Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein goes on trial on Wednesday on charges of crimes against humanity in the first of what could be several cases over atrocities committed during his quarter-century in power.
But Saddam, the feared dictator captured by United States-led forces in an underground hole in December 2003, was expected to make only a brief appearance after his lawyer said he would seek an adjournment of at least three months.
Security was tight at the grey marble courtroom in the heart of Baghdad’s highly fortified Green Zone, where Saddam and seven of his former henchmen face trial for the murder of 143 Shiite villagers from Dujail, north of the capital.
They face the death penalty if convicted.
Two mortar bombs landed in the Green Zone shortly before the trial, without causing any casualties, following calls by Saddam’s supporters for attacks.
The highly anticipated trial comes just days after a largely peaceful referendum on a proposed new Constitution to lay down the democratic foundations for Iraq after Saddam’s iron-fisted rule.
The vote, the second since Saddam was toppled in April 2003 by US-led invasion forces, is widely expected to approve the charter, though election officials say results will be unknown for days because of ”anomalies”.
It remains unclear if the trial will help push Iraq’s nascent democracy forward or deepen the divide between the Sunni Arabs, favoured during his regime, and the country’s Kurds and majority Shi’ite communities.
‘He is convinced of his innocence’
”Trial of the century” trumpeted the headline in Al-Bayan, the mouthpiece of the Shi’ite Dawa party of Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari. ”Iraqis will finally see their former dictator at the mercy of Iraqi justice.”
Saddam’s lawyer, Khalil al-Dulaimi, said he met the former president on Tuesday evening and described his morale as ”excellent”.
”He … is totally convinced of his innocence.”
Dulaimi said he would ask for an adjournment of at least three months, adding: ”All options are open, including adjournment, which is one of the defence’s rights.”
The case will make history in the region as it marks the first time an Arab leader is put on trial for crimes against his own people.
The defendants — including Barzan Ibrahim Hassan al-Tikriti, Saddam’s half-brother and a former director of the feared Mukhabarat intelligence service, and former vice-president Taha Yassin Ramadan — will stand or sit in steel-barred, waist-high pens equipped with microphones.
Large gold-coloured scales of justice adorn the wall under which the Iraqi Special Tribunal’s five judges will sit.
Dulaimi said he and ”one or two” other members of Saddam’s legal team would be present.
Armed US marshals were patrolling outside the courthouse in a former Ba’ath Party headquarters palace, while journalists covering the trial were subject to full-body X-rays as well as the usual checks.
‘No tears’ for Saddam
Jaafari, whose brother and four cousins were executed during the old regime, said Iraqis would shed ”no tears” for Saddam.
”I would like to see the trial take place and justice to be done and to be seen to be done,” he was quoted by The Washington Times as saying.
”I do not rule out that there are groups who will use this opportunity to raise violence, but as far as Iraqis overall, there will be no tears for Saddam Hussein.”
An internet statement attributed to the now illegal Ba’ath party called on Saddam’s supporters to ”salute the leader” when the trial starts ”by firing bullets and mortars of death at the occupier” as well as at ”agents in the [Iraqi] army and the symbols of treason”.
Saddam (68) is likely to face subsequent charges over the gassing of 5 000 people in the Kurdish village of Halabja in March 1988; the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, during which about one million people were killed; the 1990 invasion of Kuwait; and the violent suppression of a Shi’ite uprising the following year.
Yet, these more high-profile cases have been put aside for a relatively obscure case: the 1982 killing of 143 residents of the Shi’ite village of Dujail, allegedly as revenge for an attempt on Saddam’s life.
In Dujail, villagers, including women clutching pictures of slain relatives, waved banners urging ”death for Saddam Hussein”.
At a pre-trial hearing in July last year, Saddam appeared defiant and combative.
Having ruled with an iron fist as president since 1979 and effectively run Iraq as the power behind the throne after Ba’ath came to power in 1968, he has challenged the legality of the court set up under US ”occupation”.
Since his capture near his home town of Tikrit, the fallen dictator has been held at a US-run prison near the Baghdad airport that used to carry his name.
Doubts over fairness
Human Rights Watch, which exhaustively documented atrocities committed during Saddam’s regime, has expressed doubts the trial will be fair.
The US-based group said problems with the tribunal and its statute include the lack of a requirement to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt, disputes among Iraqi politicians over court control and a ban on any commutation of death sentences.
Despite the media hoopla, Wednesday’s court appearance is likely to be limited to prosaic matters.
Saddam and his co-defendants will give their names, the judge will read the charges, and all indications are that the trial will be postponed for weeks — possibly pushing the real courtroom fireworks into next year.
The White House said it expects the trial to follow ”basic international standards”.
”This is an Iraqi process. The Iraqi people will make the decision about how they hold Saddam Hussein to account for his crimes against humanity and his brutalities against the Iraqi people,” said spokesperson Scott McClellan.
Secret US documents declassified on Tuesday on the eve of the trial painted Saddam as a cunning survivor who depended on guile and brutality to overcome challenges to his rule. — AFP
