US wants Iraq war crimes tribunal

The US wants to set up a war crimes tribunal to look at the actions of the Iraqi government in Kuwait and Kurdistan, and has underlined that it still wishes to see President Saddam Hussein removed as Iraqi leader, Patrick Cockburn reports from Washington. A war crimes tribunal would look into the disappearance of 182,000 Kurds in 1988-89 when the Iraqi army crushed the Kurdish rebellion at the end of the Iran-Iraq war. Iraq was also accused of killing and torturing Kuwaitis who resisted the occupation in 1990-91. Iraqi opposition leaders, who met Vice-President Al Gore in Washington yesterday, were promised that President Clinton was still committed to bringing down the government in Baghdad. Setting up a war crimes tribunal marks a shift away from the more flexible attitude towards Saddam Hussein previously shown by Mr Clinton.