Thousands prevented from visiting Saddam tomb on anniversary of execution

A handful of Saddam Hussein supporters wept at his graveside in a village north of Baghdad today on the first anniversary of the toppled dictator’s execution, while thousands more were prevented from visiting the tomb because of heightened security.

In a show of defiant support for the former president, leaflets protesting about his death were scattered around a Sunni enclave in Baghdad and across the Sunni belt to the north of the capital, home to Saddam loyalists, where Iraqi security forces had been put on high alert.

Some ordinary people, both minority Sunni Arabs who benefitted under the old regime and majority Shia who suffered, also admitted to regret that Saddam was no longer president, noting that the chaos since the invasion was worse than anything before.

In the village of Awja, where Saddam was born and is buried, scores of sombre-looking Sunni tribal leaders and clerics paid their respects at his tomb, which was covered in Iraqi flags and flowers and surrounded by pictures of the mustachioed leader smiling. “With out blood, with our souls, we sacrifice for you Saddam,” a group of children chanted. More