Ziad Tareq Aziz: My father is facing execution

The former Iraqi foreign minister Tareq Aziz disclosed in a message he had sent to his son Ziad that accusations were addressed to him by the new Iraqi authority, are involvement in a mass killing operations in 1979 and 1991.

The case relating to 1979 is linked to the killing of 22 members in the Baath party who were accused of being involved in a conspiracy against the government, a short time after the toppled Iraqi President Saddam Hussein assumed power. The case of 1991 seemed to be linked to oppressing the Kurdish and Shiite people who had an uprising that year.

In statements to the press, Ziad Tareq Aziz described the accusations as "groundless." He said " eventually, according to the Iraqi criminal law, the penalty for the two accusations is execution," noting that the message was written in the first of July and he got it from the International Committee of the Red Cross last week. He added that his father also asked him in the same message, to assign a lawyer to defend him, which means that Tareq does not know what had happened. Ziad explained that in particular his father asked for former US official Ramzi Clark and the Jordanian lawyer Hani al-Khasawneh.

Worthy mentioning that Tareq Aziz was brought together with Saddam Hussein and some 10 of his aides on the first of July before an Iraqi investigation judge in a session transmitted live through world television stations.