BAGHDAD (AFX) - Iraq will execute two former henchmen of Saddam Hussein tomorrow, five days after the former dictator was himself hanged in Baghdad, an official at the Iraqi prime minister's office said.
Saddam's half-brother and former head of intelligence, Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, and Awad Ahmed al-Bandar, the former chief judge of revolutionary court, will be hanged at dawn on Thursday, the official said.
'Their documents have been signed and they will be executed Thursday,' he told Agence France-Presse, speaking on condition of anonymity, adding that the two men remain for the time being in the custody of US authorities.
On Nov 5, the two were found guilty along with Saddam by an Iraqi court of ordering the massacre of 148 Shiites from Dujail village in the 1980s in revenge for an failed attempt on the then president's life.
Barzan and Bandar were to have been hanged along with Saddam on Saturday, but their execution was postponed as 'we did not have time on that day,' the official in Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's office said.
The Iraqi government wanted to complete Saddam's execution before sunrise, which marked the start of Eid al-Adha, one of Islam's holiest holidays and traditionally a time for forgiveness. The festival ends on Wednesday.
Hot-tempered and secretive, Barzan was one of Saddam's most trusted aides, while Bandar was the first judge to be tried for ordering executions since Nazi judges were brought before the Nuremberg trials after World War II.
Saddam's execution has dramatically increased tensions between Iraq's already feuding Sunni and Shiite communities, especially after a grisly video showing the Sunni leader taunted by Shiite hangmen surfaced.
Yesterday, the prime minister launched an inquiry into the source of the video, apparently taken with a mobile phone, which has enraged Sunni Arabs across Iraq.
'He's very serious about this inquiry, and he wants to punish whoever is responsible,' said a Shiite lawmaker with close links to the prime minister.
The controversy comes at a time when most Iraqi and US strategies have failed to curb the sectarian killings and has forced US President George W. Bush to seek a new strategy to beat the extremist factions driving the violence.
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