- BAGHDAD (Reuters) -- Saddam
Hussein will be handed over to Iraqi justice Wednesday, two days after
the country regained its sovereignty from the United States, but he will
remain under U.S. guard to ensure he doesn't escape.
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- Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said Tuesday that
Saddam and up to 11 top members of his regime would appear before Iraqi
judges to be charged Thursday, a day after the legal transfer, although
the trial would take months.
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- Saddam will be charged with crimes against humanity for
the 1988 massacre of Kurds in Halabja, the 1990 invasion of Kuwait and
the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, said Salem Chalabi, a lawyer leading the work
of the special tribunal that will try the former Iraqi leader.
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- Allawi's new government is under pressure to demonstrate
to ordinary Iraqis that a break from the past has been made, while also
showing it is tough on the violence blighting the country.
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- There was no let-up in that violence Tuesday.
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- Three U.S. Marines were killed in a roadside bomb blast
in Baghdad, raising to at least 632 the number of U.S. soldiers killed
in action since the start of the war last year.
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- "I don't know why the terrorists want to kill us.
We just want to help Iraqis," said a Marine at the scene.
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- Allawi told a news conference: "This government
has formally requested the transfer of the most notorious and high-profile
detainees. These people...will face justice before the special Iraqi court
created in January to try members of the former regime for crimes against
humanity, genocide and war crimes."
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- Saddam, accused by Iraqis of ordering the killing and
torture of thousands of their compatriots during 35 years of Baathist rule,
has been held as a prisoner of war since U.S. forces found him hiding in
a hole near Tikrit in December.
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- Allawi said the U.S.-led multinational force would keep
physical custody of Saddam and the other 11 until Iraq's nascent police
force was capable of detaining them securely.
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- "We want to make sure that Saddam Hussein is alive
for his trial. We want to make sure he is actually there for his trial,"
Dan Senor, former spokesman for the U.S.-led occupation authority, told
NBC's "Today" show in the United States, explaining why the former
dictator remained under U.S. guard.
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- The special tribunal would give them a fair and open
trial, but it would not start for several months, Allawi said.
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- Highlighting the security problems facing the new government,
an Arabic television station aired a video tape showing what militants
said was the execution of a U.S. soldier.
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- THREE TURKS FREED
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- While uncertainty shrouded his fate, three Turkish hostages
walked free after their release by a group led by Jordanian militant Abu
Musab al-Zarqawi, a suspected al Qaeda ally.
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- His group had previously threatened to behead the Turks
on Tuesday unless their government told companies to stop dealing with
U.S. forces in Iraq. Ankara had rejected the demand.
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- "Jama'at al-Tawhid and Jihad announces the release
of the Turkish hostages for the sake of Muslims in Turkey and their demonstrations
against (U.S. President George W.) Bush," a masked man said on a video
tape aired by Arabic Al Jazeera TV.
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- A three-day visit by Bush to Turkey for a NATO summit
has been met by widespread protests against his policies in Iraq.
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- Another two Turks seized in Iraq three weeks ago have
told their families they are well and will return to Turkey within a week,
Turkish media reported.
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- Kidnap groups have also threatened to kill a U.S. Marine
and a Pakistani. The Pakistani's captors said Sunday he would be beheaded
within three days unless Iraqi prisoners were released.
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- DIPLOMATIC TIES RESUMED
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- A day after Iraq regained its sovereignty, ambassadors
from three nations in the U.S.-led coalition -- the United States, Australia
and Denmark -- presented their credentials to the new government, formally
resuming diplomatic ties.
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- John Negroponte, the new U.S. ambassador, who was previously
Washington's envoy to the United Nations, said he looked forward to working
with the sovereign Iraqi government.
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- The handover of power helped drive world oil prices to
their lowest level in more than two months on traders' hopes of less sabotage
and steadier exports.
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- As part of a policy introduced after the Abu Ghraib abuse
scandal, the U.S. military freed dozens more prisoners from the Baghdad
jail and another facility at Umm Qasr in the south.
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- "We were just taken from our houses with no explanation,"
said Ayad al-Azzawi, among those released from Umm Qasr. "I was in
prison for nine months and they never charged me."
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- But there was anguish for the family of the man identified
on the video footage shown on Al Jazeera television as Private Keith Maupin,
20, a U.S. soldier seized by guerrillas in April.
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- A gunman was seen firing a shot at the soldier, wearing
greenish overalls and seen only from behind. The body fell into a hole.
There was no confirmation Maupin was the man killed.
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