Giving Lawyers a Bad Name

With plenty of time on his hands these days, the former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has begun writing his memoirs.

 

According to Saddam’s legal team, the fallen dictator’s biography will deal with everything from his childhood, to his exile in Egypt and his many military campaigns.

 

And one of his lawyers, Ziad Najdawi, says when Saddam’s autobiography is published it will be a big embarrassment to the so-called “coalition of the willing”.

Najdawi was hired to represent Saddam Hussein by the former Iraqi leader’s wife and children.

 

He claims there is no evidence to convict his client on war crimes charges.

 

The first thing that strikes you about Ziad Najdawi is that he dresses exactly like one of Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath party apparatchiks.

 

As well as the olive green safari suit, he sports a Saddam Hussein watch.

And behind Mr Najdawi’s desk is a large portrait of the fallen dictator.

 

After chastising me for being Australian – and by extension a member of the coalition of the willing – he tells me about his infamous client.

 

“Really, he is a very very kind man,” he says.

 

And then Ziad Najdawi offers me a character reference of those prosecuting Saddam.

 

“They are liars, really,” he said.

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The former dictator is expected to be charged over the invasion of Kuwait, the murder of more than 130,000 Iraqi Shi’ites, the gassing of the Kurds of Halabja, and the use of chemical weapons against the Iranians.

 

But the Jordanian lawyer reckons his defence is water-tight.

 

“Really they have nothing, until this time they did not give us any document that they had,” he says.

 

“Saddam Hussein is the president of Iraq and the constitutional law give him this right to do.”

 

But even with this supposed constitutional right, Najdawi denies Saddam Hussein ever committed genocide.

 

He has an answer for every charge, including the gassing of Kurds of Halabja, and the charge of mass graves.

 

“This mass grave had been establishment by Iranian groups when they attack the south of Iraq,” he says.

 

And when you ask to see the documents, he promises that maybe tomorrow he can show us the documents.