Saddam... A few questions, a few statements, a few rants

[Kiyoodle the Gambrinous]

Ok, it's official. Saddam has been executed and is dead. Once again, one of history's chapter's can be closed, while Saddam has been burried in his hometown near Tikrit, not even 24 hours after his death. Kind of fast isn't it?

Which brings to a few things that strikes my mind in this whole thing. No, I don't want to discuss if it is a good thing that he has been executed or not.

What I find very interesting is: the Iraqi court didn't want a public hanging, in order not to upset the Sunni part of the public, right? Then why did they air the execution worldwide? Isn't that upsetting as well?

Another interesting fact is that the pictures of the actual hanging has not been aired at all. Only of the preparations and the dead body afterwards. Why not show the whole thing? Is Saddam really dead? (OK, this last statement isn't meant very seriously).

After the hanging Saddam's body has been brought to the Prime Minister's office, in order to show the dead body to (some of) the families of the victims of Saddam's regime. Ok, I'm not justifying Saddam's regime, but even if he was an animal, he was a human being as well. And putting a dead body to public display, in order for people to get their revenge is just tasteless...

And what was G.W. Bush doing during all of this? He was asleep...


Now this all brings me to the thing I wanted actually to state here in the first place:

Saddam has been a dictator, a mass murderer etc. He was a war criminal. So why in the hell wasn't he persecuted in front the International Criminal Court in Hague? Like all the other war criminals... Yeah, right, because the USA has not signed (I mean has unsigned) the ICC Rome treaty, which under the law of treaties obliges states to refrain from "acts which would defeat the object and purpose" of the treaty.

Which makes me wonder, why does the USA push other countries (mainly former Yugoslavia) to send their war criminals there, although the US don't recognize the court? Why couldn't be for example Milosevic be prosecuted in his own country, but Saddam could? Milosevic would get the rope as well...

(I have to stop now, or I will write too much and nobody will want to read it...)

[Bob in a quantum-state-of-faith]

As for not trying Sadam in the international court-- it would bring to light that George W Bush is ALSO a war criminal, and subject to the SAME rigors.

And Bushya would easily be convicted of many of the same offenses that Sadam would be in such a court.

At least, that's MY take on it.


(oh, and as for Bush being asleep-- how can one tell? He seems to be asleep every time I've seen him on TV, actually .... )

[Griffin NoName]

<off topic but you asked>

It's a Muslim religious requirement that the burial should be as soon as possible. Orthodox Jews, it's 24 hours max., not-so-orthodox and even secular jews, within 48 hours is max. The custom means a huge amount of work within a very short time due to modern beaurocracy. Problems however do not delay the ceremony, they get overcome somehow. People, often hundreds, manage to get there despite whetever else they had planned. The mourning starts in earnest afterwards and for jews goes on seven days when the mourners do mourning and their community visits them and prayers are said in the evenings. Again, even this, when cut down by non-orthodoxy, is often at least two days/evenings, although one day/evening only is increasing. I am always moved by how people manage to get to the funueral or if they miss it, prayers, in this modern world. For me it is the final token of respect, that whatever someone is doing, however important, they drop it or re-arrange it and attend. Even if it is not actually respect for the person, it is respect that a life has ended.

Quick funerals are common in faiths which are rooted in hot countries.

<off topic but related>
I glanced at my watch, had one of my funny feelings, two minutes later the news flashed up on my laptop the execution had happened two minutes ago. This is not unusual kind of experience for me but I particularly disliked it this time.

I wish he had been tried in both courts.

[Sibling Chatty]

If you Google for it, the ENTIRE execution, without mask, is available, via phone camera, on YouTube.

OK, now time for MY rant.

whatever he did, he was a human being. That there were cheers from members of the Arab communities I can understand, but WTF is up with the 'Religious Right' and their enjoyment??

And the photographic evidence? OK, it was recorded for legal reasons. Allowing the vieweing of the dead body is horrid, the lead-up to the hanging was bad enough.

Of course, a few years ago, when you couldn't even open MSN without the post-autopsy pictures of Saddam's sons popping up I was pretty grossed out as well.

As for the US and the ICC?? They're never going to sign off on something that could put the POTUS and half the generals at risk, not to mention all the CIA spooks...You'll note that the Bush retirement plans are for a country that isn't going to allow extradition. I'd be willing to bet that Cheney and Rummy have similar protection in place for their little island paradise. These creeps know they're on the list, and won't be going on too many trips to signatory countries once they no longer hold office.

The latest crop of US criminals that need some ICC action are not the only ones. There are still BushI guys, including BushI, that could go. It's just that this group is so blatant about it.

[Swatopluk]

Reasons for Milosevic to be sent to the ICC with US approval might have been that
a) he was not a US puppet
b) the "new" regime was not that different in mindset, a trial could have been a white-wash farce
c) security, a lot of potential witnesses were murdered in Serbia (both pro and anti Milosevic)
d) no need for haste (no score points in elections were to be made from it)

Concerning Saddam, the main negative effect of his execution will probably not be the act by itself but the nasty exchanges before and the behaviour afterwards. I'd say it were the Shiite participants that blew it. Now it is indeed looking (I only read the description and did not watch any video) like a petty revenge with the "victim" keeping his dignity and others losing it. At least some of the officials complained on the spot about the break of protocol but obviously to no avail. Apart from a slap in the face they couldn't have done better in achieving Saddam's intention to look like a martyr.
It might have even been better to grant him his wish to be shot instead of hanged from that point of view.

[goat starer]

Saddam has been a dictator, a mass murderer etc. He was a war criminal. So why in the hell wasn't he persecuted in front the International Criminal Court in Hague?

there are many possible answers to this.

The flippant... people are not persecuted by the ICC (apparently) they are prosecuted

The serious... the ICC is intended to be a court of last resort where national courts have failed. It is interesting to ask why Milosovich was not prosecuted under Serbian Law but this was probably due to his crimes being comitted accross several now soveriegn countries.

the relevant document is here specifically article 17

one possible reason a cynic might come up with is the penalties that the ICC can impose do not include the death penalty. Part 7 penalties

Although you specifically avoided this point I would say that generally killing people is not an effective way to end violence!

[Swatopluk]

Personally, I am against the death penalty for mainly pragmatic reasons.

That the ICC "lacks" the option may have played a small part but I think it was only secondary.
A trial before the ICC would have taken a very long time and would have been (ab)used by all sides for purposes other than "justice" (Milosevic gave a taste of that).
In the long term that would still have been the best solution but in the short term it would have been "inconvenient" for too many people (both the survivors of his regime and his "honorable" accomplices (not only in the US)).
Those who had to decide the matter clearly preferred Uncle Jossif's way of "no man, no problem".

Anyway, one should have gotten a "neutral" hangman or handed Saddam a suicide device (and neutral witnesses too, of course), if it had to be death. The way it is now, it's a large scale PR disaster.

[Kiyoodle the Gambrinous]

The serious... the ICC is intended to be a court of last resort where national courts have failed. It is interesting to ask why Milosovich was not prosecuted under Serbian Law but this was probably due to his crimes being comitted accross several now soveriegn countries.

Didn't Saddam attack other sovereign countries as well (Kuwait for example)?

Anyway, I am well aware that Saddam had to be sentenced and executed fast to get Bush some plus points very fast. Milosevic wasn't that interesting in the first place. (But it had been assessed that he would get the death penalty under Serbian law at the time, for high treason. Not 100% sure about this though.)

[Swatopluk]

I think Serbia was on the whole relieved to get rid of him (somebody else's problem). A trial in Serbia would probably have polarized the society even more.
I propose to hold all international trials on Tristan da Cunha under (ethnic) Papua-New Guinean control for remoteness and cultural/political neutrality.

[goat starer]

Didn't Saddam attack other sovereign countries as well (Kuwait for example)?

This was not, however, what he was being tried for. Milosovic was tried for genocide and war crimes in Croatia, Kosovo and Bosnia. The alternative under the ICC rules to an ICC trial would have been trial in Bosnia, Kosovo or Croatia and it is certain that the Serbs would not have acceded to an extradition request (it is also not completely certain that he would have been found guilty at the hague although he would probably have lost subsequent trials in Serbia concerning political assasinations of his regime). Saddam was not being tried for his invasion of Kuwait (and there has been very little direct evidence that there were war crimes sanctioned by Saddam against the Kuwaitis). he was unlikely to be tried for this as the Iraqis always contended that their invasion was predicated on the alleged illegal tapping of Iraqi oil wells by the Kuwaitis and this argument has anough legitimacy to prevent the war itself resulting in war crimes prosecutions. The evidence of his guilt in relation to atrocities against Shiia, marsh Arab and Kurd communities was pretty strong and it is unlikely he would have faced a trial over the Kuwait conflict. If he had it is not unlikely that there would have been stronger calls for an ICC trial.

The worst atrocities were probably committed during the Iran - Iraq war which would have easily merited an ICC trial but which would have required the inditement of Iranian officials as well.