Iraq - hanging of Ali Hassan al-Majid

Chemical Ali executed

Article published on the 2010-01-25 Latest update 2010-01-25 16:06 TU

Ali Hassan al-Majeed, better known as Chemical Ali, listens to the prosecution during the Anfal genocide trial in Baghdad
(Photo: Reuters)

Saddam Hussein's right-hand man "Chemical Ali" has been executed, an Iraqi government spokesperson confirmed on Monday. The sentence was carried out eight days after he received a fourth death sentence.

"The condemned Ali Hassan al-Majid has been executed by hanging until death today," spokesperson Ali al-Dabbagh said in a statement.

On January 17, Majid was sentenced to death for ordering the 1988 gassing of Kurds in the north-eastern town of Halabja, one of the worst atrocities of the Hussein regime that killed an estimated 5,000 people.

Three-quarters of the victims at Halabja were women and children. They died when Iraqi jets swooped over the small town and for five hours sprayed it with a cocktail of mustard gas and nerve agents.

The conviction was the fourth time that Majid has received a death sentence.

Handing down the ruling, Judge Abud Mustapha al-Hamani described Majid's offences as "deliberate murder, a crime against humanity".

His execution had previously been held up by legal wrangling. The first execution was due to have been carried out by October 2007, but delayed so as not to coincide with the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Majid had first been sentenced to hang for genocide over the Kurdish offensives when in December 2008 he received a second death sentence for war crimes committed during the ill-fated 1991 Shia-Muslim uprising in southern Iraq.

Last March, the Iraqi High Tribunal handed down a third death sentence over the 1999 murders of dozens of Shia in the Sadr City district of Baghdad and in the central shrine city of Najaf.