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Kuwait Draws Up Charges Against Saddam NewsMax.com WiresKUWAIT CITY -- Kuwaiti prosecutors have drawn up a list of charges against ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and hundreds of his officials for alleged war crimes committed during Iraq's occupation of the Gulf nation, the prosecutor general said Wednesday. The list will be delivered to the Iraqi court that will try Saddam and other former regime members and the new charges will be added to the existing allegations, prosecutor general Hamed al-Othman said, according to the state-owned Kuwait News Agency. Story Continues Below Saddam, who was captured in December 2003, already faces charges in Iraq that include killing rival politicians during his 30-year rule, gassing Kurds, invading Kuwait and suppressing Kurdish and Shiite uprisings in 1991 after the U.S.-led Gulf War that liberated Kuwait. The Kuwaiti charges include allegations that Saddam's regime kidnapped 605 Kuwaitis and nationals of other countries who lived in the oil-rich state at the time of the 1990-91 occupation, al-Othman said. The remains of 147 of them were found in mass graves in Iraq after Saddam was toppled in April 2003. Another 5,733 were tortured by electric shock, beaten, starved and sexually abused, and 139 were seriously injured by shooting or by land mines planted by Iraqis, he added. The Kuwaiti charges are against Saddam and nine other senior regime figures - including Ali Hassan al-Majid, who ruled Kuwait during the seven-month occupation; Tariq Aziz, Saddam's foreign minister; and Taha Yassin Ramadan, who served as vice president. The three men are in U.S. custody awaiting trial. The names of 293 other lower officials and their alleged crimes also were included, according to the prosecutor general. It was not clear how many of these officials are in custody in Iraq. Among the other charges were murder, torture, theft and damaging the environment, the prosecutor general said. Senior Iraqi officials ordered in writing the theft and destruction of the country's archives, and the Iraqis sabotaged some 700 oil wells before their troops withdrew from the country. Kuwait was the launch pad for the invasion of 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, and it was the only Arab country that supported it openly. Ties with Baghdad resumed after Saddam's regime was overthrown.
© 2005 The Associated Press
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