WHERE TO TRY SADDAM?
Yesterday, the UN Security Council voted to authorize a peacekeeping mission to Liberia. The vote was 12-0 with France, Germany and Mexico abstaining. The US inserted a clause into the resolution that would exempt the UN peacekeepers from the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court, which the Bush administration rabidly objects to. This is ironic since the primary demand of the White House is for the removal of Liberian dictator Charles Taylor, a man indicted for war crimes by and who everyone wants to face justice in front of... an international tribunal: the UN Special Court for Sierra Leone.

The Bush administration also successfully pressured the Belgian governement to quash a controversial law. The law gave Belgian courts universal jurisdiction to prosecute war crimes, genocide and other crimes against humanity regardless of where the atrocities took place and regardless of the nationality of the victim. Washington had warned that it would refuse to send officials to NATO meetings in Brussels if the law were to stand. Lawsuits had already been filed there against such high-profile targets as President Bush, Secretary of War Donald Rumsfeld, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat. Under the revised law, only Belgian subjects or people resident in the country for at least three years at the time of the crime will have the right to launch such a suit.

All this leads me to wonder: what would happen if we actually captured Saddam Hussein? Osama bin Laden would be one thing, since the gravest crime he is accused of occurred on American soil (9/11). But since Saddam did not commit any crimes on American territory, American laws surely wouldn’t apply to him.

Since, in Belgian case, the Bush administration rejects the principle of national courts holding universal jurisdiction, we couldn’t try Saddam for crimes he committed in Iraq (or Kuwait or Iran). Since the administration rejects the authority of the International
Criminal Court, we wouldn’t send him there either. And do you seriously believe the occupation authorities would let Saddam be tried by domestic Iraqi courts?

So this begs the question, if American forces captured Saddam Hussein, where would he go on trial? Would the administration condescend to put him on trial? Can they afford not to?