Iraq

Tribunal for war crimes will be Iraqi-led

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Saddam Hussein and hundreds of his aides could go on trial for crimes against humanity and genocide in an Iraqi-led tribunal that will be established in the coming days, Iraqi and American officials told the Associated Press on Friday.

Some human rights groups criticized the plans, saying that Iraq's U.S. occupiers have too much of a hand in them and that Iraqi judges and prosecutors may not have the experience needed to try the cases.

The law creating the tribunal - which could be passed as early as Sunday - will be similar to proposals made in Washington in April, one member of Iraq's Governing Council said. The law calls for Iraqi judges to hear cases presented by Iraqi lawyers, with international experts serving only as advisers.

That would be starkly different from U.N.-sponsored tribunals set up to consider war crimes in the former Yugoslavia and in Rwanda. In those cases, international judges and lawyers have argued and decided cases.

Two members of the Governing Council - Mahmoud Othman and Samir Shakir Mahmoud - said Friday the tribunal would be created in the coming days. The International Center for Transitional Justice said its sources in the coalition said the tribunal could be established as early as Sunday.

Othman said the tribunal would hear hundreds of cases involving members of the former regime.

"There will be more trials than only the 55 deck of cards," he said, referring to the U.S. list of most-wanted Iraqis.

Already, thousands of relatives of the missing have filed complaints against members of the former regime. One group in Baghdad, the Iraqi Human Rights Society, took 7,000 complaints before the paperwork overwhelmed its staff.

The Governing Council has been discussing the war crimes tribunal law for months, and it was not expected to encounter major opposition within the governing body. The U.S. occupation authority, which has veto power over Governing Council decisions, also must sign off on the plan.

It remained unclear when the trials would begin. The coalition authority now holds at least 5,500 people in prisons, but it isn't known how many of those are war crimes suspects and how many are accused of common crimes.

Those in custody include Ali Hassan al-Majid, known as "Chemical Ali" for his role in chemical attacks on Kurds in the 1980s; Hussein's secretary, Abid Hamid Mahmud al-Tikriti; and Muhammad Hamza al-Zubaydi, a leader of 1991 suppression of the Shiite Muslim rebellion. If Hussein himself is captured, he presumably would be tried by the special tribunal as well.

As evidence, prosecutors will use a growing cache of documents seized from the former regime. The coalition now has an estimated nine miles of paperwork, and Iraqi human rights groups and political parties have more.

Evidence also will come from the excavation of mass graves that dot the Iraqi landscape. There are some 270 mass graves believed to hold at least 300,000 sets of remains. Forensic teams are expected to start excavating for evidence in January.

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