Word: saddams
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Truth be told, there was never any doubt Saddam would get the death sentence; he had himself anticipated it weeks ago, when he asked that he be shot - like a soldier - rather than hanged. That request was not honored. As the presiding judge, Rauf Rasheed Abdel Rahman, announced the verdict, the tyrant responded by shouting, "God is great," and "Long live the nation!" and an assortment of other slogans. But by his standards, it was a subdued performance; there was none of the bug-eyed ranting that has characterized many of his court appearances...
...Joining Saddam on the gallows will be his cousin and enforcer, Barazan al-Tikriti, and Awad al-Bander, who presided over many of the dictator's kangaroo courts. Saddam's former vice president, Taha Yaseen Ramadan, got life and three lower-ranking officials were each sentenced to 15 years. One official was acquitted for lack of evidence...
...nearly 13 months after the trial had begun in a high-security courtroom in Baghdad's fortified Green Zone. The eight men were tried for an incident that, until the trial began, most Iraqis had long forgotten. On July 8, 1982, at the height of the Iraq-Iran war, Saddam's motorcade was attacked by gunmen in the village of Dujail, an hour's drive north of Baghdad. During the trial, Saddam recollected the attempted assassination, saying, "Bullets were in front of me and here and there. [But] God wanted to save...
...dictator's retribution was ferocious. Although the then outlawed Dawa Party claimed responsibility for the attack, it was the residents of Dujail who bore the brunt of Saddam's revenge. In al-Bander's "revolutionary" court, 148 townspeople were tried and sentenced to death. Many died from torture before the sentences could be carried out. Hundreds of others were forced to a desert camp. Large portions of the village were razed to the ground...
...Dawa Party is a major political force in post-Saddam Iraq; current Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his predecessor Ibrahim al-Jaafari are both members of it. That meant the trial was always going to have political overtones, which tarnished its credibility with many Iraqis. The trial's first top judge resigned halfway through the proceedings of the Iraqi High Tribunal (IHT), complaining that Shi'ite and Kurdish political leaders were leaning on him for being too lenient toward Saddam's courtroom antics. The judge who was due to succeed him was blocked by Shi'ite officials because...