Saddam set for first appearance before judge

From wire reports

Iraqis and the world will get their first glimpse of Saddam Hussein since his capture in December when he and 11 of his top lieutenants are brought to court Thursday to face war crimes charges.

Already there are pretrial negotiations over permitting Saddam's foreign legal team to work in Iraq, whether to televise the proceedings and whether to reinstate the harshest penalty in Iraq's legal code: hanging by the neck until dead.

Iraq will take legal custody of Saddam from the U.S. Army today and the former dictator is to make his first court appearance Thursday, where he will be informed of the charges in his arrest warrant, Prime Minister Iyad Allawi announced Tuesday.

Salem Chalabi, director of the Iraqi Special Tribunal that will try Saddam, said Thursday's appearance at the tribunal, housed in a courthouse with a prominent clock tower inside Baghdad's sealed-off Green Zone, is expected to be filmed for public release.

The pictures would offer the first bit of video since Saddam's Dec. 13 capture by U.S. soldiers, when a clip showed the bushy-bearded leader opening his mouth for a dental examination.

Saddam is expected to be arraigned on charges of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, as well as other misdeeds, according to lawyers involved in the case. He is likely to be tried for the use of chemical weapons in the 1988 attack on the Kurdish town of Halabja; the Anfal campaign of 1988 against the Kurds in the north; crimes related to Iraq's 1980-88 war with Iran and to the suppression of a Shiite uprising in southern Iraq in 1991, among others.

Upon their arraignment, the dozen U.S. military detainees will be given the status of Iraqi criminal suspects, which gives them the right to lawyers or appointed counsel, Chalabi said.

The first batch of Saddam's lieutenants to face the tribunal include Ali Hassan al-Majid, also known as "Chemical Ali"; former Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan; former deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz; and two of Saddam's half brothers.

The moves to try Saddam are a sign of Iraqis taking matters into their own hands after U.S. administrators turned over power Monday -- though some 160,000 U.S.-led foreign troops remain to protect Allawi's government from a relentless insurgency.

Allawi said he requested that coalition forces keep Saddam and other top prisoners in a U.S. lockup "until correction services are fully capable of providing for their safety" and secure detention.

When the prosecution is fully staffed, some 75 foreign lawyers and investigators will be helping to track down evidence and organize the case. The majority of the staff is expected to be made up of Americans, but there is hope that experts from European countries also will be involved.

The trial of the 67-year-old Saddam, still months away, stands to be the most sensational case in Iraqi history, igniting Iraqi interest like the O.J. Simpson trial fascinated Americans. The O.J. trial highlighted rifts between black and white Americans; Saddam's case is expected to bare the chasm between the Iraqis who benefited from his 24-year rule, and those whom it scarred.

"Everyone who lost loved ones to Saddam will want to see this," said Hamid al-Bayati, Iraq's new deputy foreign minister and a leader of the main Shiite Muslim party.

"A tyrant in the dock -- that is unbelievable," said Sheerwan Hassan, 42, a Kurd. "I and my family are eagerly awaiting the sight of that person being prosecuted. That is the first step toward democracy in Iraq," he said.

French lawyer Emmanuel Ludot, one member of a 20-person team appointed by Saddam's wife to represent him, said the former president would refuse to acknowledge any court or any judge. "It will be a court of vengeance, a settling of scores," Ludot told France Info radio.