WORLD / Middle East
Saddam believes US will beg for his help
(AP)
Updated: 2006-06-26 10:19
Saddam Hussein believes the United States will have to seek his help to
quell the bloody insurgency in Iraq and open the way for US forces to
withdraw, his chief lawyer said Sunday.
Saddam Hussein listens as the prosecution makes its closing arguments at
the trial of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and seven members of
his regime in Baghdad, Iraq Monday, June 19, 2006. [AP]
Khalil al-Dulaimi argued in an interview with The Associated Press that
the former leader is the key to returning stability to Iraq.
"He's their last resort. They're going to knock at his door eventually,"
the lawyer said. Saddam is "the only person who can stop the resistance
against the US troops."
There is no indication US officials have considered seeking his help.
While Saddam's once dominant fellow Sunni Arabs are the backbone of the
insurgency, the Shiite Muslim majority and Kurds repressed by his regime
would be enflamed by his presence.
The comments from Al-Dulaimi, the head of Saddam's defense team,
portrayed a deposed leader who seems to hold out hope he can bargain his
way out of trials that threaten him with the death penalty.
Al-Dulaimi said Saddam brought up the topic during a meeting Tuesday, and
indicated he would be willing to help the United States, "for the sake of
saving both peoples, the Iraqis and Americans."
He quoted Saddam as saying:
"These puppets in the Iraqi government that the Americans brought to
power are helpless. They can't protect themselves or the Iraqi people.
The Americans will certainly come to me, to Saddam Hussein's legitimate
leadership and to the Iraqi Baath Party, to rescue them from their huge
quandary."
Although he would not say exactly what Saddam might ask in return for
helping, al-Dulaimi said it would not necessarily involve being
reinstated as president of Iraq.
The lawyer suggested, though, that Saddam might be willing to negotiate
such help by making the verdict in his trial a bargaining chip.
Saddam and seven of his former officials are on trial in the deaths of
148 people during a crackdown on a Shiite village. He also is due to
begin a second trial that could end with the death penalty.
When Saddam mentioned he expected the Americans to seek his help,
al-Dulaimi said he asked the former leader if he would really be willing
to help the country who toppled him from power.
Saddam replied that he would, said al-Dulaimi, a Sunni who considers
Saddam to remain Iraq's legitimate president.
"We will do that for the sake of preventing more bloodshed, for the
liberty of all Iraqis," al-Dulaimi quoted Saddam as saying.
Saddam predicted Iraq would "flourish within five years," saying that was
the time that would be needed for reconstruction that would transform the
country into the envy of the region, the lawyer said.
He said Saddam also believes he will be given the death penalty in the
current trial, which began in October. The prosecution summed up its case
last Monday, and defense lawyers are to begin their final arguments July
10, after which the five judges are expected to take several months to
reach a verdict.
Al-Dulaimi claimed the outcome of the trial has already been determined.
"The ongoing trial and verdict, which are already decided by Washington,
are expected to result in the death penalty," he said.
"The death penalty is political blackmail to pressure President Saddam to
help the American forces out of their predicament in Iraq and to rescue
it from the mess it created there."
Al-Dulaimi said Washington also should look to Saddam as the only person
who can stop the growing influence of Iran and radical Shiite Muslims in
the region.
Pointing to Saddam's 1980-88 war with Iran, a conflict in which the
United States and others backed Iraq, he said Saddam served as a
counterbalance to Iranian power.
The Bush administration should recognize the "hard reality" that the US
invasion of Iraq delivered the mostly secular Arab nation into the hands
of Shiites strongly sympathetic to their larger Iranian neighbor, the
lawyer said.
"Iran is the enemy of Arabs, Islam and the United States, and the only
person who can stand in the face of Iran is Saddam Hussein," he said.
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