Breaking News: Former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein executed  2006-12-30 11:01:50

Special Report: World reactions on execution of Saddam

Special Report: Execution of Saddam

Special report: Tension escalates in Iraq

Iraqi TV footage shows ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's final moment before execution on early Saturday, Dec 30, 2006. (Xinhua/AFP Photo) Photo Gallery>>>

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     BEIJING, Dec. 31 (Xinhuanet) -- Iraqi state television showed on Saturday that former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein was led to the gallows and a noose was placed around his neck.

    According to the footage, Saddam refused to have his head covered with a hood as he was taken to the gallows with his hands bound behind him.

    The footage also aired film of Saddam, looking composed and talking with a masked hangman as he placed the noose around Saddam's neck on the gallows.

    However, the footage did not show the death or the body.

    Arabic satellite channel Arabiya also reported the execution had taken place.

    "It was very quick. He died right away," one of the official Iraqi witnesses said

    Before the rope was put around his neck, Saddam shouted: "God is great. The nation will be victorious and Palestine is Arab," Sami al-Askari, the political adviser to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, said.

    Meanwhile, Iraqi Deputy Foreign Minister Labeed Abbawi told the BBC on Saturday that Saddam had been executed.

    The execution occurred after Saddam, who was born on April 28, 1937, and was deposed by the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, was handed over to the Iraqi authorities from a U.S. camp near Baghdad international airport where he had been held.

    On Nov. 5, a panel of five Iraqi judges sentenced Saddam, his half-brother Barzan al-Tikriti and Iraq's former chief judge Awad Ahmed al-Bandar to death by hanging for the killing of 148 people in Dujail, some 60 km north of Baghdad.

    On Dec. 3, the defense lawyers of Saddam officially appealed to the higher court against the death penalty imposed on Saddam and another two co-defendants.

    However, the Iraqi appellate court chief announced on Tuesday that the court had upheld the death sentence for Saddam Hussein.

    Earlier on Friday afternoon, a U.S. judge refused a last-minute request to stay the execution as Saddam's lawyers filed the court challenge.

    (Agencies)

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