July 22
IRAQ:
Hussein Jousts With Iraqi Judge Over His Rights in a Court Hearing
A new court videotape broadcast on Thursday showed a caustic but emaciated
Saddam Hussein complaining to an investigative judge about limits on
access to his lawyer and about the entire process of holding him prisoner
while Iraqi prosecutors prepare to try him for atrocities committed during
his 24-year rule.
"Right now, I'm a prisoner - that's what is being said," Mr. Hussein said
in the tape aired by Dubai-based Al Arabiya television, which provided the
first opportunity for the public to hear the former dictator speaking
since a court appearance last July. "It's a game, as you'll see. I am a
prisoner of the Iraqi government, but that government was appointed by the
Americans."
Moments later, Mr. Hussein interrupted the judge, Munir Hadad, as he read
from a legal document outlining the former Iraqi leader's right to a
lawyer.
"When do I see my lawyer?" Mr. Hussein asked, motioning to Khalil
al-Dulaimi, an Iraqi defense attorney hired by the Hussein family. "Is it
right that I see my lawyer only when there is a hearing, and that I know
that there is to be a hearing only when I'm already in it? Is this the
law?" Judge Hadad listened pensively, but appeared at one point to run out
of patience.
"I want to say this for the historical record," the judge said,
interrupting Mr. Hussein. "We have been listening to you for 35 years. We
are an independent court. We have not yielded to pressure from anyone. The
people elected the government."
"No, no," Mr. Hussein retorted, in a mocking tone, waving his hands
dismissively. "You are a man of the law, and you should understand."
Resuming the argument later, he pointed to the judge's robe, black with
white trim, and said, "When you wear that robe, you should be independent,
whether you are facing me, or the foreigners, or any Iraqi."
Another tape of Mr. Hussein testifying was released by court officials
last month, but that one was silent. The new tape showed one major change
in the 68-year-old former leader since last year's court appearance - a
marked weakening of his voice, to the point of huskiness.
Mr. Hussein wore a dark suit, but was tieless, in accordance with rules
set at a prison camp near Baghdad airport where American military guards
watch over more than 80 high-ranking officials of the ousted government.
American officials have said that the ban on wearing ties was set to
prevent suicide attempts, not to humiliate Mr. Hussein, who was a
fastidious dresser when he was in power.
At last year's appearance, Mr. Hussein appeared to have lost at least 30
pounds since he disappeared from public view in April 2003, when he fled
Baghdad ahead of American troops and lived a fugitive existence until his
capture 8 months later. On the new tape, he appeared thinner still, with
his once well-groomed hair curling to his open collar, and his gray beard
straggly. He appeared anxious, frequently jabbing his hands and following
occasional verbal thrusts at the judge with periods of intense silence and
darting eyes.
"I beg your pardon," he said at one point, when the judge admonished him
for interrupting.
Nothing in the tape indicated when the questioning occurred, and Al
Arabiya, a channel seen widely across the Middle East, gave no indication
of how it was acquired. One theory was that the Iraqi Special Tribunal
might have released the tape to rebut suggestions by Ahmed Chalabi, a
deputy prime minister, that the tribunal has been infiltrated by former
members of Mr. Hussein's ruling Baath Party, and that they plan to spare
the former Iraqi leaders, in part by delaying their trials.
Mr. Chalabi's allegations have thrown the tribunal into turmoil just as it
enters the final stages of preparing for the first of its trials.
On Sunday, Raid Juhi, one of the judges Mr. Chalabi wants to dismiss,
announced that Mr. Hussein will go on trial, probably in mid-September, on
the first of about a dozen charges for which he is being questioned. That
case centers on the execution of 150 men and youths implicated by Mr.
Hussein's Revolutionary Court in an attempt to assassinate Mr. Hussein at
the town of Dujail in 1982.
The videotape broadcast on Thursday showed Mr. Hussein being questioned on
the deportation in the late 1980's of Shiite Kurds from the district of
Khanaqin, 120 miles northeast of Baghdad on the Iranian border. The plight
of the deportees, many of whom disappeared, is part of a broader
investigation into the mass killing of Iraqi Kurds during Iraq's
eight-year war with Iran.
At his news conference on Sunday, Mr. Juhi said the tribunal expects to
refer Mr. Hussein to a separate trial for his involvement in the Kurdish
massacres within weeks.
A tribunal official who demanded anonymity because of his concern for his
job has said that Mr. Juhi advanced the announcement of the Hussein trial
after Mr. Chalabi prepared letters demanding the dismissal of 28 judges,
prosecutors and officials because they were former Baathists.
Nine of them have already been dismissed, and 19 others, including Mr.
Juhi and at least some of the judges named to sit on the 3 5-member panels
that will preside at trials, are waiting to see whether Mr. Chalabi, who
heads the government's de-Baathication committee, will press his campaign.
The outcome has been deferred while Iraqi legislators review a draft of a
new statute that will adopt the tribunal, originally created under an
American occupation statute, as a fully Iraqi institution. One proposal
under discussion, put forward by moderates in Prime Minister Ibrahim
al-Jaafari's government, is to amend a provision in the American statute
that excluded Baathists from working for the tribunal, and substitute the
standard used for all other Iraqi government agencies, which bar only the
4 highest ranks of former Baathists. Through aides, Mr. Chalabi has vowed
to block the move.
(source: New York Times)
