IRAQ. SADDAM SHOULD BE EXECUTED 20 TIMES A DAY, TALABANI SAYS

ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein "confessed" to releasing orders for executions and a campaign against Kurds in which thousands of people are said to have been killed, President Jalal Talabani said.
"I met the investigator who questioned Saddam," he told Iraqiya state television in an interview. "He said he had extracted important confessions from Saddam Hussein and he signed them."
Asked about the confessions, Talabani replied: "About the crimes he committed: he confessed to al-Anfal and the executions," adding that Saddam had said: "The orders were released by me."
Al-Anfal was a campaign against the Kurds between 1986 and 1989 in which over 100,000 people are said to have been killed and many villages destroyed. Talabani is a Kurd.
"Saddam deserves a death sentence 20 times a day because he tried to assassinate me 20 times," he said, recalling his days as a Kurdish rebel leader fighting the Baghdad authorities.
The official government spokesman said at the weekend that Saddam's trial, on a single charge of mass killings in reprisal for a 1982 assassination attempt, would begin on October 19.
He added that if Saddam were found guilty in this case, the court could dispense with the need to try him for other crimes -- clearing the way for an early execution.
Iraq scrapped the death penalty immediately after the U.S. invasion in March 2003, but has since reintroduced it and executed its first three convicted criminals last week.