Reactions Across Mideast to Saddam's Trial
Oct 18/05 - CAIRO, Egypt - AP -Reactions from people across the Middle East to the opening of Saddam Hussein's trial in Baghdad on Wednesday:
"I am not a Saddam supporter, but I am against this trial because it came on American orders. ... If Saddam was a murderer, what can we call the American acts (in Iraq)? For justice, (President) Bush and Saddam should sit together in the same place." Saed Souror, a Palestinian taxi driver in the Gaza Strip.
"We have been waiting for this trial a long time. Not only us, but the Iraqi people and Iranian people as well." Omar Al-Murad, an architect in Kuwait, which Saddam's forces invaded in 1990.
"I hope that before they execute him, they bring him to Kuwait, put him in a cage and drive around so that (Kuwaitis) can hit him with shoes." Wadha al-Abduljader, a Kuwaiti mother.
"He's the only one who hit Israel. He's the only one who said 'no' to America. I'm very upset because he's being tried."
Jordanian taxi driver Khaled Abdul-Khader, referring to Saddam's firing Scud missiles at Israel during the 1991 Gulf War.
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Joy, fury as Iraqis watch Saddam trial
By Jafer Majid Hatem
DUJAIL, Iraq (Reuters)- Oct 19/05 - Some Iraqis watched with relief as Saddam Hussein's trial began on Wednesday, bringing to account the man who brutalized them for three decades.
Others, particularly among the Sunni minority, angrily dismissed the trial as a U.S.-manipulated kangaroo court, declaring they did not recognize the case against a man who still proudly styles himself "the president of Iraq."
Saddam's trial was broadcast with a tape delay on major television stations in Iraq, giving Iraqis a first-hand glimpse of their former dictator brought low in a Baghdad courtroom, where he faced charges of crimes against humanity.
For many Iraqis, justice was sweet -- if long in coming.
"The beautiful thing is that the trial is live," said 25-year-old Hamid Hussein, watching in an electronics store in the southern Shi'ite city of Najaf. "It comes just in time ... now we start trying the criminals."
Emotions ran higher among others, reliving their own tragedies brooding over their own anger.
"I wish that I could judge Saddam with my own hands," swore Krav Nahid, who said his father was executed in 1991 when Saddam's forces crushed a rebellion in Najaf following the Gulf War. "What I want is revenge."
The charges Saddam was facing stem from events in Dujail, a Shi'ite farming village about 35 miles north of Baghdad, where local young men linked to the Shi'ite Dawa party, tried to kill the Iraqi ruler in 1982 as his convoy passed through town.
Prosecutors say Saddam ordered reprisals, telling his men to hunt down, torture and kill more than 140 men from Dujail.
Families and friends of those killed said on Wednesday they hoped the trial would lead to swift conviction and execution.
"This is the end of every tyrant," said Laith Abd Mahdi, a middle-aged Dujail man outside his small house.
"He hurt us, hurt my relatives and hurt my closest friends. Death is not enough for him."
Others saw the trial as little more than a legal coda to the U.S.-led overthrow of Saddam in 2003.
"I don't care about the trial," said Abu Hamed, a bearded local man, with a small grimace. "Saddam Hussein was convicted when his statue was toppled and we saw it on TV."
DEFIANT SHOW
Saddam gave his erstwhile subjects a defiant show on Wednesday, hectoring the special court set up to try him and claiming still to be Iraq's rightful president. He eventually pleaded not guilty and the trial was adjourned until November 28.
Some Iraqis expressed frustration with the patchy quality of the broadcast.
"If a government cannot even get the volume right on a thing like this, how can it run the country?" asked Adnan Hamed, 32, who was watching the trial in the northern city of Mosul.