Death penalty for Saddam Hussein

Saddam Hussein has been convicted of crimes against humanity and sentenced to death by hanging.

The former Iraqi president was convicted by a Baghdad court for his role in the killing of 148 people in the mainly Shia town of Dujail in 1982.

His half brother Barzan al-Tikriti was also sentenced to death, as was Iraq's former chief judge Awad Hamed al-Bandar

Former Vice-President Taha Yassin Ramadan got life in jail and three others received 15 year prison terms.

Another co-defendant, Baath party official Mohammed Azawi Ali, was acquitted.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki hailed the conviction in a televised address, saying that the sentence was "not a sentence on one man, but a sentence against all the dark period of his rule".

"Maybe this will help alleviate the pain of the widows and the orphans, and those who have been ordered to bury their loved ones in secrecy, and those who have been forced to supress their feelings and suffering, and those who have paid at the hands of torturers," Mr Maliki said. When called to court, Saddam Hussein, dressed in his usual dark suit and white shirt and carrying a Koran, walked to his customary seat and sat down.

Judge Rauf Abdel Rahman ordered Saddam Hussein to stand while he read out the verdict, but the former president defiantly refused to do so and had to be moved from his seat by court attendants.

As the judge began reading the death sentence Saddam Hussein shouted out "Allahu Akbar!" (God is Greatest) and "Long live Iraq! Long live the Iraqi people! Down with the traitors!"

'Triumphant smile'

The former leader looked shocked and furious as the sentence was passed, and continued to shout, denouncing the court, the judge and the US-led occupation force in Iraq.

But the BBC's world affairs editor John Simpson said that after his tirade, which was clearly deliberate, as he was led away from the courtroom, Saddam Hussein seemed to have a small smile of triumph on his face. "It was as if he was thinking 'I've come here and done what I intended to do'," our correspondent said.

Shortly after the verdict was announced celebratory gunfire could be heard across Baghdad.

In the Shia district of Sadr City there was jubilation on the streets, with people driving around in cars, beeping their horns. There were also jubilant scenes in the holy city of Najaf.

The Baghdad celebrations were in defiance of a 12-hour daytime curfew banning all vehicle and pedestrian traffic which was placed on the whole city of six million people amid fears of violence from Saddam Hussein's Sunni Arab supporters.

The government cancelled all army leave and the city's civilian airport was closed.

Hometown anger

Immediately after the sentencing violence reportedly broke out in the mainly Sunni Azamiya district of Baghdad, with machine guns and mortars being fired. Three nearby provinces, including Salahuddin, which contains Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, are also under curfew.

Thousands of people also defied the curfew in Tikrit, but there it was to voice support for Saddam Hussein and to denounce the verdict.

Sunnis in Tikrit marched through the city, chanting "We will avenge you Saddam."

Almost three years since Saddam Hussein was captured, soaring sectarian violence has brought Iraq to the brink of civil war.

Few Iraqis think the trial verdict will ease conflict, the BBC's Andrew North in Baghdad says.

Even those Iraqis who want to see their former leader dead do not believe his execution would make things any better, our correspondent says.

Chance to appeal

Saddam Hussein and his co-defendants will be given the right to appeal, but that is expected to last a few weeks and to end in failure for the defendants. Many critics have dismissed the trial as a form of victors' justice, given the close attention the US has paid to it.

Before the session began former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark was ejected from the courtroom after handing the judge a note in which he called the trial a "travesty".

Saddam Hussein's defence team have also accused the government of interfering in the proceedings - a complaint backed by US group Human Rights Watch.

And the former leader's lawyers have attacked the timing of the planned verdict, which comes days before the US votes in mid-term elections.

US President George W Bush's Republican Party is at risk of losing control of Congress in part because of voter dissatisfaction over its handling of the Iraq conflict.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6117910.stm