Google Alerts AFP - BAGHDAD - Judges put Saddam Hussein�s appeal process into motion on Monday as Baghdad found itself once more under round-the-clock curfew after the ousted president�s death sentence stirred Iraq�s sectarian tensions.
Saddam was sentenced to hang by the Iraqi High Tribunal, which found him guilty on Sunday of crimes against humanity in the case of 148 Shia civilians killed in revenge for an 1982 attempt on the then Iraqi leader�s life.
The verdict served only to deepen Iraq�s bitter religious divide, with Shias celebrating it as a victory against their former oppressor and some Sunni Arabs protesting at this latest humiliation to the ousted regime.
Tribunal spokesman Raed Juhi said the court has 10 days, starting Monday, within which it must submit its ruling justifying Saddam�s execution to an appeals committee. This panel will then invite input from the prosecution.
Defence lawyers also said they will submit their arguments.
�My experience with this court shows that there is no benefit to gain from appealing because this court is political; nevertheless we will appeal,� lead defence lawyer Khalil Al Dulaimi said.
Twenty days after the 10 day filing deadline, the case will be sealed and the panel will retire to consider its verdict. No date has been set for their final judgement, which is binding, said Juhi, the court�s investigative judge.
If the final verdict confirms Saddam�s guilt, he will be executed within 30 days, and some powerful Iraqi voices are calling for the judges not to dawdle.
�We strongly feel that every day he lives is not good for the Iraqi people. We need to put an end to him, to this dictator,� Bassam Ridha, a senior aide to Prime Minister Nuri Al Maliki, told AFP.
�I hope this issue comes to an end quickly. Hopefully, in the next few months -- before next summer -- he will be dead,� he said, adding that he was giving his personal view and not seeking to influence the verdict.
The satisfaction of Maliki�s Shia-led government at the verdict was mirrored in the joyful street rallies held to celebrate the death sentence in Shia and Kurdish areas across Iraq.
�This just sentence on Saddam has comforted me greatly,� said Fatima Mohammed a teacher in her 50s living in the mainly Shia city of Kut, who lost six brothers to Saddam�s security forces in a 1982 purge against Maliki�s then banned Dawa party.
�It�s a great day. We do not know how we can express our feelings on such a great day,� Wahid Dairam, a 45-year-old writer living in the Shia holy city of Najaf, told AFP.
�The blood of our brothers and fathers in the mass graves was not spilled in vain. Today, their killer is facing a just fate,� he added.
But among Saddam�s supporters in Iraq�s Sunni Arab minority, there was anger at a ruling many argued had been forced on Iraq by foreign powers, in particular the United States.
In Hawijah, a Sunni town in northern Iraq, hundreds of school children and women gathered and linked their arms bearing portraits of Saddam and placards demanding their former leader�s release.
Here -- as elsewhere in Sunni regions of Iraq -- the threat of violence was not far from the surface.
�The Americans and the Iraqis who are with them will see black days ahead of them in Iraq,� warned Abdullah Zamar Hassan, a 49-year-old shopkeeper.
Meanwhile, the Iraqi authorities tried to keep a lid on the boiling tensions with a total lockdown in the capital. The streets were empty, the airport closed and security patrols out in force.
A security official said that the Baghdad curfew had been successful, with almost no violent incidents reported overnight in a city which has for months been at the centre of a bloody sectarian turf war.
Elsewhere, sporadic violence continued.
In Iskandariyah, south of Baghdad, a bomb exploded on a bus and wounded 10 passengers, two of them seriously, police said.