[Marxism] Iraq Seeks Arrest of Ahmad Chalabi

["Alain St-Amour" <alainstamour@xxxxxxxx>]

Ahmad Chalabi is a scumbag. But he's our scumbag. So why is he being treated so 
shabbily now? Why not 20 years ago?

Alain
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http://tinyurl.com/6bhlh
The New York Times
August 8, 2004
Iraq Seeks Arrest of Ahmad Chalabi
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Iraq has issued an arrest warrant for Ahmad Chalabi, a 
former governing council member, on counterfeiting charges and another for 
Salem Chalabi, the head of Iraq's special tribunal, on murder charges, Iraq's 
chief investigating judge said Sunday.

The warrant was a new sign of the fall of Ahmad Chalabi from the centers of 
power. Chalabi, a longtime exile opposition leader, had been a favorite of many 
in the Pentagon but fell out with the Americans in the weeks before the U.S. 
occupation ended in June.

His nephew, Salem Chalabi, heads the tribunal that is due to try Saddam on war 
crimes charges.

``They should be arrested and then questioned and then we will evaluate the 
evidence, and then if there is enough evidence, they will be sent to trial,'' 
said Judge Zuhair al-Maliky.

The warrants, issued Saturday, accused Ahmad Chalabi of counterfeiting old 
Iraqi dinars -- which had been removed from circulation following the fall of 
Saddam's regime last year, he said.

Ahmad Chalabi appeared to have been hiding the counterfeit money amid other old 
money and changing it into new dinars in the street, he said.

Police found the counterfeit money along with old dinars in Ahmad Chalabi's 
house during a May raid, he said.

Salem Chalabi was named as a suspect in the June killing of the Haithem Fadhil, 
director general of the finance ministry.

Both men were reportedly out of the country Sunday.

Haidar al-Moussawi, Ahmad Chalabi's spokesman, said members of his Iraqi 
National Congress had heard of the arrest warrants only through the media.

``Such a warrant has been issued, but no one called any of the accused or gave 
them a chance before issuing the arrest warrant,'' he said.

``These are very bad indications about the state of justice and law in the new 
Iraq,'' he said.

If convicted, Salem Chalabi could face the death penalty, which was restored on 
Sunday, al-Maliky said. Any sentence for Ahmad Chalabi would be determined by 
the trial judges, he said.

Ahmad Chalabi was a senior member of the Governing Council, which ran Iraq from 
the fall of Saddam until the end of the U.S. occupation. But he fell out with 
the Americans, and allegations surfaced that he supplied Iranians with 
classified U.S. intelligence on American monitoring of Iranian communications.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/international/AP-Iraq-Arrest-Warrants.html?pagewanted=print&position=

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