Iraq

Frenchman says he'll represent Hussein

PARIS - A French lawyer, known for defending terrorists and a Nazi leader, said Saturday he will defend Saddam Hussein.

Jacques Verges told France-Inter radio he had received a letter from Hussein's family requesting him to defend the former Iraqi leader in court.

The letter read: "In my capacity as nephew of President Saddam Hussein, I commission you officially by this letter to assure the defense of my uncle," Verges said. He did not identify the person who sent the letter.

U.S. officials have said they will bring Hussein to trial for alleged crimes against Iraqi people. But the location of a trial and its format and date have not been decided.

Hussein is being held by U.S. forces at an undisclosed location.

Verges has defended Venezuelan terrorist Carlos the Jackal, whose real name is Ilich Ramirez. Ramirez gained international notoriety during the Cold War for staging a string of deadly bombings, assassinations and hostage seizures.

The French lawyer also defended Klaus Barbie, a Nazi Gestapo chief in France in World War II who was convicted of crimes against humanity in Lyon, France.

BAGHDAD - Rebel rockets slammed into a government building in the northern city of Mosul on Saturday, killing two civilians and wounding 14. An explosion rocked central Baghdad in a roadside bomb attack on a convoy, wounding five Iraqis.

The Mosul attack brought to 21 the number of people killed in two days of explosions and shootings across the country.

The rocket launcher was hidden in a wooden cart that was wheeled up to a blast wall surrounding the three-story main government building, said Mosul police Sgt. Jassim Mohammed.

In central Baghdad Saturday, a bomb exploded on a street as a convoy of sport utility vehicles passed, wounding five Iraqis, U.S. Army Lt. Col. Peter Jones said.

BAGHDAD - An aide to Iraq's most influential Shiite cleric was quoted Saturday as saying the cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, might issue a religious edict against Iraqis who join the interim government that is scheduled to take office when the United States transfers sovereignty to Iraq on June 30.

Al-Sistani's representative in Kuwait, Ayatollah Muhammad Baqr al-Mohri, warned the edict, or fatwa, would be issued if al-Sistani's demands for changes in the interim constitution adopted this month were not met. Al-Sistani has called for scaling back guarantees of minority rights that were written into the charter with American encouragement as an assurance to Iraq's principal minorities, Sunnis and Kurds.

BAGHDAD - The U.S.-led coalition in Iraq set up a $6-million commission to regulate the news media, senior coalition officials said on Saturday.

The Iraqi Communications and Media Commission, whose nine members will be appointed by the U.S.-run Coalition Provisional Authority in consultation with the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council, will organize telecommunications and broadcast operators and devise codes of conduct.

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