Editorial: Fairness, even for Saddam

Saturday, Nov. 25, 2006 | 7:01 a.m.

While we harbor no sympathy for former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, complaints from the group Human Rights Watch that his trial was riddled with "serious procedural flaws" are cause for concern.

The U.S.-based group has released a 97-page report in which it says that observation and interviews with court officials, lawyers and other key players show that the Iraqi High Tribunal's handling of the trial fell well short of being fair.

In Nov. 5 court proceedings, Saddam and two senior members of his regime were sentenced to death for ordering the execution of about 150 Shiite Muslims following a 1982 attempt on Saddam's life.

Saddam and his henchmen were brought to trial in an Iraqi court that - after the 2003 U.S. invasion - was created to prosecute human rights violations.

The Human Rights Watch report says that Saddam's trial included such flaws as defendants being prohibited from properly confronting witnesses, a failure to disclose incriminating evidence in a timely manner and a failure on the part of judges to maintain an impartial demeanor.

The court's conduct, the report says, "reflects a basic lack of understanding of fundamental fair trial principles." And the result, it adds, "is a trial that did not meet key fair trial standards."

Granted, it would be easier to cry foul if the defendant in this case were someone other than a diabolical leader whose tyrannical reign has resulted in the deaths of thousands of innocent people. But one of the reasons people in free nations despise the likes of Saddam is that such leaders deny their countrymen the rights to such basic democratic principles as fair and objective trials.

With admissions from the Bush administration and members of Congress that most of the evidence for going to war in Iraq was bogus or poorly documented, establishing a democracy in Iraq is about the only reason the United States has left for being over there. It is the reason more than 2,870 American troops have died and tens of thousands of others have been wounded.

But a democracy cannot exist without an open and impartial court system.

These violations took place in a high-profile case. Imagine what it could be like for those whose cases don't draw such attention.

We would prefer that the report on Saddam's trial had emerged from a more objective source. Human Rights Watch is, among other things, against the death penalty. So the group's stance against Saddam's conviction and sentence is not without bias.

But the report does raise issues that should be investigated through an impartial examination of the proceedings, preferably by a panel that includes U.S. attorneys and judges. The United States is expending thousands of American troops' lives and billions of dollars trying to create democracy in Iraq. It also must provide checks and balances for the institutions the Iraqi government is creating in the name of that democracy.