NEW YORK, Aug 1: In a bid to avoid a trial of Saddam Hussein by the United Nations International Criminal Court, if he is captured by US forces, the US plans to create a special tribunal of Iraqi judges to prosecute the Iraqi leader for crimes against humanity.
A senior State Department official told the New York Times on Thursday that “We’re looking for an Iraqi-led process to deal with these abuses, it’s important that we bring ownership of these matters to the Iraqi people.”
The official told the newspaper that the administration had ruled out seeking a broad-based international tribunal or a United Nations-led effort to try Saddam Hussein. However, he said the Iraqis who would lead the court could seek assistance from other Arab countries or elsewhere.
“But it will be up to them,” the official said. “The Iraqis will play the undisputed leadership role in this process.”
As military officials sound more optimistic that an increasing number of tips from Iraqis will help locate Mr Hussein, discussion within the administration over how to deal with the ousted Iraqi leader, if captured, has accelerated in recent days.
American administrators in Baghdad and officials in Washington have devoted their attention to forming a court that would have the authority to try Mr Hussein on charges of crimes against humanity, including attempted genocide against the Kurds and marsh Arabs of Iraq.
The Times said that a US Judge Gilbert S. Merritt, of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, recently returned from several weeks in Iraq advising the American and Iraqi authorities about establishing war-crimes courts and other legal issues. He said officials were looking to create a tribunal that would have the stature to be seen as free of American control.
“Many Iraqi judges and lawyers said to me that they believe it is important that they be given the authority to try him if he is captured,” said Judge Merritt, the former chief judge of the circuit court. He said the most important reason for doing so was that it would be “a vote of confidence in the Iraqi judiciary to have them conduct any such trial.”
UN officials, however, have been considering different approaches. Early in July, the UN convened a small group of international legal scholars and Iraqis in Baghdad to discuss what kind of trial would be best if Mr Hussein were captured the paper said.
One scholar invited to advise the UN-sponsored group, Diane F. Orentlicher, a professor of international law at American University here, said participants discussed several specific options. Among them were granting jurisdiction to an international tribunal, organizing a hybrid court of Middle Eastern judges working with Iraqis, or waiting for Iraq’s new legal system to mature sufficiently to do the job, she said.
US officials in Baghdad have said they hope to have some sort of working court system in place over the next several months for crimes like murder. But administration officials said that war crimes trials for Mr Hussein or any of his senior aides would not necessarily have to wait until a court system was fully functional. “This can proceed on a swifter track,” the senior State Department official told the newspaper.