|
New saddam tape denies role { September 2 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.chinapost.com.tw/detail.asp?ID=40889&GRP=Ahttp://www.chinapost.com.tw/detail.asp?ID=40889&GRP=A
Tuesday, September 02, 2003
New Saddam tape denies role in bombing
2003/9/2
Steven R. Hurst, BAGHDAD, Iraq, AP
A new audiotape Monday purporting to carry the voice of Saddam Hussein denied involvement in the bombing in Najaf that killed 125 people, including a cherished Shiite leader. The message was broadcast after the U.S.-picked Iraqi Governing Council named a new Cabinet in a step toward reclaiming some powers from the American occupation administration.
Using Saddam's well-known rhetorical style, the voice urged the Iraqi people not to believe those who blamed the ousted dictator and his followers for Friday's attack on the Imam Ali Shrine in Najaf.
"Many of you may have heard the snakes hissing, the servants of the invaders, occupiers, infidels, and how they have managed to accuse the followers of Saddam Hussein of responsibility for the attack on (Ayatollah Mohammad Baqir) al-Hakim without any evidence," said the tape, which was broadcast by the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera satellite television station.
"They rushed to accuse before investigating," the voice said.
While he denied any role in the Najaf bombing, he made no mention of the Jordanian Embassy bombing on Aug. 7 or the U.N. headquarters attack 12 days later, which investigators suspect may have also been committed by Saddam followers.
It was impossible to immediately authenticate the tape.
Al-Hakim was a longtime opponent of Saddam and spent more than two decades in exile in Iran, returning to Iraq only in May. The crowds mourners have accused Saddam loyalists of killing the cleric.
Iraqi police officials leading the investigation, however, have said they believe al-Qaida linked Islamic militants were behind the attack. The FBI said on Sunday that it would help investigate the bombing after receiving a request from local officials.
Iraq's 25-member Governing Council announced a Cabinet, which mirrored exactly the council's ethnic and religious breakdown with 13 Shiites, five Sunni Arabs, five Kurds (also Sunnis), one ethnic Turk and an Assyrian Christian.
The new Foreign Minister will be Hoshyar Zebari who was spokesman for the Kurdish Democratic Party. The key Oil Ministry will be headed by Ibrahim Mohammed Bahr al-Uloum, the son of Governing Council member Mohammed Bahr al-Uloum, who on Saturday suspended his membership in the interim body because of the lack of security in the country and what he saw as the American's inability to protect prominent figures. The elder Bahr al-Uloum cited the Najaf bombing.
The Information Ministry, which became famous for its distorted accounts of the war, was abolished in the new government list.
The Governing Council, formed on July 13 had been promising for weeks that it would name a government. It was unclear what delayed announcing the Cabinet, but several members of the council had spent much time after their appointment on trips throughout the world seeking recognition for the body as the legitimate representative of the Iraqi people.
|
|
