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Aziz mild compared to Saddam
26/04/2003 11:52 - (SA)
Baghdad - Tariq Aziz appears to have hidden in plain sight during the US invasion, holing up in a Baghdad home until four American armoured vehicles rolled up and he surrendered, neighbours and relatives said.
The former deputy prime minister finds himself in a position he swore he'd never face: captured by the United States and facing a possible war crimes trial for his career as Saddam Hussein's sidekick.
Some Iraqis, quick to urge hanging or cages for Saddam and other members of his regime, called on Friday for mercy for Aziz. They said he showed none of the personal relish for blood that the others did.
"He had to do what he was told, or Saddam would execute him," said Bishop Emmanuel Delly, Baghdad leader of the Chaldean Catholic faith, to which Aziz belongs.
The US Central Command on Thursday announced the capture of Aziz -Iraq's best-known figure internationally, after Saddam himself. US military officials said Aziz surrendered on Thursday in Baghdad.
American officials gave no further details. Chaldean Catholic clerics in Baghdad insisted church figures played no role in mediating the surrender, saying they learned of it afterward.
In a wealthy eastern Baghdad neighbourhood, neighbours described seeing four US armoured vehicles pull up about 11 pm on Thursday outside the block-wide mansion where one of Aziz's daughters lived.
US soldiers spilled from the hatches, taking up positions around the home, neighbours said. They spoke on condition of anonymity.
The neighbourhood was in darkness at the time, emerging only on Friday from a citywide three-week power outage. It was impossible to see who, if anyone, accompanied the soldiers when they left, residents said.
At another Aziz family home, a woman who described herself as a very close relative refused to talk at length. "This is not the time," said the clearly exhausted woman, apparently in her early 50s.
She confirmed, however, that the family was worried about the 66-year-old Aziz's heart condition. Media reports said Aziz has had two heart attacks and that a doctor was with him when he surrendered.
Many in Baghdad had assumed Aziz fled to Syria with other government ministers and their families.
A source close to Aziz's family had pointed to Baghdad as the most likely place Aziz would have gone into hiding, however - citing the many Aziz family homes, at least four in all, in the capital.
Aziz was the only Christian in Saddam's top circle.
Clerics and fellow congregation members said on Friday they had not seen Aziz in church for years. But his wife, they said, was a faithful celebrant at every Mass until early April.
"Especially in the last weeks, she would weep and weep," said the Rev. Boutros Haddad, priest at the Virgin Mary Baghdad parish church. "The last time she came, she could not stop crying. Probably she expected this."
Delly, the bishop, refused to say whether he hoped for mercy for Aziz.
"I am not a judge," he said. "He did his job. He did his duty, like all of us."
British lawmakers and others were talking Friday of a war crimes trial for Aziz for his role in Saddam's regime.
Aziz was known to some in international diplomatic circles as a hard-nosed, brusque man, a tough advocate for Saddam's interests.
Iraqis described far gentler behaviour, especially compared with the torture and killing that Saddam and his sons meted out.
A woman recalled the time long ago when, as a schoolgirl, she visited Aziz's daughter at their home. She said Aziz invited her to take any book she wanted from his library, the largest she had ever seen - on condition, he said gently, that she return it.
Another Baghdad resident, also speaking on condition of anonymity, described Aziz at a party, nervously chain-smoking cigars as he worried over a visit of a United Nations delegation.
Aziz was "a big liar," said Ali al-Safar, a college student in a baseball cap, as he shopped with friends in Baghdad.
As for Saddam himself, "I want him handed to the Iraqi people, and you'll see what the people will do with him," al-Safar said, smiling grimly. "Maybe put in the zoo, in a monkey cage."
But he said Aziz "should be judged like any other wanted person - to examine the good and the bad." - Sapa-AP
- SAPA
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