Saddam’s signature on incriminating documents-court

By Mussab al-Khairalla and Michael Georgy

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Signatures on documents linking Saddam
Hussein and six of his co-accused to the killings of 148
Shi’ites in the 1980s match those of the former Iraqi
president, a court heard on Monday.

“The signatures and margins stipulated in the documents
match the signature of Saddam Hussein on presidential decrees,”
said a report demanded by the prosecution read out at the
court.

The prosecution had demanded the court commission a team of
criminal experts to authenticate the signatures and handwriting
of the defendants facing charges of crimes against humanity.

Saddam and his half brother Barzan al-Tikriti have refused
to give the court samples of their writing but both have said
there was no crime in prosecuting the 148 Shi’ites because they
were accused of trying to kill the former leader.

The defendants could face death by hanging if found guilty.

Defense lawyers demanded 45 days to study new evidence
before commenting. The trial was adjourned until May 15 to give
the defense time to present their witnesses in next session.

Barzan, once one of the most feared men in Iraq, challenged
the evidence once again, dismissing it as an attempt to ruin
the reputations of the accused.

“Why didn’t the investigator show us the original copy of
this evidence… It’s presented in front of hundreds of
millions to try and stain our reputation,” said Barzan, a
former Iraqi ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva.

“I have my reservations about the accusations that the
signatures and handwriting is real.”

The 148 Shi’ite men and teenagers were killed or executed
after an attempt on Saddam’s life in the town of Dujail in
1982.

Television footage of that day showed Saddam in a military
uniform getting out of his armored car and personally
interrogating nervous Iraqis about the assassination attempt.

On Monday, he sat in his dark suit and white shirt in his
metal pen, unusually quiet for a man who has dominated the
court with tirades calling for Iraqis to revolt against U.S.
occupation.

He left the talking to Barzan, who said the evidence was
weak because anyone can forge a signature.

Saddam could soon face a new trial on charges of genocide
against the Kurds in the late 1980s in the Anfal campaign, in
which Kurdish authorities say about 100,000 were killed or
disappeared and many villages were destroyed.

Prosecutors had hoped for a quick sentence in the Dujail
case because it is far simpler than others such as genocide
against the Kurds and charges of crimes against humanity in the
suppression of Shi’ite uprisings.