Saddam foreign minister Tariq Aziz sentenced to death (Roundup)

Oct 26, 2010, 15:50 GMT

Baghdad - Former Iraqi foreign minister Tariq Aziz and two other aides to toppled ruler Saddam Hussein were sentenced Tuesday by an Iraqi court to death by hanging.

The Supreme Court in Baghdad found Aziz guilty of persecution and efforts to 'liquidate' Iraqi religious parties, particularly those of Shiite Muslims.

The three were also found guilty of targeting the Dawa Party, a Shiite grouping now headed by Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

Sentenced with Aziz were Saadoun Shaker, a former interior minister, and Abdul Hamid Hamoud, a personal secretary to Saddam. All three have 30 days to appeal the ruling.

The former Iraqi president was hanged in 2006.

Aziz, once the public face of Saddam's regime, is 74 years old and suffered a stroke in January in a prison in Baghdad. He is believed to be in poor health.

This was his fourth major trial since the fall of the former rulers, with earlier court rulings giving him either jail time or finding him not guilty.

Aziz's son responded to the death penalty decision by accusing the judiciary of making a political move.

'My father has never had any relationship with religious parties in Iraq,' Ziad Aziz said from his home in Jordan. 'In fact, he was a victim, when the Dawa Party attempted to assassinate him.'

The Dawa party was accused in 1980 of throwing a grenade at Aziz.

Kamal Saadi, a Dawa member of parliament, rejected any charges of bias, saying 'this was an independent judgment based on data and facts.' The verdict, he added, was for 'crimes against the Iraqi people.'

No date was given by the court for carrying out the death penalty.

Aziz is already serving a 15-year-prison sentence for the execution of 42 traders in 1992 who were accused of profiteering during a time of sanctions. He was also given seven additional years in a separate trial for the displacement of Kurds in northern Iraq.

Another court acquitted him on charges that he was involved in crushing an uprising after a prominent Shiite cleric, Mohammad al- Sadr, was assassinated.

Aziz, who was also a deputy prime minister under Saddam, rejected the charges against him in an interview with the London-based Guardian newspaper in August.

'Did I commit a crime against any civilian, military or religious man? The answer is no,' maintained Aziz.

He accused the United States of destroying the country since the invasion in 2003 and said President Barack Obama was 'leaving Iraq to the wolves.'

Aziz was the highest-ranking Christian politician in the former Iraqi regime and rose to international prominence as Baghdad`s top spokesman to the world.

He was born Mikhael Yuhanna in the northern Iraqi town of Mosul, a ethnically diverse region that is now one of the most violent and dangerous parts of the country.

He surrendered to US troops shortly after the fall of Baghdad.

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