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USA has violated International Law
Published on December 31, 2006 By Bahu Virupaksha In Current Events
Few images are likely to be more compelling than the picture of a shackled, manacled Saddam Hussein dressed in a dark overcoat calmly walking to the gallows. He was always the defiant one as his name translates in Arabic and he lived up to his name. Not a sign of weakness, not even a nervous twitch as the hangman's noose was fixed round his neck. His lips moving in silent prayer and the dignified manner in which Saddam Hussein faced his death will live in the minds of the Iraqi people. Even his many many enemies have said privately that the grainy images of Saddam's last moments will be his most enduring legacy.

Sadfdam Hussein was captured by the US miltary near Tikrit and was held as a "prisoner of war" by the Americans and as a POW was entitled to all the protection of the Geneva convention and also the recent Hamdan Judgement of the US Supreme Court though restricted in scope to the G"Bay detainees, clearly maintained that enemy combatants were entitled to the protection of both US domestic and International law. Just hours before his excecution Saddam was handed over by the Americans to the al Maliki regime. This act demonstrates the complicity of the US in the judicial murder of Saddam Hussein though for the purpose of public record the US maintains the the "independent" judiciary of the "sovereign" governemnt of Iraq carried out the sentence. It does not behove of an occupying power to send its prisoner to his death when the whole world knows that by any standard of jurisprudence Saddam did not get a free anfd fair trial. Had he been tried by an objective International Tribunal, Saddam Hussein may still have faced a death sentence but the stench of a victor's justice will not vitiate the whole process.

The death sentence was carried out in haste moments before the dawn of ID. Moslems both Shiaa and Sunni find it haighly insulting that the holy month of Id was chosen to carry out the death sentence. Why were both the USA and the Quisling regime in the Green Zone so eager to get rid of Saddam Hussein. Afterall even the Supreme Court did not mandate the excecution till the 27th of January 2007. The two other co accused and awaiting excecution along with Saddam, the Chief Juctice Bander and Hussein's half brother have not been excecuted. Why then the indecent haste to push Saddam Hussein into his grave.

The Prime Minister, al Maliki had declared weeks earlier that Saddam Hussein would be killed before the end of the year. By making such a declaration did not al Maliki usurp the functions and powers of the so called independent judiciary that operated in Iraq. In fact the PM did something terrible:He signed the death warrant of Saddam Hussein before the glare of the international media. In fact when the people of Iraq regain thir dignity they will not forget the act of al-Maliki.

The violence in Iraq will now escalate beyond all sustainable levels. The Baathists so far have remained preipheral to the strife presently unfolding in Iraq. With their cross sectarian links, political training and military skills the regime of the US backed al Maliki will have more than a handful. What is appaling is that al Maliki wants the Baathists to join hands with him and his Dawaa Gang which planned the assasination of Saddam at Dujail in 1982 for which Saddam has now been killed.

In a way George Bush is right: Iraq has crossed a "milestone". From mnow on the struggle will get more vicious and more bloody. The final statement of Saddam Hussein will not bring about an immediate reconciliation but the bais of a national reconciliation are there in that short statement."

Comments (Page 1)
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on Dec 31, 2006
The whole world has condemned the killing of Saddam Hussein especially the indecent haste with which it was carried out. USA could have shown greater statesmanship by trying Saddam in an International tribunal.
on Dec 31, 2006
Few images are likely to be more compelling than the picture of a shackled, manacled Saddam Hussein dressed in a dark overcoat calmly walking to the gallows. He was always the defiant one as his name translates in Arabic and he lived up to his name. Not a sign of weakness, not even a nervous twitch as the hangman's noose was fixed round his neck. His lips moving in silent prayer and the dignified manner in which Saddam Hussein faced his death will live in the minds of the Iraqi people. Even his many many enemies have said privately that the grainy images of Saddam's last moments will be his most enduring legacy


I have to agree with this he did not flinch.... that takes some doing when your strongest instinct is to survive.
on Dec 31, 2006
This act demonstrates the complicity of the US in the judicial murder of Saddam Hussein though for the purpose of public record the US maintains the the "independent" judiciary of the "sovereign" governemnt of Iraq carried out the sentence. It does not behove of an occupying power to send its prisoner to his death when the whole world knows that by any standard of jurisprudence Saddam did not get a free anfd fair trial. Had he been tried by an objective International Tribunal, Saddam Hussein may still have faced a death sentence but the stench of a victor's justice will not vitiate the whole process.


I disagree with this, the US did not murder Hussein.

What was not free and fair about the trial? It was a court of law of the land. How many people died trying to bring this man to justice during that trial?

Why then the indecent haste to push Saddam Hussein into his grave.


Simply because to have him languishing in a prison waiting for the sentence ot be carried out would have been a dangerous thing to do...so many things could go wrong. The sentence was passed and carried out forthwith - no time for appeals and the like...delay tactics.


on Dec 31, 2006
Oh well...   
on Dec 31, 2006
Oh well...


oh dear it is a hard day isn't it!
on Dec 31, 2006
It is called Eid,Bahu---or more exactly Eid ul Adha.
on Dec 31, 2006
The whole world has condemned the killing of Saddam Hussein especially the indecent haste with which it was carried out
Actually that is false, but regardless it is another reason we could care less about what the world thinks of us. They care more about a brutal dictator than anything else.
on Dec 31, 2006
Poppycock, Bahu.
on Dec 31, 2006
This was sectarian justice, Moqtada al-Sadr's name was chanted as he hung.

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6220829.stm
on Dec 31, 2006
Killing Saddam Hussein will not prevent the death of a single US Serviceman or woman. It will not in any sense contribute to the formation of a viable independent government in Iraq. It will not lessen by a single day the reign of violence and sectarian terror now engulfing Iraq.

Why? Because victor's justice, the imposition of the will of an Occupying Power in collusion with collaborators and Quislings, allows to no one that moment of historical reflection, that moment in which the infection of historical hatreds can be lanced and cleansed. Would South Africa have made the progress it has, if not for the proceedings of the Truth and Reconciliation Committee? Personally, I very much doubt it. Killing Hussein provides the Sunnis with a martyr, and a point around which the hatreds that America has constantly under-estimated can coalesce and organize. And you can be certain that those who hate America in Iraq are even now re-writing the history of Saddam's regime so that he will be seen as a noble defender of the Arabs against the godless aggression of the Infidel West.

Hussein committed no crime against America, posed no threat to America, was in fact America's greatest asset in the region and for a long while was a useful client of America - serving as a secular buffer against the medieval fallacies and local aspirations of Iran. Iran, which will as a consequence of the loss of political credit and the ongoing demonstration of utter impotence to crush the so-called 'insurgency', prove far more difficult to deal with than Iraq was in the early and more conventional stages of the war.

But, if you will elect fools to power and then follow them in their folly, you have no one to blame except yourselves when the consequences of their folly, and your own, are poured out upon your heads.
on Jan 01, 2007
Killing Saddam Hussein will not prevent the death of a single US Serviceman or woman. It will not in any sense contribute to the formation of a viable independent government in Iraq. It will not lessen by a single day the reign of violence and sectarian terror now engulfing Iraq.

Why? Because victor's justice, the imposition of the will of an Occupying Power in collusion with collaborators and Quislings, allows to no one that moment of historical reflection, that moment in which the infection of historical hatreds can be lanced and cleansed. Would South Africa have made the progress it has, if not for the proceedings of the Truth and Reconciliation Committee? Personally, I very much doubt it. Killing Hussein provides the Sunnis with a martyr, and a point around which the hatreds that America has constantly under-estimated can coalesce and organize. And you can be certain that those who hate America in Iraq are even now re-writing the history of Saddam's regime so that he will be seen as a noble defender of the Arabs against the godless aggression of the Infidel West.

Hussein committed no crime against America, posed no threat to America, was in fact America's greatest asset in the region and for a long while was a useful client of America - serving as a secular buffer against the medieval fallacies and local aspirations of Iran. Iran, which will as a consequence of the loss of political credit and the ongoing demonstration of utter impotence to crush the so-called 'insurgency', prove far more difficult to deal with than Iraq was in the early and more conventional stages of the war.

But, if you will elect fools to power and then follow them in their folly, you have no one to blame except yourselves when the consequences of their folly, and your own, are poured out upon your heads.



For once, (slightly shocking myself realizing such) I agree with you.

Peace, ~Lucas
on Jan 01, 2007
I disagree with this, the US did not murder Hussein.


The USA held Saddam as a PoW and under international law is responsible for his safety and well being. Instead the US military handed him over to the Sadr Death Squad which mocked and taunted him as he went to his death. And please do not make the argument that a "Free Democratic" and Soverign Governemnt tried and sentenced Saddam Hussein to death. It was a farcical, one sided and a totally unfair trial.
Simply because to have him languishing in a prison waiting for the sentence ot be carried out would have been a dangerous thing to do...so many things could go wrong


Simply because to have him languishing in a prison waiting for the sentence ot be carried out would have been a dangerous thing to do...so many things could go wrong

So you seem to agree that the haste with which the dark deed of judicial murder was carried out was only an act of convienience.


They care more about a brutal dictator than anything else.


Now if Saddam Hussein deserved to hang then what is the punishment for the rulers of so called democratic countries who invaded an Independent country on the false pretext of finding WMD and then caused the death of nearly 650 000 civilians.



Hussein committed no crime against America, posed no threat to America, was in fact America's greatest asset in the region and for a long while was a useful client of America - serving as a secular buffer against the medieval fallacies and local aspirations of Iran


Hussein committed no crime against America, posed no threat to America, was in fact America's greatest asset in the region and for a long while was a useful client of America - serving as a secular buffer against the medieval fallacies and local aspirations of Iran

I agree that Iraq was backed to the hilt by the USA when the alleged crimes against humanity were carried out.
on Jan 01, 2007
By handing over Saddam Hussein, a POW, to the Sadr Death Squad the USA has once again did an "EXTRAORDINARY RENDITION"
on Jan 01, 2007
Bahu, is there no end to your Anti American bigotry. Hussein was tried and convicted by the laws of Iraq... and executed by the same.

It's too bad you weren't a Kurd under Hussein's "leadership" then your bigotry would have choked to death with you as your hero laughed while you died.

It is people like you who made the "Final Solution" possible.
on Jan 01, 2007
When is your turn to become a martyr for anti US terrorism? When will you don the vest and kill innocent women and children in America? I bet you are living for the day you get to blow yourself up in the name of your hatred for me and my fellow Americans.
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