Saddam's execution may be this weekend

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Saddam Hussein met with two of his half brothers and his lawyers Thursday at a U.S. detention facility as a senior U.S. official said his execution could come in "a couple of days."

Other news outlets including Reuters, The Associated Press and NBC News also reported that Saddam's hanging appeared imminent.

Saddam has been in U.S. custody in a prison cell at Camp Cropper near Baghdad's international airport. U.S. officials are expected to transfer him to official Iraqi custody shortly before the death sentence is carried out as ordered by an Iraqi court.

The execution likely will occur in "another day or so," which would place it before the religious holiday known as the Eid begins in Iraq, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Iraqi officials have said their government would be loath to carry out an execution during the Eid festival, which is expected to begin during the weekend. The U.S. official noted that the administration had been "in close contact with the government of Iraq" on Saddam's fate.

As speculation rose that the execution is near, the former president met at Camp Cropper with half brothers Sabawi and Watban Ibrahim Hassan Tikriti, both of whom are also in U.S. custody, according to one of Saddam's attorneys, Bushra Khalil.

"He met with them, and he gave them some things. I'm not sure what," said Khalil, speaking by phone from Amman, Jordan, where she plans to meet today with Saddam's daughter Raghad Saddam Hussein.

Another Saddam lawyer, Badie Aref, said Saddam was in high spirits and had sensed "something was happening relating to the sentence" when prison guards took away a small radio he had been given several months ago.

Aref said prison sources who told him of the family meeting said Saddam was aware of an appeals-court decision upholding his death sentence.

The court said the former president should be hanged within 30 days.

Saddam's lawyers said they had not been notified of the execution date.

Saddam, 69, shared untitled poems he wrote recently and well wishes for the Iraqi people with his visitors over lunch Thursday, said attorney Wadood Fawzi, one of those who met with Saddam.

During the two-hour meeting, Saddam made no requests and asked no questions, Fawzi said, even about his execution. "He wasn't sad; he was very normal," Fawzi said.

Saddam's lead attorney, Khalil al-Dulaimi, said he does not expect Saddam to invite family members to witness his execution.

Saddam was sentenced Nov. 5 for crimes against humanity in connection with the killing of about 100 men and boys from the Shiite town of Dujail who were suspected of attempting to assassinate him in 1982. Three of his six co-defendants also received death sentences.

Al-Dulaimi called Saddam's trial illegal and politically motivated. He called on U.S. and world leaders to acknowledge that, saying that otherwise they risked alienating not just Iraqis, but the rest of the Muslim world.

"I would like to advise the American administration and President Bush: Do not make mistakes again," al-Dulaimi said. "This is not advice from Saddam Hussein's lawyer, but from an Iraqi citizen."

Iraq's deputy justice minister, Bosho Ibrahim, said Saddam shouldn't be hanged for another few weeks. "The law does not say within 30 days, it says after the lapse of 30 days," Ibrahim said. He did not explain the discrepancy between his interpretation and the court's, nor could he give a specific execution date.

Information from The Associated Press and Reuters is included in this report.

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