The Trial of Saddam Hussein and The Fallout of The War

The Trial of Saddam Hussein

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The fallout in the Middle East from the regime change in Iraq

Thursday, June 26, 2008

Police Seize Boris's Cigar case

The British police have confirmed that they are examining an Iraqi cigar case belonging to London mayor Boris Johnson, in order to determine whether it is a looted Iraqi artifact. Johnson handed over the case on Monday.

Johnson took the case in 2003 from the bombed-out home of former Iraqi deputy prime minister Tariq Aziz.

Johnson was then working as a journalist, and had been taken to Aziz's ransacked villa. He is quoted in The Daily Telegraph:

"And there, just by my toe, protruding from beneath a piece of dusty plywood, was the cigar case.....the circumstances in which I came by this object were so morally ambiguous that I cannot quite think of it as theft."

He added, rather ruefully:

"Well, I suppose we should be grateful for one thing, it seems that a Western politician is finally going to pay the price for his involvement in the Iraq war."

Much a do about nothing!