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Current Events => Breaking News => Topic started by: BlueStateSaint on March 02, 2009, 02:21:48 PM

Title: Iraqi court acquits former top aide to Saddam Hussein
Post by: BlueStateSaint on March 02, 2009, 02:21:48 PM
(http://www.topnews.in/law/files/Tariq-Aziz2.jpg)


I kinda expected this, though I can't say that I'm happy about it.  At least they've got two other shots at him.


Quote
Iraqi court acquits former top aide to Saddam Hussein

By Steven Lee Myers Published: March 2, 2009

BAGHDAD:

Iraq's special criminal court Monday acquitted Tariq Aziz, the man who once served as the urbane, cigar-smoking public face of Saddam Hussein's rule, delivering the most significant not-guilty verdict in a series of prosecutions for crimes against humanity that occurred before the U.S. invasion in 2003.

Aziz, who will turn 73 next month, remained in custody, facing charges in two other cases. Only hours after his acquittal, he appeared before another judge to defend himself against charges that he was involved in a massacre of Kurds in 1983.

Even so, the verdict - the first in a case against him - was viewed as a sign of judicial fairness and independence for a controversial tribunal that has been deliberating the most heinous crimes of the Saddam era.

Aziz, who served as foreign minister of Iraq during the invasion of Kuwait in 1990 and as Saddam's deputy prime minister during the U.S. invasion in 2003, was acquitted of culpability in a brutal crackdown against Shiite protesters that followed the assassination of a revered cleric, Grand Ayatollah Mohammed al-Sadr, in 1999.

The court convicted Ali Hassan al-Majid, a former aide known as "Chemical Ali" for ordering poison gas attacks against the Kurds in the 1980s, for his role in those killings, sentencing him to death for a third time.



I can see the judicial fairness idea.  And, as I said above, I'm glad that he's remaining in custody for the other two trials.

Link:

http://www.iht.com/articles/2009/03/02/mideast/iraq.php
Title: Re: Iraqi court acquits former top aide to Saddam Hussein
Post by: NHSparky on March 02, 2009, 02:51:43 PM
C'mon, let's be fair--even here, it took how many times before OJ finally got nailed?

Ditto Gotti, et al.  We're not perfect, and we can't expect others to be.  But the fact they're facing justice is good enough for me.
Title: Re: Iraqi court acquits former top aide to Saddam Hussein
Post by: thundley4 on March 02, 2009, 03:01:34 PM
(http://www.topnews.in/law/files/Tariq-Aziz2.jpg)
Tariq-Aziz

Kinda looks like Captain Kangaroo.
Title: Re: Iraqi court acquits former top aide to Saddam Hussein
Post by: BlueStateSaint on March 02, 2009, 03:27:46 PM
Hey, thundley--do you mind if I transplant that pic into my post, so as to snazz it up on the main page?
Title: Re: Iraqi court acquits former top aide to Saddam Hussein
Post by: thundley4 on March 02, 2009, 04:39:58 PM
Hey, thundley--do you mind if I transplant that pic into my post, so as to snazz it up on the main page?

That's why I put it there.
Title: Re: Iraqi court acquits former top aide to Saddam Hussein
Post by: BlueStateSaint on March 02, 2009, 04:45:19 PM
That's why I put it there.

Thank You, very kindly!  H5!