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Saddam's half-brother testifies at trial
(AP)
Updated: 2006-03-15 18:53
Saddam Hussein's half-brother, former intelligence chief Barzan Ibrahim,
denied he took part in a crackdown against Shiites in the 1980s as he testified
Wednesday for the first time in the trial of the former Iraqi leader and members
of his regime.
Barzan Ibrahim, Saddam's half-brother and
Iraq's former intelligence chief, testifies during his trial in Baghdad,
Iraq, Wednesday, March 15, 2006. Saddam Hussein and seven co-defendants
including Ibrahim are on trial for torture, illegal arrests and the
killing of nearly 150 people from Dujail after a 1982 assassination
attempt on Saddam in the town. [AP] |
Ibrahim is the latest of the eight defendants in the trial to undergo direct
questioning by the judge and chief prosecutor. Saddam was expected to testify
later Wednesday.
The former Iraqi leader and his regime officials are charged with killing 148
Shiites and imprisoning and torturing hundreds of others after an attempt on
Saddam's life in their village of Dujail in 1982. They face possible execution
by hanging if convicted.
In previous sessions, Dujail residents have testified that Ibrahim took part
in torturing them during their confinement at the Baghdad headquarters of the
Mukhabarat intelligence agency, which Ibrahim headed. One woman claimed Ibrahim
kicked her in the chest while she was hanging upside-down and naked.
Ibrahim, wearing a traditional red scarf on his head, told chief judge Raouf
Abdel-Rahman that he was in Dujail on the day of the July 8, 1982 shooting
attack on Saddam's motorcade and the following day but has not visited the
Shiite village since then.
He said the General Security agency handled the investigation into the
shooting, not Mukhabarat. He claimed he ordered the release of Dujail residents
who had been detained. "I chided the security and party officials for detaining
those people," he said "I shook their (the released detainees') hands and let
them go."
"I didn't order any detentions. I didn't interrogate anyone," he said, adding
that he resigned from his post as head of the Mukhabarat in August 1983.
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