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Baghdad: Saddam Hussain, back in court two days after being sentenced to hang for crimes against humanity, urged Iraqis yesterday to seek reconciliation.
Invoking the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) and Jesus, Saddam told a court trying him for genocide against Kurds: "I call on all Iraqis, Arabs and Kurds, to forgive, reconcile and shake hands."
Saddam met his death sentence in the first trial on Sunday with cries of "Allahu Akbar!" and "Down with the invaders!".
Yesterday he was unusually subdued during a session in which he quietly listened to witnesses recount how Kurds were detained, shot or gassed by Iraqi soldiers in the late 1980s.
Saddam and six former commanders face charges of genocide for their roles in the 1988 Anfal (Spoils of War) military campaign against ethnic Kurds. Prosecutors say up to 180,000 Kurds were killed, many of them by gas attacks.
When he was summoned by the judge yesterday, Saddam, dressed in a black suit and tieless shirt and smiling faintly, filed into the marbled courtroom and made his way quietly to his seat.
At one point, the fallen strongman challenged a witness who took his shirt off to show what he said were scars suffered after being shot on Saddam's orders.
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