Page 27 - ARUBA TODAY

CLASSIFIED A27
Saturday 6 June 2015

Continued from Page 10 articulate, arrogant and before him by inspectors Aziz was instrumental in
unhesitant to make even about weapons programs. restoring diplomatic rela-
His interlocutors variously the most preposterous “He didn’t agree with our tions with the United States
described him as courtly, denials of evidence put basic tasks and I didn’t in 1984, after a 17-year
agree with his tasks to hide break. At the time, Wash-
and mislead us. But I think ington backed Iraq as a
we respected each other,” buffer against Iran’s Islamic
Rolf Ekeus, head of the in- extremism.
spectors from 1991 to 1997, That changed after Iraq’s
later said of Aziz. invasion of Kuwait in 1990.
As bombs rained down on Aziz met in January 1991
Baghdad during the U.S.- with then-Secretary of
led 2003 invasion, Aziz said State James A. Baker in Ge-
of American forces, “We neva in a failed attempt to
will receive them with the prevent the Gulf War, and
best music they have ever the U.S. broke off ties with
heard and the best flow- Saddam’s government for
ers that have ever grown good. He also met with the
in Iraq ... We don’t have late Pope John Paul II at
candy; we can only offer the Vatican just weeks be-
them bullets.” fore the March 2003 inva-
His freedom ended shortly sion in a bid to stop it.q
afterward. The U.S. military
knocked on his door in
Baghdad on April 24, 2003,
and he surrendered with-
out resistance.
Still, his prominence as an
international spokesman
— and his outsider status
as a Christian in a Sunni
Muslim-dominated regime
— gave supporters fuel to
argue that he was not a
real decision-maker in Sad-
dam’s regime and was less
to blame in the torture and
bloody crackdowns it in-
flicted on Iraqis.
Aziz was born to a Chal-
dean Catholic family in
Tell Kaif, Iraq, in 1936. He
studied English literature at
Baghdad College of Fine
Arts and became a teach-
er and journalist. He joined
the Baath Party in 1957,
working closely with Sad-
dam to overthrow British-
imposed monarchy.
Saddam took charge in
1979. Aziz was deputy
prime minister a year later,
when attackers hurled a
grenade at him in down-
town Baghdad. Several
people were killed; Aziz
was injured. It was one of
several attacks Saddam
blamed on Iran — part of
his justification for the ex-
pulsion of large numbers
of Shiite Muslims and Iraq’s
1980 invasion of Iran.