Saddam Hussein's crimes against humanity

Repression, imprisonment, torture, deportation, assassination, and execution. That's how Saddam's regime dealt with the Iraqi people. Arrogance and aggression. That's how Saddam's regime dealt with it's neighbours. Saddam's regime was a dictatorship which lacked constitutional legitimacy and real popular base inside the country. Since the 17-30 July 1968 coup of the Ba'ath Party, the numbers of prisons and the amount of oppressive and intelligence apparatus had steadily increased. There have been hundreds of decrees issued by Saddam or the Revolutionary Command Council which sentenced to death anyone who criticized the brutal regime in any way (such as writing slogans or delivering speeches) . The list of crimes committed by Hussein and his thugs seems endless, however here are a few examples:

• The killing of Sunni religious leaders such as Abdul Aziz Al Badri the Imam of Dragh district mosque in Baghdad in 1969, Al Shaikh Nadhum Al Asi from Ubaid tribe in Northern Iraq, Al Shiakh Al Shahrazori, Al Shaikh Umar Shaqlawa, Al Shiakh Rami Al Kirkukly, Al Shiakh Mohamad Shafeeq Al Badri, Abdul Ghani Shindala.
• The arrest of hundreds of Iraqi Islamic activists and the execution of five religious leaders in 1974.
• The arrest of thousand of religious people who rose up against the regime and the killing of hundreds of them in the popular uprising of 1977 in which Ayatollah Mohamad Baqir Al Hakim the leader of SCIRI was sentenced to life imprisonment.
• The arrest, torture and executions of tens of religious scholars and Islamic activists in such as Qasim Shubbar, Qasim Al Mubarqaa in 1979.
• The arrest, torture and execution of Ayatollah Mohamad baqir Al Sadr and his sister Amina Al Sadr (Bint Al Huda) in 1980.
• The war against Iran in 1980 in which hundreds of thousands of Iraqis AND Iranians were killed, and many doubles of that number were handicapped or missed.
• The arrest of 90 members of Al Hakim family and the execution of 16 members of that family in 1983 to put pressure on Ayatollah Mohamad Baqir Al Hakim to stop his struggle against Saddam's regime.
• Using chemical weapons in the North and the South.
• The occupation of Kuwait which resulted in the deaths of many in both Kuwait and Iraq.
• The assassination of many opposition figures outside Iraq such as Haj Sahal Al Salman in UAE in 1981, Sami Mahdi and Ni'ma Mohamad in Pakistan in 1987, Sayed Mahdi Al Hakim in Sudan in 1988, and Shaikh Talib Al Suhail in Lebanon in 1994.
• The execution of 21 Bath Party leaders in 1979 in Iraq , the assassination of Hardan Al Tikriti former defence Minister in Kuwait in 1973, and the former Prime Minister Abdul Razzaq Al naef in London 1978.
• The deaths of 148 villagers from the town of Dujail, where torture and executions followed a failed assassination attempt on Saddam in 1982.

Please feel free to add to this list. In other news:
+ Defence Department nixes proposal to buy slightly used A-4 and A-5 versions of the Leopard-2 tank from Germany and Switzerland
+ Cpl. Michael Seeley, 27, of Fredericton, a Canadian Mi’kmaq Native Indian and U.S. Marine, was killed in action in Iraq. His mom says he never questioned the war or his participation in it.
+ Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said today that the Israeli military would not halt its offensive in the northern Gaza Strip until Palestinian terrorist rocket fire is significantly reduced.