of its own people killed and imprisoned. Other cases include his regime's Anfal Offensive that killed some 180,000 Kurds, a poison gas attack on the town of Halabja that killed 5,000 and a crackdown on rebellious Shiites and Kurds in 1991. The five-judge panel will both hear the case and render a verdict against Saddam and the other defendants. Many Iraqis and others across the Middle East were glued to their television sets to watch the first-ever criminal trial of an Arab leader. The camera did not show four of the five judges, whose identities have been kept secret, focusing instead on Amin, the Kurdish chief judge whose name was announced only just before the trial. The chief prosecutor, Jaafar Al-Mousawi, then outlined the case against the men. Afterward, Saddam's lawyer, Khalil Al-Dulaimi, asked for the names of the witnesses who will testify for the prosecution names that have been kept strictly secret to prevent reprisals against them. Amin said Al-Dulaimi could ask the prosecutors for the names but did not say if he would order them handed over. Saddam and his fellow defendants were seated in three rows inside a pen made of white iron slats. Starting the session, Amin called in the defendants one by one. Saddam was the last to enter, escorted by two Iraqi guards in bulletproof vests guiding him by the elbow. He glanced at journalists watching through bulletproof glass from an adjoining room. He motioned for his escorts to slow down a little. The other defendants include Saddam's former intelligence chief Barazan Ibrahim, former Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan and other lower-level Baathist civil servants. Most were wearing traditional Arab robes and complained they were not allowed to have headdresses, so court officials brought out red headdresses for them. The 68-year-old ousted Iraqi leader and his seven co-defendants, all top officials from his regime, sat in two rows, with Saddam in the front, directly facing the panel of five judges that will both hear the the case and render a verdict in what could be the first of several trials of Saddam for atrocities carried out during his 23-year-rule. Defense lawyers sat to the defendants' right, the prosecutors to their left in the small courtroom, located in the marble building that once served as the National Command Headquarters of his feared Baath Party. The building, located in Baghdad's Green Zone, the heavily fortified district where Iraq's government, parliament and the U.S. Embassy are located, was ringed with 3-meter-high (10-foot) blast walls and U.S. and Iraqi troops, with several Humvees and at least one tank deployed outside. The trial was being aired with a 20-minute delay on state-run Iraqi television and on satellite stations across Iraq and the Arab world. Many Iraqis, particularly from the Shiite Muslim majority and the Kurdish minority, the two communities most oppressed by Saddam's regime, have eagerly awaited the chance to see the man who ruled Iraq with unquestioned and total power held to justice. Saddam Hussein's lawyer said a 40-day adjournment issued by the Kurdish judge presiding over the first day of the former Iraqi dictator's trial for crimes against humanity is not long enough for the defence to prepare its case fully. Saddam has been charged with crimes against humanity in connection with the deaths of more than 140 Shiite Muslim men after a group of young Shiites tried to assassinate him near Dujail, a town about 60 kilometres north of Baghdad, in 1982. Saddam and his seven co-defendants have all pleaded not guilty to the charges. "They adjourned it until November 28 but we need at least three months to study the files," lawyer Khalil al-Dulaimi said after the three-hour hearing. "We will see what we can do." Mr Dulaimi says he will work to obtain licences for foreign lawyers to come to Baghdad to defend Saddam in court. "We will try to get licences for foreign lawyers. They are trying to prevent my client from having a fair trial," he said. When asked about the opening day of the trial, Mr Dulaimi said it went well and praised presiding judge Rizgar Mohammed Amin, who is from the ethnic Kurdish community that mostly opposed Saddam while he was in power. "He was very wonderful," Mr Dulaimi said of Judge Amin after he remained firm but polite in the face of more than one harangue from Saddam. However, Mr Dulaimi had some strong criticism for the prosecutor. "He was not acting as a prosecutor but rather as an adversary; it was political," Mr Dulaimi said. Another member of Saddam's legal team, Abdel al Haq al-Ani, described the trial in Baghdad as "pure theatre". "The Americans are intent on making this pure theatre, a show trial," said Ms Ani, who is coordinating Saddam's defence effort from London. Although the US-backed investigation had two years to prepare for the trial, Ms Ani said the evidence presented to the defence linking Saddam to Dujail was a presidential decree he signed for the execution of dozens of alleged culprits in the assassination attempt. "This is the only so-called evidence they have linking Saddam Hussein to the charges and it is ridiculous," she said. "I am not sure what else is expected from any president in the world if he is faced with an armed mutiny like the one in Dujail. What should he do, kiss their cheeks?" But the Iraqi ambassador in London, Dr Salah Al Shaikhly, has defended the legitimacy of the trial, saying it is a historic moment in the country's history. "The trial is fair, can you imagine during Saddam's time a defence lawyer getting up and saying what he said in court," he said. "This is one of the most fantastic things in the history of Iraq. Not the past 35 years but also for the past 82-years, since it's been established in the 1920s and 30s." Meantime France called for unveiling the truth about Saddam's crimes. Reaction to the trial has been mixed on the streets of Iraq. Hakim al-Dujaili is a former prisoner of the Saddam regime and he is delighted the ex-president is finally facing a court. "I was 14 at the time, what can I tell you. They tortured me to try to get me to sign a confession and they killed my brother. Execution is too good for Saddam. I want him put in a zoo," he said. "All residents of Dujail call for executing Saddam and his aides, and we call for punishing all those who contributed to harming residents of Dujail," another Iraqi said. "Forty-five people from my tribe were killed when he took revenge, including four of my sons. I was jailed and given electric shocks," said Fadhel Jafar, a survivor from the Dujail killings. Meanwhile, insurgents killed 26 people, including six Shiites who were lined up at a factory and gunned down in front of their fellow workers, police said. In two other deadly attacks, six civilians were killed when mortar rounds hit their homes in Samarra, 95 kilometers north of Baghdad, and three election commission officials were shot and killed on the outskirts of the capital in Abu Ghraib, as they drove home after another round of counting ballots from the constitutional referendum, police said. Insurgents killed three Iraqis and two coalition soldiers one American and one British in the hours before Saddam Hussein's trial began. A bomb also went off at a famous monument in a Baghdad square honoring the 8th-century founder of Baghdad to whom Saddam had often compared himself. The blast, which toppled the bust of Abu Jaafar Al-Mansour but caused no injuries, appeared to be a jab at the former dictator. Shortly before Saddam's trial was to begin in Baghdad's highly secured Green Zone, suspected insurgents shot and killed Hakim Mirza, one of several municipal directors of the capital, and his driver, in the southern neighborhood of Dora, said police Maj. Falah Al-Mohamadawi. In other violence in Iraq, a roadside bomb hit a U.S. Army patrol, killing one soldier and wounding two near Iskandariyah, 30 miles south of Baghdad, the military said. The attack raised to at least 1,981 the number of members of the U.S. military who have died since the beginning of the Iraq war, according to an Associated Press count. A British soldier also was killed by a roadside bomb in the southern region of Basra where most British forces are based, Britain's Ministry of Defense said. Meanwhile Iraqi security forces have arrested a nephew of toppled president Saddam Hussein in the northern city of Tikirt on suspicion of financing insurgents, national security adviser Mowaffaq al-Rubaie said. Yasser Sabawi was arrested as residents of Tikrit -- Saddam's hometown -- protested to mark the beginning of the ousted president's trial on charges of crimes against humanity, Rubaie said. "He was seen distributing money to incite violence," Rubaie said. Rubaie said Sabawi was suspected of funneling money to Arab insurgents who have a staged a relentless series of attacks targeting both civilians and the Baghdad's U.S.-backed government. "He is one of the people who fund terrorism and we believe there is strong evidence that he is one of the channels that brings in funds used to finance the terrorist operations in the north and the northeast of the country," he said. Sabawi is one of the sons of Saddam's half brother and former presidential adviser Sabawi Ibrahim Hasan al-Tikriti. Up to a hundred people took to the streets of Tikrit chanting support for Saddam, who went on trial in Baghdad and who still commands loyalty among some Sunni Arabs who benefited under his rule. In September, an Iraqi court sentenced another one of Sabawi's sons, Ayman, to life in prison on charges of financing insurgents and possession of bombs. Iraqi officials say Sabawi was detained in Syria earlier this year. He has been questioned by Iraqi's Special Tribunal, which began trying Iraq's ousted leadership on Wednesday, in connection with crimes committed against Shi'ites and Kurds. The United States has frozen the assets of six of Saddam's nephews, accusing them of funding insurgents that include former Baathists and Saddam supporters who want to topple Iraq's Shi'ite and Kurdish-led government. On the other hand US forces killed 12 militants in western Iraq including an al-Qaeda leader responsible for attacks around Ramadi, a focus of the Sunni Arab insurgency, the US military said overnight. A statement said Sa'ad Ali Firas Muntar al-Dulaimi, also known as Abu Abdullah, was among 12 people killed in a series of October 15 raids on suspected insurgents in Ramadi, about 110km west of Baghdad. The statement said Dulaimi was "highly regarded" by top al-Qaeda leaders in Iraq including the group's chief, Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. "(Dulaimi) was chiefly responsible for planning and executing all terrorist attacks on Iraqi and coalition forces in the Ramadi and Falluja areas," the statement said. Ramadi and Falluja in western Anbar province are both bastions of insurgents who have waged a bloody campaign of bombings, murders and kidnappings against the US-backed Baghdad government. US forces have conducted a series of operations against insurgents around the two cities and areas to the west over the past three weeks to try to impose security ahead of last weekend's constitutional referendum in Iraq. In Washington, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice heralded the constitutional referendum and said the American strategy in Iraq was to "clear areas from insurgent control, hold them securely, and build durable, national Iraqi institutions." Rice told the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee the United States is working to dismantle the insurgent network and disrupt foreign support for them, maintain security in areas insurgents no longer hold, and build national institutions to "sustain security forces, bring rule of law, visibly deliver essential services, and offer the Iraqi people hope for a better economic future." Meantime Iraq's constitution, a post-Saddam Hussein milestone for the nation, has been adopted despite strong opposition from disaffected Sunni Arabs, officials announced yesterday. "It is an accomplishment for all Iraqis," said commission spokesman Farid Ayyar in announcing the results 10 days after the landmark referendum on a charter that lays down a democratic future for the violence-wracked country. Nationwide, 78 percent of Iraqis voted for the constitution, the commission said, while opponents failed to muster a two-thirds majority against in at least three of Iraq's 18 provinces which would have meant its rejection. The final results showed that only two provinces, the insurgent stronghold of Anbar in the west and Saddam Hussein's home region of Salaheddin, had mustered a "No" vote of at least two-thirds one short of the three provinces necessary to veto the measure. The northern province of Nineveh, thought to represent a third possible "No" due to its large population of Sunni Arabs, ended up with only 55.08 percent of voters rejecting the charter. "It's a civilized step that puts Iraq on the path to democracy, to rebuilding our new Iraq," said Ayyar. The United States and Britain were among the first to congratulate Iraq on the result. "It's a landmark day in the history of Iraq," White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters. Britain hailed the result as a milestone and looked forward to "maximum participation" in new elections to be held in two months. "The Iraqi people have shown again their determination to defy the terrorists and take part in the democratic process," said Foreign Secretary Jack Straw. But 2.1 million of Iraq's 15.5 million voters nonetheless opposed the constitution, largely a result of fears among Sunni Arabs that it will place too much power in the hands of regions and lead to a break-up of Iraq. "The referendum led to a split instead of a union," said political science professor Hasan Bazaz. "There is polarization from the results because there was no accord among (Sunni and other) constituencies on the text." The United Nations called for renewed efforts to woo disenchanted Sunnis away from the insurgency and into the political process. "The results of the referendum have indicated the degree of political polarization in Iraq," said UN envoy Ashraf Jehangir Qazi. "This poses an ongoing challenge for all Iraqis and underscores the importance of an inclusive national dialogue." The sentiment was echoed by EU external relations commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner who said, "It is important that we see an even more inclusive process, to elect an administration that is fully representative of the whole country." Arab Sunni leaders rejected the referendum, saying "fraudulent" results would discourage them from taking part in December elections and fuel insurgent violence. "Violence is not the only solution, if politics offers solutions so that we can move in that direction. But there is very little hope that we can make any gains in the elections," said Sunni leader Saleh Mutlaq. "I call on the free world. I call on the United Nations to intervene. We will not accept any referendum or election without international observers." Carina Perelli, head of the UN team providing technical assistance to the Iraqi government, told reporters the election results should be trusted. Iraqi officials had earlier said they were auditing early results which indicated more than 90 percent of voters backed "Yes" in certain areas, leading some opponents of the charter to question whether the results were being fixed. US officials sponsoring the political process had described the election, in which many in the disaffected Sunni Arab minority took part, as a success for democracy. But Mutlaq and other prominent Sunnis who had been involved in negotiations on the draft charter accused the Iraqi electoral commission of bowing to US pressure and fixing results in favor of Shiite and Kurdish leaders dominating the government. The Iraqi government has been struggling to draw Sunnis into the political process but the charter has deepened sectarian divisions which have generated talk of civil war. On the other hand in line with the preliminary results of the vote on the constitution, the Secretary General of the Arab League, Amr Moussa, who concluded a visit to Iraq, said that he is satisfied following the talks he held with various Iraqi forces, but he stressed that he had realized the difficulties impeding the Arab initiative aiming at convening an Iraqi national reconciliation conference. In statements to press who accompanied him on his way to Cairo, Moussa said that the extent of the Iraqi response to the Arab League initiative was high and positive, noting that the matter requires more consultations with the Iraqi side by all its components, and with certain proposals concerning dates and participants in the conference and preparations for it. Moussa said that the Arab League Assistant Secretary General for political affairs Ahmad Bin Hali will lead an Arab League delegation to Iraq within one week in order to maintain an understanding over other details of the initiative, stressing that he received the support of leaders of the political forces and parties, Christian and Islamic religious clerics, and all sects of the Iraqi people with whom he had met over the initiative. Iraqi figures had stressed that a preliminary conference for the Iraqi national reconciliation conference will be held on November 15 in Cairo. However, this information was not officially confirmed. Concerning political developments in Iraq, the Secretary General of the Arab League Amr Moussa consulted with Iraqi political forces in order to arrange for the Iraqi reconciliation conference which the AL proposed to convene in Cairo in mid November. The Arab League chief attended a session for the Kurdish parliament in Irbil and commended in a speech he delivered before the parliament what he called the "new Iraq," stressing that Iraq by all its colors and sects represents an integrated part of the Arab states. Moussa stressed the need that Iraq achieve self reconciliation and to conclude a comprehensive national coexistence among all members of society. He considered that what he called "a free independent united Iraq represents a qualitative political development in the region." He added there are many obstacles the Iraqis should overcome to achieve a stable situation towards a positive future in which the Iraqis enjoy the right of who will rule them. Moussa who met with the Kurdish Leader Masoud al-Barzani on Saturday explained that the mission of the reconciliation conference is difficult but not impossible, noting that the initiative deals with all national political forces in Iraq. Barazani expressed a high flexibility from the Kurdish side in order to provide the initiative a success. Moussa also got the support of the Supreme Shiite clergy in Iraq Ayatullah Ali al-Seistani with whom he had met in Najaf on Saturday on the idea of convening the conference. For his part, the secretary general for the Sunni national dialogue council Saleh al-Mutlaq said that the AL chief extended a verbal invitation to him to attend the Cairo conference. He added that these calls will cover 80 Iraqis representing all trends and groups. He also agreed on the return back of the AL assistant secretary general Ahmad Bin Hali to Baghdad once again to complete preparations for the conference. Moussa met with the Muslim Scholars Commission which set before him its conditions for "national reconciliation" according to what it called the vision of the national forces which stand against occupation. But he said that the proposals made by the commission are not "conditions," rather an explanation for certain situations, points and topics to be proposed by the representatives of the commission. The commission distributed a statement that specifies conditions for national reconciliation proposed by the founding conference and the Sunni Muslim Scholars commission, mainly "defining an internationally guaranteed schedule for the withdrawal of the occupation forces, the source of the problem." The commission stressed that "the Iraqi resistance is a legitimate right and terrorism by all its means is a rejected crime." It called "for efforts to bring back the Iraqi army after distancing bad members, according to a mechanism that can be agreed upon later." Moussa met with some Shiite leaders who criticized the Arab League over what they called its late role in trying to solve the Iraqi crisis. In that meeting, Moussa stressed the need of finding out a political solution that would include all. The Secretary General of the Arab League, Amr Moussa, who was visiting Baghdad deplored the acts of violence which target innocents in Iraq, stressing simultaneously that there should be a political solution that satisfies all." Moussa explained to journalists in conclusion of his meeting with the leader of the United Iraqi Coalition parliamentary bloc Abdul Aziz al-Hakim "we are against all those who stand against innocent Iraqis," calling for a political solution that takes into account the interests of all sides. For his part Hakim, who presides over the Higher Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, strongly criticized the Arab League, expressing strong blame on it "because its position and presence in Baghdad was late." Moussa arrived in Baghdad to prepare for a national dialogue in his first visit to Iraq since the fall of the regime of Saddam Hussein, amid strong security measures. Earlier, Mousa met with the speaker of the Iraqi national assembly (parliament) Hajem al-Hosni. He stressed in a press conference held with the Interim Iraqi prime minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari that the Arab League and the Arab states are the safe net politically and strategically for the Iraqi people. He added that the Arab League will shortly open an office in Iraq, but he did not specify a date for that. For his part, Jaafari did not oppose the convening of the national reconciliation. But he set a precondition that it is not to include the participation of what he described as "terrorists and Baathists who occupied high level positions."