As Muslims worldwide are preparing to welcome the joyful
religious holiday of Eid al-Adha starting from Saturday, the ousted
and jailed former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was hastily
executed by hanging at dawn in Iraq.
The former Iraqi strongman who had been in power for decades and
wielded considerable influence in the Middle East for many years
has finally perished for good.
History will be the best judge of the rights and wrongs of the
former Iraqi leader, but the fact that the Iraqi government and the
US authorities in Iraq chose to execute Saddam in such a hasty way
is something worth thinking about.
It is widely believed in the international community that
Saddam's execution will not solve the problems and clear the
troubles currently haunting Iraq.
It is true that Saddam Hussein should be held accountable for
political, economic and social problems in Iraq during decades of
his reign.
The major cause of Iraq's current chaos and conflicts is not the
person who was in prison, but the Unite States which launched the
Iraq War in 2003 and has since maintained its military
occupation.
As far as the foreign occupation is still there, anti-occupation
insurgencies will not stop, and the conflicts and chaos will not
end in Iraq.
One of the major reasons for the US to take the trouble to
launch the Iraq War was to establish a pro-US government in Baghdad
in order to replace the anti-US Saddam regime, so it can promote
the American-style democracy and values in the country.
What the US government didn't expect was that it was exactly its
military interference that has intensified the already-existing
conflicts among Iraqi sects.
Moreover, unfair power redistribution in the wake of the fall of
the Saddam regime has weakened the authority of the Iraqi central
government, while some sectarian paramilitary forces have been
bogged down in frequent and violent bloodshed. In face of this
situation, the jailed Saddam Hussein didn't have much
influence.
Ever since Saddam's rule, Iraq has been in the whirlpool of the
Middle East crisis. The current disorder in Iraq offered a wide
leak for foreign forces, especially some extremist and aggressive
forces, to get involved in Iraq's domestic affairs, further
exacerbating the turbulence in the country. For this, the occupiers
should be held responsible.
To sum up, it's evident that an end to Iraq's conflicts and
insurgencies is unlikely to be achieved by simply trying to get rid
of Saddam Hussein physically. What's worse, executing the former
Iraqi leader may even worsen the already bad situation in the
country.
(Xinhua News Agency December 31, 2006)
