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And in a revelation likely to stir anger among
Kurdish survivors, the memo orders the Iraqi
officers "to cooperate with the Turkish side,
according to the cooperation protocol with them to
chase all the refugees".
No detail was given of the alleged agreement between
Turkey and Iraq, and a Turkish official rapidly
denied that Ankara had had any role in the deadly
1988 Anfal campaign.
"This has nothing to do with realities," the
diplomat told AFP in Ankara on condition of
anonymity. "It is an internal communication of the
Iraqis and has nothing to do with us."
While Ankara has long opposed the idea of an
independent Kurdish homeland in northern Iraq, it
has never been proved that Turkey cooperated with
Saddam's forces during Anfal, which prosecutors
describe as a genocide.
While the document touching on Turkish links was
read out, sound was cut off to trial reporters and
no discussion of the memo could be heard, although
the Arabic-language document could still be read on
the court screens.
Saddam and six co-defendants are accused of killing
182,000 Kurds between 1987 and 1988, when government
troops allegedly suppressed a Kurdish uprising by
using artillery, air strikes, death camps and poison
gas attacks.
They insist the so-called Anfal campaign was a
legitimate counter-insurgency operation against
Kurdish separatists at a time when Iraq was at war
with Iran.
At one point, defendant Hussein Rashid al-Tikriti,
Saddam's deputy chief of operations for the armed
forces, angrily interrupted proceedings, dismissing
the idea that he was responsible for the use of
"special ammunition".
"I was deputy commander. Deputy commander is not the
one responsible in any army... Did I sign this?" he
said, referring to one memo given in evidence.
"Is my name on it? If my name is there, I will sign
my execution warrant myself. I am only afraid of
God. If God wants me to die, I will die."
Judge Mohammed al-Oreibi sought to appease him. "You
are an old man, we want you to calm down. If you
deny something, just say it," he said.
But chief prosecutor Munqith al-Faroon remained
unmoved.
"This is the first time in history that we see the
army of a country using chemical weapons against its
own population. He is deputy commander. Of course
there is a supply directory, but who is in charge?"
said Faroon.
"It is not only about chemical weapons. This is also
about mass graves, destroying villages, civilians,
people," the prosecutor added.
Co-defendant Sultan Hashim al-Tai, the commander of
the Anfal task force and once defence minister, took
up the slack to deliver his own impassioned speech
in the name of self-defence.
"Put yourself in my shoes. I had this order and we
were at war. What were my choices? Carry out orders?
I am on trial here. Not carrying out orders would
have meant being courtmartialed. I am a dead man
already," Hashim said.
But the prosecution ridiculed his claims that
civilians were merely transferred out of fighting
zones to homes in the northern city of Kirkuk.
"We have seen documents. We have seen videos. Do
what you want to do. Believe the documents and the
videos or believe him?"
Saddam was sentenced to death a month ago for his
role in the execution of 148 Shiites in revenge for
an assassination attempt against him in the town of
Dujail in 1982. A panel of appeal court judges is
reviewing the verdict.
The trial adjourned until January 8.
Turkey kept out of Saddam campaign against Iraqi
Kurds: diplomat
Turkey had no role in a deadly 1988 campaign by
Iraqi forces against Kurdish civilians, a Turkish
diplomat said Thursday after a memo mentioning a
cooperation deal between Ankara and Baghdad at the
time was presented at a hearing of Saddam Hussein's
trial.
"This has nothing to do with realities," the
diplomat, who spoke on the condition of anonymity
told AFP. "It is an internal communication of the
Iraqis and has nothing to do with us."
The diplomat stressed that "the international
community remembers very well the assistance and
support that Turkey had offered to the Iraqi Kurds."
The official was referring to the aftermath of 1991
Gulf War when some 500,000 Iraqi Kurds found refuge
in Turkey, fleeing an Iraqi military crackdown on a
Kurdish rebellion in northern Iraq.
Turkey also allowed US and British warplanes to use
its southern Incirlik base between 1991 and 2003 to
enforce a "no-fly" zone over northern Iraq to
protect the Kurds.
The memo from the the 1988 Anfal campaign, presented
Thursday to a Baghdad court trying Saddam Hussein,
orders Iraqi officers "to cooperate with the Turkish
side, according to the cooperation protocol with
them to chase all the refugees."
It was presented as part of efforts by prosecutors
to prove that the ousted Iraqi dictator ordered the
slaughter of 182,000 Kurdish civilians.
No detail was given of the alleged agreement between
Turkey and Iraq.
Ankara has long opposed the idea of an independent
Kurdish homeland in northern Iraq, but it has never
been proved that Turkey cooperated with Saddam's
forces during Anfal, which prosecutors describe as a
genocide.
In 1983, Ankara and Baghdad had signed a security
agreement allowing them to cross into each other's
territory in hot pursuit of rebels.
It served as a ground for Turkish cross-border
operations in northern Iraq to hunt down militants
from the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), a Turkish
Kurd separatist group which has traditionally found
save haven in the area.
In 1988, Baghdad cancelled the agreement after
Ankara had refused to allow Iraqi forces onto its
soil to hunt Iraqi Kurds.
The PKK's separatist campaign in Turkey has claimed
more than 37,000 lives since the group took up arms
in 1984.
AFP
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