Saddam trial judge appointed Iraqi PM adviser
Shafaq News- Baghdad
A Kurdish judge who presided over the execution of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein in 2006 has been appointed legal adviser to Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi, an informed source told Shafaq News on Sunday.
Judge Munir Haddad, a member of the Feyli Kurdish community, a predominantly Shia Kurdish population that endured forced displacement and systematic repression under Saddam’s Baath regime, served as the judicial official who read the death sentence aloud in the execution chamber.
Haddad previously held senior positions at the Iraqi High Tribunal (IHT), which was established after 2003 to prosecute former regime officials on charges that included the Anfal campaign that killed an estimated 50,000 to 180,000 Kurdish civilians, along with thousands of Assyrian, Turkmen, and Shabak civilians in 1988. He served as head of the IHT's appellate chamber and deputy president of the tribunal.
Following the conclusion of the tribunal's work, he remained active as an independent legal voice, offering constitutional analysis and commentary across Iraqi media outlets and policy research centers before his selection for the advisory post.
