[Mb-civic] CBC News - SADDAM TO SUE OVER PICS OF HIM IN UNDERWEAR: LAWYER

Fri May 20 17:31:38 PDT 2005

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SADDAM TO SUE OVER PICS OF HIM IN UNDERWEAR: LAWYER
WebPosted Fri May 20 08:53:16 2005

LONDON---Saddam Hussein's lawyer says the former Iraqi dictator plans to
take legal action after a British and an American newspaper published
front page photos of him in his underwear.

"We will sue the newspaper and everyone who helped in showing these
pictures," Saddam's chief lawyer Ziad Al-Khasawneh told the BBC Friday.

Britain's Sun newspaper said it would fight the suit, calling Saddam a
"modern-day Hitler."

A photo showing Saddam in his prison cell, wearing only his underwear,
drew the ire of the U.S. military when it was splashed across the front
pages of both the Sun and the New York Post newspapers Friday.

The colour picture shows the former Iraqi dictator standing in his white
underwear while he folds a pair of brown pants.

Inside Britain's Sun newspaper, another photo shows him wearing a
traditional white Arab robe, or dishdasha. He is sitting on a plastic
chair, hand- washing some clothing.

The photos are likely to be viewed negatively in Arab countries,
especially by those who still laud Saddam for fighting the Americans.

"He was once the world's most feared despot with the blood of innocent
thousands on his murderous hands," the Sun newspaper says in its
typically sensational style.

"Now Saddam Hussein is reduced to shuffling around his prison compound in
his underpants and washing his OWN dirty socks in a simple bowl."

Bush plays down impact of photos

On Friday, U.S. President George Bush said he did not believe the photos
would incite further anti-American feelings in Iraq.

"I don't think a photo inspires murderers," Bush told the press at the
White House. "These people are motivated by a vision of the world that is
backward and barbaric &#8230; I think the insurgency is inspired by their
desire to stop the march of freedom."

U.S. officials have launched an investigation into who took the
photos of the former Iraqi dictator and provided them to the mass-
circulation tabloid. Both papers say they got the photos from "U.S.
military sources."

In Baghdad, the U.S. military said in a statement that the photos
violated military guidelines "and possibly Geneva Convention guidelines
for the humane treatment of detained individuals."

"The specific issue here is that these images are against DoD [Department
of Defence] policy. It's not the content of the photo that is the issue
at hand, but it is the existence or release of the photos," U.S. military
spokesman Staff Sgt. Don Dees told the Associated Press.

Photos not recent He said the photos were likely taken more than a year
ago.

The U.S. military captured Saddam in December 2003. He was hiding in a
concealed hole in the ground near his home of Tikrit, 130 kilometres
north of the capital.

He is being held at an undisclosed location, likely somewhere in Baghdad.

Saddam's London-based legal adviser questioned the publication of
the photos.

"It can't be right, can it, that you put a man in his underpants in the
paper," Giovanni di Stefano told the Associated Press.

The American military is sensitive to the release of prisoner photos
since the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, which involved photographs
showing Iraqi prisoners being abused by U.S. soldiers guarding the
Baghdad prison.