Saddam Hussein shortly after his capture (picture US Department of Defense)
The choice of an Iraqi court rather than an international one is telling. One of the major reasons put forward by advocates of invasion was that Saddam Hussein was a threat to the entire region: he had invaded two neighbouring countries and fired rockets at at least two others. However, the choice of an Iraqi court precluded those incidents being brought to justice. Kuwaitis who suffered during the occupation will have to enjoy the vicarious justice from Baghdad rather than any real justice of their own.
As Margaret Beckett said, Saddam Hussein has been held to account, but only partially.
The next significant feature of the trial was that the procedures were novel and rather strange. The case got through six judges, members of the defence legal team were assassinated and threatened throughout. The manner of the execution was in some senses a continuation of this.
But any “political” trial will be peculiar; indeed, one could go further and say that any trial of a famous person is going to be odd. Remember the difficulty of finding a jury that could sit in judgement of Michael Jackson.
John Laughland, a noted souverainist, raised this point in the Guardian. But the answer is clear.
If the problem is that the procedures were novel, let’s make them routine. Lift the burden from individual courtrooms and move major trials to a dedicated facility. The trial of a former head of state such as Saddam Hussein or Slobodan Milosevic needs to be normalised as much as possible. That way, people in those positions will come to learn that, like the rest of us, they are subject to the law.
I am happy to be dismissed as an enthusiast for “international justice”, well aware as I am of the limitations of international justice, because it is still better than being an enthusiast for international injustice.
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It is normal to expect West Europeans, born and educated with some particular values, to expect others (with other values) to behave as they would under the same circumstances.
Politics is not a fair realm. And it is easy to realize that once a head of state is not in accordance with the rest of the world and moreover prefers to express it in a violent way, this is the end one should expect. For example, Ceausescu’s politics was not in accordance with Moscow. My generation has studied French and English in schools and not Russian. He refused to participate with troops to the Prague Spring and by the mid ’60 Russia was about to start a war against Romania.
Once such dictators go against their own people either with gas or by starvation, I think that it is difficult for the people to hear of international justice.
This trail may not have been the fairest. Also it is not human that he was not allowed to finish his prayers. As Saddam, Ceausescu was judged and killed on a holiday, a christian one: Christmas. And I am not sure that he was served a Christmas dinner before execution. It is probably the way human nature acts in these circumstances.
I did not even think that dealth penalty by hanging is still on. Images of hanging smb in the year 2006 AC are beyond immagination. But this is the rule in this country. Ceausescu got several bullets as it was the rule at that time. I wonder if public reactions wouldn’t be different if he was killed with a leathal injection.
I don’t know if Saddam – may God rest him in peace! – got a fair trail or he was the victim of his own vision of the world. But I think I know the feeling of remouving a dictator: a mixed feeling of relief and fear for the uncertain future. I am sure that the Iraqi will work it out sonner or later, as my country did. And now it is the 27th EU Member State!