Saddam Hussein

One of Saddam Hussein's best-known lieutenants was convicted of helping plan the forced displacement of Kurds from northeastern Iraq and was sentenced to seven years. It was the second conviction against Tarik Aziz, the silver-haired former foreign minister and deputy prime minister who argued his boss' case in the halls of the United Nations and other international forums. Dozens of villages were destroyed and thousands of people displaced as part of Hussein's campaign against the Kurds in the late 1980s.

To what degree is the elected government of Iraq obligated to pay for the sins committed by the late dictator Saddam Hussein? Should neighboring Kuwait forgive Iraq's new leadership $24 billion in outstanding debt for the destruction wrought by the 1990 invasion, a seven-month occupation, looting and the violent retreat of Iraqi forces? And is it relevant that Iraq may need the money more than Kuwait does?

Iraq on Monday set a provisional date of Jan. 30 for parliamentary elections, the third since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein six years ago. The date was proposed by Iraq's federal court, which deals with government disputes, the office of Iraq's first deputy parliamentary speaker said. An official at Iraq's Independent High Electoral Commission said parliament would need to approve legislation enabling the elections, and a budget, before the balloting could take place. "We are of course ready.

All of the past is alive in Najaf's winding alleys, and none of it is forgotten by Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Hakim, who grins frequently and seems to delight in contradiction, as if his own suffering made him accept the paradoxes around him. In this Shiite Muslim holy city, Saddam Hussein stripped away clerics' rights and harassed, imprisoned and killed them. Hakim, a scion of one of the country's most prominent religious families, managed to survive prison and wars. After the U.S.

Clothes make the man, no matter what his size, and few know that better than Wisam Hussein. His men's clothing shop is one of many along a broad and busy avenue, but the sign sets it apart. "Farah Fashion for Large Sizes," it reads in letters too large to miss. Have plus sizes come to Iraq, where a Baghdad University study put the average male at 5 feet 6 and 168 pounds?

Tariq Aziz, who once represented Saddam Hussein's Iraq to the world, was sentenced Wednesday to 15 years in prison for his involvement in the 1992 killing of 42 merchants accused of price-fixing. The court found Aziz guilty of premeditated murder and crimes against humanity. It was the first conviction for the onetime foreign minister and deputy prime minister; last week the Iraqi High Tribunal dismissed charges against him regarding Hussein's crushing of a 1999 Shiite Muslim revolt.

A Shiite pilgrim sat on the sidewalk outside a Baghdad shrine, clad in black and holding a brown walking stick. He took off his slippers to rest his scratched and bloodied feet. Abu Zahra had just finished four days and 100 miles of walking, from Baghdad to the holy city of Karbala and back, and his feet were sore. But he had survived. Each year, millions of Shiites make religious pilgrimages such as this one, and each year, the death toll from violence along the way can rise into the hundreds.

A suburban Detroit man accused of spying for Saddam Hussein's regime and sharing information with the executed Iraqi dictator's intelligence service has pleaded guilty to aiding Iraq without approval from the U.S. government. Najib Shemami, 60, was accused of traveling to Iraq to report on U.S. and Turkish military activities and to supply information about Iraqi natives living in the United States. Defense lawyer Ed Wishnow says he'll argue at sentencing in May that the Sterling Heights man was coerced by Saddam's regime.

It is a wide world, I know, and there are surely people in it more receptive than myself to the idea of a four-hour miniseries about Saddam Hussein. That seems a long time to spend with the man. (John Adams got eight-plus hours earlier this year, but he was a Great American and lived to be 90.) And there is Steven Soderbergh's upcoming 257-minute Che Guevara biopic, but that has Benicio Del Toro in it, at least, and a big-screen budget.