Team Infidel
Forum Spin Doctor
Media: AFP
Byline: n/a
Date: 05 October 2006
WASHINGTON - Ramsey Clark, a former US attorney general who is one of
Saddam Hussein's lawyers, said Thursday that any death sentence against the
former Iraqi president would increase violence in the strife-torn country.
"It seems clear that a guilty verdict will set off catastrophic violence"
and that a death sentence would be even worse, Clark told a Washington
press conference.
"It's hard to know how many Iraqis, dozens, hundreds, thousands, will die
because of the sentence," he said.
A date for a verdict in the crimes against humanity trial against Saddam
and seven co-accused, which opened in October, 2005, is due to be set soon
after the trial resumes on October 16.
If Saddam is found guilty and sentenced to death, Iraqi law lays down that
he should be executed within 30 days, said Clark.
The US attorney general from 1967-69 reaffirmed his belief that the court
is illegal because it was set up only to try Saddam. He criticised the
judges because they were "selected, trained, paid, protected by the United
States."
Saddam and his co-defendants, including a half brother Barzan al-Tikriti,
are on trial for a crackdown on a Shiite town of Dujail following an
assassination attempt in 1982.
He faces a separate trial for genocide against Iraq's Kurdish minority in
the 1988 Anfal campaign.
Byline: n/a
Date: 05 October 2006
WASHINGTON - Ramsey Clark, a former US attorney general who is one of
Saddam Hussein's lawyers, said Thursday that any death sentence against the
former Iraqi president would increase violence in the strife-torn country.
"It seems clear that a guilty verdict will set off catastrophic violence"
and that a death sentence would be even worse, Clark told a Washington
press conference.
"It's hard to know how many Iraqis, dozens, hundreds, thousands, will die
because of the sentence," he said.
A date for a verdict in the crimes against humanity trial against Saddam
and seven co-accused, which opened in October, 2005, is due to be set soon
after the trial resumes on October 16.
If Saddam is found guilty and sentenced to death, Iraqi law lays down that
he should be executed within 30 days, said Clark.
The US attorney general from 1967-69 reaffirmed his belief that the court
is illegal because it was set up only to try Saddam. He criticised the
judges because they were "selected, trained, paid, protected by the United
States."
Saddam and his co-defendants, including a half brother Barzan al-Tikriti,
are on trial for a crackdown on a Shiite town of Dujail following an
assassination attempt in 1982.
He faces a separate trial for genocide against Iraq's Kurdish minority in
the 1988 Anfal campaign.