AMMAN, Dec 15: A lawyer who defended former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein said on Monday he was forming a team to defend the Iraqi journalist who hurled his shoes at US President George Bush during his farewell visit to Baghdad.

“So far around 200 Iraqi and other lawyers, including Americans, have expressed willingness to defend the journalist for free,” the Amman-based Khalil al-Dulaimi said.

“I took the decision on Sunday night to defend the man after the incident.

I am currently contacting Arab bar associations to form a defence committee.”

Television journalist Muntazer al-Zaidi jumped up as Mr Bush was holding a press conference with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki on Sunday, shouting: “It is the farewell kiss, you dog” and threw two shoes at the US leader.

Both missed after Mr Bush ducked, but Muntazer Zaidi was wrestled to the ground by security guards and arrested.

“It was the least thing for an Iraqi to do to Bush, the tyrant criminal who has killed two million people in Iraq and Afghanistan,” said Mr Dulaimi, calling for Zaidi’s immediate release.

Khalil Dulaimi headed Saddam’s defence team until his execution in Dec 2006.

“Our defence of Zaidi will be based on the fact that the United States is occupying Iraq, and resistance is legitimate by all means, including shoes,” he said.

A Jordan-based Iraqi rights group also called for Mr Zaidi’s release.

“All US soldiers who have used their shoes to humiliate Iraqis should be brought to justice, along with their US superiors, including Bush himself,” said Ali Qeisi, head of the Society of Victims of the US Occupation in Iraq.

The Jordanian press also welcomed Zaidi’s action. “Hurling shoes at Bush was the best goodbye kiss ever... it expresses how Iraqis and other Arabs hate Bush,” wrote Musa Barhoumeh, editor of Al-Ghad newspaper.

“Bush is a tyrant and got a harsh response for filling the entire world with destruction and turning the lives of millions around the world into hell.”

—AFP