After 3 of his defence lawyers and a witness were killed, Saddam was finally sentenced to the gallow’s by his enemies. Except for the Americans who wanted Saddam silenced for good for fear of him revealing embarrassing details of their dealings with him (hence the trial by a biased Iraqi court rather than the World Court) the world has condemned the lack of due process and fair trial.
In an obscene haste, Iraq's highest appeals court (also staffed by his enemies) has (naturally) upheld the death sentence for Saddam Hussein.
The relieved Americans said unashamedly that the court decision was an important milestone in the Iraqi people's efforts to replace the rule of a tyrant with the rule of law.
I would have thought the milestone of rule of law would be the hitherto missing due process and fair trial, but then that’s the Americans clutching at a 'happy' outcome in Saddam’s death verdict as a consolation prize to their general sorry state in Iraq.
And the hallmark of a civilised democracy would have been the total rejection of the death sentence, but regrettably Texas vigilante law has been adopted in Iraq.
In a disgraceful spin to mask their pressure on their client state’s kangaroo court to pass the inevitable death sentence, the American spokeman said: "The Iraqis deserve praise for continuing to utilise the institutions of democracy to pursue justice.”
The whole trial has been a sorry tale of continuous gross violation of fair proceedings.
Maybe Saddam deserves the death sentence but now we would never ever know whether that would be the case in a fair trial without American interference. Experts forecast that Saddam would be executed in secret as soon as possible, maybe even within a couple of days.
You can bet your last sen that Saddam will be hanged secretly at night in a secret prison and then buried/burnt in a secret place so as to prevent riots. This was exactly what happened to Pakistan's Prime Minister Zulkiflar Ali Bhutto who was deposed in a coup orchestrated by the Americans.
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