Chemical Ali sentenced to death in 1991 uprising al-Intifada al-Shaabaniya
BAGHDAD / IraqiNews.com: Iraq‘s Supreme Criminal Court on Tuesday sentenced to death Ali Hassan al-Majid, otherwise known as Chemical Ali; and Abdul Ghani Abdul Ghafour, a former Baath Party official, after found guilty in the 1991 al-Intifada al-Shaabaniya case. Life sentences were handed down against Ibrahim Abdelsattar Mohammed; Iyad Fatieh al-Rawi, former chief of staff and a Republican Guard commander; Hussein Rashid al-Tikriti, former assistant chief of staff; and Saber Abdul-Aziz al-Dori, the former chief of military intelligence.
Other defendants in the case are Abad Hamid Mahmud, Saddam’s personal secretary; Sabaawi Ibrahim al-Hassan, former President Saddam Hussein’s half brother; Iyad Taha Shehab, a former intelligence chief; Latif Mahal Hamoud, former Basra governor; Walied Hamid Tawfiq al-Naseri; Sufyan Maher al-Tikriti, a former Republican Guard commander; Saadi Taama Abbas, the former minister of defense; Saber Abdul-Aziz al-Dori, the former chief of military intelligence; and Qays Abdul Razzaq Mohammed al-Adhami, the commander of the Republican Guard Hamourabi forces.
The 1991 incidents, known in Arabic as the al-Intifada al-Shaabaniya, or the Shaaban uprising, were a series of rebellions in southern and northern Iraq in the aftermath of the Gulf War. The revolts in the predominantly Shiite cities of Basra and al-Nassiriya broke out in March 1991, sparked by demoralized Iraqi army troops returning from Iraq’s defeat in the Gulf War. Another uprising in the Kurdish areas of northern Iraq broke out shortly thereafter. Although they represented a serious threat to his regime, former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein was able to suppress the rebellions with massive force and maintain power, as the expected United States intervention never materialized.
The uprisings were eventually crushed by the Iraqi Republican Guard, which was followed by mass reprisals and intensified forced relocations. In few weeks, tens of thousands of civilians were allegedly killed.