Special report:Tension escalates in Iraq

Special report: Saddam Hussein's Fate

Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein yells in court as he receives his verdict, as a bailiff attempts to silence him, during his trial held under tight security in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone November 5, 2006. (Xinhua Photo) Photo Gallery >>>

    BEIJING, Nov. 6 (Xinhuanet) -- Fierce clashes broke out in some Sunni districts in Baghdad immediately after former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was sentenced to death, an Interior Ministry source and witnesses said Monday.

     Clashes erupted in Zaafaraniyah neighborhood in southeastern Baghdad between insurgents and Iraqi security forces backed by U.S. troops, wounding at least five people. Elsewhere, clashes in Fadhil district in central Baghdad resulted in death of an Iraqi army officer, he added.

    As many as 2,000 people took to the streets in Iraq in protest after Saddam Hussein was sentenced to death by hanging Nov. 5. And the number of demonstrators is increasing.

    A witness said the protesters in Tikrit, Hussein's hometown, carried his posters and shot into the air in defiance of the government's curfew while some others joyously shouted "the killer deserves to be killed" and set his pictures on fire.

    Iraqi President Jalal Talabani insisted the trial was "fair," but he refused to comment on it further.

In this image from TV Chief judge Raouf Rashid Abdel-Rahman begins Sunday's Nov. 5, 2006 session in Saddam Hussien's trial held in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone.  (Xinhua Photo) Photo Gallery >>>

    Two Sunni Arab local television stations, Baghdad-based, have been shut down by Iraq's Interior Ministry for inciting violence.

    Leading Iraqi attorney Khalil al-Dulaimi warned early Sunday in a letter to the U.S. President Bush that the verdict could plunge Iraq and the region into violence. The trial on Saddam has caused casualties before. On Sept. 29, a brother-in-law of a judge trying Saddam Hussein for genocide in Anfal operation was shot dead, together with his son, by unknown armed men in a western Baghdad neighborhood.

    The sentence has also aroused mixed reactions worldwide. U.S. President Bush hailed it as "a milestone" for Iraq, while the Finnish presidency of the European Union (EU) called for Iraq not to use the death penalty against Hussein.

    Saddam got his sentence by the Iraqi High Tribunal for his killing of 148 Shiite villagers in the Iraqi village of Dujail. Along with this verdict, two other Saddam's defendants were also sentenced to death by hanging. One other defendant was sentenced to life in prison, and three received 15-year sentences.

    (Agencies)

Saddam verdict arouses mixed reactions

    BEIJING, Nov. 6 (Xinhua) -- The death sentence given to former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein on Sunday has aroused mixed reactions worldwide, with many countries welcoming the end of the trial but opposing the use of death penalty.

    The United States, which led the 2003 invasion of Iraq, hailed the verdict as "a major achievement." Full Story

A policeman stands guard at a checkpoint in Baghdad November 5, 2006.(Xinhua Photo) Photo Gallery >>>

Saddam Hussein sentenced to death by hanging

    BAGHDAD, Nov. 5 (Xinhua) -- Iraq's High Tribunal on Sunday handed down death penalty by hanging to ousted President Saddam Hussein and two of his senior aides for the Dujail case.

    Saddam's half brother and former intelligence chief Barzan Ibrahim and Awad Hamad al-Bandar, chief judge of Saddam's Revolutionary Court, were sentenced to death over the execution of 148 people of Dujail in crackdown on the town after a failed assassination attempt against Saddam in 1982. Full Story