Iraqi leader wants two more executed with Hussein cousin

Iraq's former deputy health minister, Hakim al-Zamili, hugged his daughter yesterday after he was released from detention. He and another Health Ministry official were cleared of charges that they helped Shi'ite death squads operate by giving them access to hospitals and ambulances. (Karim Kadim/Associated Press)

BAGHDAD - The Iraqi government is refusing to execute the Saddam Hussein henchman and cousin known as "Chemical Ali" unless the death sentences of two other Hussein-era officials also are approved.

The dispute pits the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki against the three-member presidential council, which moved last week to block the two other executions in what was seen as a possible attempt to appease minority Sunni Arabs.

The standoff underscores the often unclear lines of authority in Iraq and is another blow to Iraq's beleaguered judicial system.

Also yesterday, two former Health Ministry officials were released after being cleared on charges that they helped Shi'ite death squads operate by giving them access to hospitals and ambulances. There are widespread allegations of witness intimidation in those proceedings.

In the case of the executions, government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said in a telephone interview that Maliki's administration would not take custody of Ali Hassan al-Majid alone and that it wanted all three men.

The United States has custody of Majid as well as the two others, Hussein Rashid Mohammed, the former deputy director of operations for the Iraqi armed forces, and former defense minister Sultan Hashim al-Taie. A US military spokesman, Major General Kevin Bergner, said yesterday that no request had yet been made to turn Majid over to Iraqi authorities.

Last Friday, Iraq's three-member presidential council - President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, along with the Sunni and Shi'ite vice presidents - endorsed the death sentence of Majid, who earned the grim nickname "Chemical Ali" for gassing Kurd civilians during a brutal crackdown on their region in the 1980s.

The endorsement was thought to be the last step before carrying out Majid's sentence - death by hanging - within a month.

He and the two other Hussein deputies were condemned in June after being convicted of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity for their part in the Kurdish campaign, known as Operation Anfal.

Majid won little sympathy when his sentence was handed down, but Taie and Mohammed were seen by some as career soldiers who were just following orders.

Many Sunni Arabs thought Taie's sentence was evidence that Shi'ite and Kurdish officials were persecuting the nation's once-dominant minority. Hussein and many of his closest advisers were Sunnis.

Sunni leaders, including Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, launched a campaign to spare Taie, and the presidential council last week agreed not to execute either him or Mohammed.

Maliki, a Shi'ite, finds that unacceptable. "The prime minister refuses to split the death sentences issued by the Iraqi High Tribunal," Dabbagh said.

"He wants them to be carried out together. He believes that the death sentences issued by the High Tribunal are irreversible and unchangeable and do not need the approval of the presidency council, which has no right to change the sentences."

It was not clear what will happen if Majid is not executed within the month his sentence is meant to be carried out.