‘It’s about justice, not Saddam alone’

In an office off Al Jaleel street, a group of lawyers thumbed through legal books and debated how to get bail for a man accused of genocide....

In an office off Al Jaleel street, a group of lawyers thumbed through legal books and debated how to get bail for a man accused of genocide.

This is the headquarters of the Saddam Hussein Legal Defence Fund. The team begins with Muhammed Rashdan, a 55-year-old former Baathist who says Iraq’s ex-dictator has been misunderstood. ‘‘He’s a severe person but he’s just,’’ Rashdan said. ‘‘I’m honoured to represent his excellency.’’

Then there is Ali Nasrat Al-Asaadi, a Kurdish lawyer from Nebraska, who defended Saddam’s use of chemical weapons on Iraqi Kurds. ‘‘In self-defence, you can use whatever you need, even chemicals.’’ And Giovanni Di Stefano, a slickly-dressed Italian dynamo, who said he’s met Saddam and that one of the former dictator’s favourite books is To Kill a Mockingbird.

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‘‘That’s what this case comes down to,’’ Di Stefano said. ‘‘Do you want law or mob justice?’’

They concede their work will not be easy. ‘‘This isn’t about Saddam,’’ Di Stefano said. ‘‘This is about fact and truth and law and justice.’’ If their presumptive client is extraordinary, so are the difficulties they face in representing him: Earlier this week, their Baghdad trip was cancelled after they heard some people were waiting to kill them.

The lawyers were coy about whether they were getting paid. ‘‘If we do get paid, it will be from legitimate funds from the Hussein family,’’ Di Stefano said.

A central argument is that the tribunal, established by the occupying US authority, is illegitimate because there was no legal basis for invading Iraq. ‘‘Everything based on something illegal is illegal,’’ Rashdan said. M. Cherif Bassiouni, an international law expert at DePaul University in Chicago, said some of the arguments were stronger than others. —(NYT)