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IRAQ. TALABANI OPPOSES EXECUTION OF SADDAM AIDE
September 7, 2007: Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said he would not sign the execution order of a top Saddam aide whom he personally had "provoked" to rebel against the executed dictator.
Talabani said he would refuse to sign the order of Sultan Hashim al-Tai, senior officer who became defence minister during Saddam's regime, if the approval of his three-member presidency is sought by the Iraqi supreme court.
"I had known him (Tai). He had relations with us during Saddam's regime," Talabani told a press conference in the Kurdish city of Sulaimaniyah. "We were urging him to revolt against Saddam. How can I today sign his execution order when I was the one who provoked him then to rebel against Saddam. No, No, No. I will not do it." Tai, along with Ali Hassan al-Majid who is widely known as "Chemical Ali", and Hussein Rashid al-Tikrit, the former armed forces deputy chief of operations, are to be executed for their role in the 1988 Kurdish massacre after the Supreme Court confirmed their death sentences.
The three were sentenced on June 24 to hang after they were found responsible for the slaughter of tens of thousands of Kurds in the so-called Anfal campaign of 1988. (Sources: Agence France Presse, 07/09/2007)
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