- AMMAN, Jordan - Hussein Mjalli,
the head of Jordan's Bar Association, says more than 600 lawyers have signed
up to defend captive Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
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- Mjalli said the volunteers had signed up at the association's
offices in Amman and 600 lawyers indicated their readiness to be part of
a defence team for the former president of Iraq.
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- "The intention is to form a higher committee for
the defence of Saddam, one which will include legal experts from all over
the world," Mjalli said.
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- The general secretariat of the Arab Lawyers' Union was
meanwhile due to meet in Cairo to discuss plans for setting up the defence
team, he added.
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- The Jordanian association earlier this month sent letters
to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and Arab League chief Amr Mussa urging
them to ensure that Saddam would be handed to a neutral country or the
International Committee of the Red Cross.
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- The barristers have argued that Saddam should not be
put on trial because "a head of state is immune from prosecution"
and that in any case he should be protected from retribution by the United
States.
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- US troops captured Saddam in northern Iraq on December
13.
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- Since then both the Jordanian association and the Cairo-based
Arab Bar Association have insisted that Saddam receive a fair trial before
an Iraqi court supervised by Arab and international human rights organisations.
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- Members of Iraq's US-appointed interim Governing Council
say Saddam must be judged by an Iraqi tribunal inside Iraq, a view shared
by Paul Bremer, the US civil administrator in Iraq.
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- http://www.news24.com/News24/World/News/0,,2-10-1462_1463776,00.html
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