REPORT: USWAR/Seven Baath elements executed in southern Iraq

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REPORT: USWAR/Seven Baath elements executed in southern Iraq

Tehran, March 25, IRNA -- Seven members of Iraq's ruling Baath party
were executed on Sunday on the order of President Saddam Hussein's
cousin and the commander in the south, Ali Hassan al-Majid, the
Supreme Assembly of the Islamic Revolution of Iraq cited its sources
inside Iraq as saying Monday.
"Security elements and Saddam's (suicide paramilitary) Fedayeen
on Sunday arrested these seven around Basra for alleged laxity in
fulfilling their military duties," the information center of SAIRI
here said.
They were executed at a security office building in Basra without
any interrogation or probe, it added.
Majid, known as Chemical Ali, is blamed for the 1988 chemical
attack on the Kurdish town of Halabja, in which about 5,000 were
killed.
A US State Department official has been reported as saying that
Majid had been authorized to use chemical weapons against the local
Shiite Muslim population in southern Iraq.
US Secretary of State Colin Powell was reported on Monday as
saying that Washington was informed of the report and would follow
the matter carefully.
There were also unconfirmed reports that Saddam was intending
to appoint Majid as the new governor of Basra, which is under the
siege of US-led forces.
The city, which has 1.2 million residents, is Iraq's key economic
artery and is defended by the Republican Guards and Iraq's 51st
mechanized division.
BH/AR
End