Talabani seeks executions delay

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Iraq's President Jalal Talabani has called for a delay in executing two of Saddam Hussein's co-accused, sentenced to death for crimes against humanity.

Mr Talabani said the circumstances were not right for the executions to go ahead; a reference to the controversy surrounding Saddam Hussein's hanging.

Barzan al-Tikriti and Awad al-Bandar are to due to be executed this week for the mass killing of Shias in the 1980s.

As president, Mr Talabani has no power to annul or delay the executions.

International outrage

"I prefer to go slow on the executions as the circumstances are not right," Mr Talabani told reporters at a news conference in the northern city of Sulamaniyeh.

Correspondents say his remarks were in response to the international outcry over the release of secretly-filmed video footage showing Saddam Hussein's execution and its aftermath two weeks ago.

The condemned men held high office in the Saddam era

In the days following the execution video clips filmed on mobile phones were posted on the internet showing Saddam Hussein being taunted before his death.

This week a second video appeared on the internet showing the former Iraqi leader's body lying on a hospital trolley.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said the secret footage had turned Saddam Hussein into a martyr.

Mr Talabani's comments come after the Iraqi government said it would carry out the death sentences on the two men this week.

"The execution orders have been signed and are ready to be implemented," Iraqi government spokesman, Ali al-Dabbagh, said on Sunday.

Mr Talabani's opposition to the death penalty is well known but this is the first time he has spoken publicly about the executions of Barzan al-Tikriti, Saddam's half-brother and head of Iraq's secret police in the 1980s, and Awad al-Bandar, a former chief judge.

The two men were sentenced to death for their part in the 1982 killing of 148 Shia Muslims in the town of Dujail.