Bhutto, Saddam, Hariri: The travails of international criminal "justice"

Helena Cobban, Just World News

...And while we're on the subject of internationally launched criminal investigations and other criminal proceedings, let's: (a) remember that today is the first anniversary of the ghastly travesty of the execution of Saddam Hussein, conducted by a kangaroo court that was convened under the eager and highly politicized auspices of the US military occupation; (b) look at how incredibly divisive, inconclusive, and partisan the SC's Hariri investigation has turned out to be; and (c) review the record of all the other criminal proceedings the international "community" has launched over the past 14 years... continua / continued

Thousands prevented from visiting Saddam tomb on anniversary of execution

Deborah Haynes of The Times and Ali Hamdani in Baghdad

A handful of Saddam Hussein supporters wept at his graveside in a village north of Baghdad today on the first anniversary of the toppled dictator’s execution, while thousands more were prevented from visiting the tomb because of heightened security. In a show of defiant support for the former president, leaflets protesting about his death were scattered around a Sunni enclave in Baghdad and across the Sunni belt to the north of the capital, home to Saddam loyalists, where Iraqi security forces had been put on high alert. In the village of Awja, where Saddam was born and is buried, scores of sombre-looking Sunni tribal leaders and clerics paid their respects at his tomb, which was covered in Iraqi flags and flowers and surrounded by pictures of the mustachioed leader smiling... continua / continued