FACTBOX: "Chemical Ali", feared Saddam henchman
(Reuters) - Iraq's presidency council has cleared the way for the long-delayed execution of Saddam Hussein's cousin, Ali Hassan al-Majeed, widely known as "Chemical Ali", to be carried out, Iraqi officials said on Friday.
Here are some key facts on Majeed.
* RISE TO POWER:
-- Like others in Saddam's inner circle, Majeed owed his rise to family ties to the Iraqi strongman, who came to trust few beyond his Sunni Arab clan based around Tikrit, north of Baghdad.
-- He played a key role in the purge of the Baath party in 1979, when Saddam, formally installed as head of state, sat on the stage of an auditorium and watched "traitors" being led away to their deaths after their names were called out.
* GULF WAR:
-- In August 1990, after the invasion of Kuwait, Saddam had appointed him military governor of what was deemed to be Iraq's "19th province" but replaced him three months later for fear his brutal reputation was strengthening the hand of Kuwait's allies.
-- When a U.S.-led coalition expelled Iraqi forces from the emirate in 1991, Saddam appointed Majeed interior minister to help stamp out the Shi'ite rebellion sweeping southern Iraq.
* SENTENCED TO DEATH:
-- After the overthrow of the Baathist regime under Saddam by U.S.-led coalition forces, Majeed was captured in August 2003.
-- Majeed was sentenced to death by hanging last June for his role in a military campaign against ethnic Kurds in the 1980s that killed tens of thousands.
-- The military offensives were codenamed Anfal -- Spoils of War -- after the title of the eighth chapter of the Koran and took place from February until late August 1988.
-- Majeed told the court trying him, he had ordered Kurdish villages cleared in the "Anfal" campaign, but insisted he was right to do so and had nothing to apologize for.
-- In a separate single attack, not seen as part of Anfal, Majeed reportedly ordered the gassing of 5,000 Kurds in the village of Halabja in March 1988.
