print:The Terrible State Murder of Abed Hamid Hamoud

LETTER TO THE WORLD

My father received a death sentence on the same case Mr. Hamid Hamoud was executed for, I am deeply worried that they would the same thing for my father. The prime minister's press secretary said early this year that they will execute my father, and now that they have done with formalities, there is nothing to stop them. The world must know what these people have done, and what I am very sure they will do, god forbid, in the near future.

I asking for your help to let the world know what these people have done, and stop what they are planning to do.

Tariq Aziz, Iraq's former foreign minister and deputy prime minister.

Thank you for your support, my family and I are, as always, in your debt.

Yours Sincerely,

Ziad Tariq Aziz

May 9, 2008

"People say to me, you (Iraqis) are not the Vietnamese. You have no jungles and swamps to hide in. I reply, let our cities be our swamps and our buildings our jungles." - Tariq Aziz

Tariq Aziz in 2006

In the interview published below, Malcolm Lagauche tells of 2 times he saw Tariq Aziz interviewed on US television: the first, prior to Desert Storm and later, before the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

I also remember seeing Mr. Aziz interviewed on the Charlie Rose Show where Rose was no match for Aziz. Rose's feeble attempts to attack and belittle Mr. Aziz were calmly met with superior knowledge, impeccable logic and a superb use of the English language. In the end the interview was obviously embarrassing for Charlie Rose and his "liberal" media host, PBS.

It is little wonder that when seeking the video on the long list of videos on the Charlie Rose website, one finds: "Tariq Aziz: Video not available".

[2010 Addendum: Instead, PBS replaced Charlie Rose's embarrassing interview with Tariq Aziz with A conversation with David Martin from CBS News "about the surrender of Tariq Aziz, the number two official in Saddam Hussein's regime," on April 24, 2003. In his interview with Martin, Rose resuscitates his cowardly attack on Tariq Aziz when Aziz is not there to respond. In the same show, Rose and Martin served as state/corporate media for the Bush regime and Pentagon, giving credence to the existence of "weapons of mass destruction."]

- Les Blough, Editor

“There was no honour left; ruin and war and the blood was flowing … Sadness, hate and the reign of arbitrary destruction.”

- Rachid Taha, Algerian
Musician and lyricist

Abed Hamid Hamoud, President Saddam Hussein’s former personal secretary and aide, executed by the US puppet regime in Iraq.

Shocking details have emerged from an impeccable source (not named for obvious reasons) of the execution on Thursday 7th June, in Baghdad, of Abed Hamid Hamoud, President Saddam Hussein’s former personal secretary and aide.

Mr Hamoud, fourth on America’s 2003 asinine, juvenile playing card list of Iraq’s sovereign government, has been held in jail since June 2003, after being arrested by US occupying forces.

He was sentenced to death in October 2010 with former Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Tareq Aziz and former intelligence chief Sadoun Shakir, heightening fears for their imminent execution.

“What you have not heard” states the commentator : “is that (Mr Hamoud) was led to his execution whilst under the impression that he was going for a medical check up.

“The Iraqi government didn’t even notify his family or relatives or make arrangements with them to deliver his body.”

A chilling observation on America and Britain’s “New Iraq” is that the Maliki government is: “ … so intent on revenge that they have waved the formalities of telling a person they were taking him to his execution.”

Deep concern is expressed for the fate of both Tareq Aziz and Sadoun Shakir in the light of this appalling act. They were sentenced at the same Court hearing.

Prime Minister Nuri al Maliki’s Press Secretary stated earlier this year that they would execute Tareq Aziz: “ … and now they are done with the formalities, there is nothing to stop them.

“The world must know what these people have done and what I am sure they will do, God forbid, in the near future”, concludes our contact bleakly, pleading that pressure be brought to: “stop what they are planning to do” in the case of Tareq Aziz, Sadoun Shakir and many others.

Amnesty USA (i) has called the number of execution in Iraq “alarming” pointing out that at least seventy people were executed already in the first half of this year.

In January thirty five people were executed in a single day(ii) a number UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay called: “terrifying”, adding: "Given the lack of transparency in court proceedings, major concerns about due process and fairness of trials, and the very wide range of offences for which the death penalty can be imposed in Iraq, it is a truly shocking figure.

"Most disturbingly, we do not have a single report of anyone on death row being pardoned, despite the fact there are well documented cases of confessions being extracted under duress"’ she said.

Amnesty’s statement reminds: “The death penalty, which is the ultimate denial of human rights, should never be used, whatever the gravity of the crime… the present Iraqi government should demonstrate a clear break with the past by following the global trend away from the death penalty.”

Iraq became signatory to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, including the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. (iii)

In February 2010 the UN Human Rights Council’s periodic review of Iraq, primary recommendations were that a moratorium on the death penalty was established with a view to abolishing it. Iraq’s comically named, near mute “Human Rights Minister”, was in attendance.(iv)

It should be added that since the Court system was entirely overhauled under the occupation of Iraq and designed to US dictat. Changing anything in a Constitution is illegal under occupation, thus, it could be argued legally that the whole set up is not alone inhuman but illegal.

Ironically, it was al Maliki’s Dawa Party who attempted to assassinate Tareq Aziz and Saddam Hussein in Dujail in 1982. He is clearly determined to ruthlessly eliminate those who are familiar with a long, murderous, destabilizing history. Legalities be damned.

Never the less, however it is dressed up, as the lynching of Saddam Hussein, these killings are now being done in the name of Britain and America, who wrought the “New Iraq.”

Will they continue to stand silently by for as long as it takes – or will the largest US embassy on the planet, in Baghdad, rein in their puppet Prime Minister and regain at least some semblance of that which the USA is supposed to stand for?

Notes