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| Saddam sentenced to hang | | | Nov 5
BAGHDAD | Nov 5
Saddam Hussein was found guilty of crimes against humanity on Sunday and sentenced to hang by the U.S.-sponsored court that has been trying him in Baghdad for the past year.
Two other senior aides, including his half-brother Barzan al-Tikriti, will also hang if automatic appeals fail in the coming months. His vice-president was jailed for life and three minor officials of his Baath party were sentenced to 15 years.
Shortly after the verdict was read out at noon (0900 GMT) in a heavily fortified Baghdad courtroom that was once a Baath party office, clashes broke out between gunmen and U.S. and Iraqi troops in two Sunni Muslim neighborhoods of the capital.
Mortar rounds slammed into two districts of Baghdad, one Sunni, one Shi'ite, killing five people in all, police said.
The Shi'ite prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, said in a somber televised speech to the nation that Saddam "is facing the punishment he deserves". Maliki's government has been criticized for interfering in the case, which concerns the deaths of more than 148 Shi'ite men from the town of Dujail.
The verdict, delivered in a rapid-fire, 45-minute session, was the highpoint so far in one of the great experiments in the law of war crimes since Nazi leaders were tried at Nuremberg 60 years ago. Saddam is also on trial for genocide against Kurds.
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