It was hard to believe, even though we all had heard the court’s verdict.
After the long, tedious and unfinished trial of Milosevic, I was expecting a lengthy process of appeals and re-appeals, but today, the news was short and shocking. “Saddam has been executed”
Although I’m firmly against the capital punishment, even for such a ruthless dictator like Saddam, it’s genuinely hard to feel sympathy for one of the darkest figures in the modern history. Even harder for us, Iranians, who have no shortage of first-hand experiences of his merciless killing machine.
I’m not sad that he’s been executed. I’m angry. I’m furious. Angry because he was sentenced to death for a minor fraction of what he was truly responsible for. Because the history was denied from everything he knew and was buried with him forever. Because he died before talking about all who supported him for years, from United Stated and European countries to Russia and Arab leaders of the region, with money, intelligence, weapons, and sadly, by providing him the materials that enabled him to put forward his deadly chemical and biological program.
He died before he was given enough time to think about what he had done to his people, to Iranians and to Kuwaitis and to be honest, death by hanging was a gift to Saddam that relieved him from unquestionable years of pondering in prison. The gift, he was not courageous enough to give himself, the way Hitler and Goebbels generously indulged themselves with.
The day, I watched Saddam’s being brutally humiliated on TV, was one of the best days of my life. The day he got executed, I just feel shocked and betrayed.
He definitively deserved to die, but the humanity deserved much more than that.
