Saddam denounces foes as 'hyenas'
Your support helps us to tell the story
As your White House correspondent, I ask the tough questions and seek the answers that matter.
Your support enables me to be in the room, pressing for transparency and accountability. Without your contributions, we wouldn't have the resources to challenge those in power.
Your donation makes it possible for us to keep doing this important work, keeping you informed every step of the way to the November election
Andrew Feinberg
White House Correspondent
LEON BARKHO
Reuter
Baghdad - On the fifth anniversary of the Gulf war which drove Iraq out of Kuwait, President Saddam Hussein has hit out at the "howls of hyenas" from Iraq's critics.
In an address to the nation yesterday, Saddam acclaimed the "Mother of All Battles" and said that Iraq, not the US-led multinational coalition, had won the six-week war which began on 17 January 1991.
"The crows, jackals and hyenas around it ... thought that Iraq, a nation of faith and jihad [holy struggle], was on its way to fall, so they increased their howl," he said. "The Iraqis defeated the enemy by preventing them from throttling the base of the capability of the faithful [Arab] nation and centre of its radiation [Iraq]," Saddam said in the 90-minute speech on Baghdad television.
But he admitted that his country suffered a great deal from the war and the prolonged sanctions - "a painful and vicious embargo" - imposed on Iraq as punishment for invading Kuwait in 1990.
Saddam said that thosedemanding a change in Iraqi government despite his overwhelming victory in a presidential referendum last October were following "the path of subservience to the [unnamed] foreigner". He said: "The foreigner gestured to them to embark on what you hear ... They are lowly obedient servants, utterly humiliated, and shall not stop until the foreigner is frustrated."
King Hussein of Jordan, who backed Saddam in the Gulf crisis, has called for a change of government in Baghdad after giving asylum to two senior Iraqi defectors and their wives - both daughters of Saddam - last August.
Saddam, however, said he was ready to turn a new page in his relations with the Arab states hostile to his leadership, saying he was ready to solve outstanding issues which he described as "minor".
Subscribe to Independent Premium to bookmark this article
Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? Start your Independent Premium subscription today.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments