Terming as "rigged" the death sentence to ousted Iraq president Saddam Hussein, the Communist Party of India-Marxist on Sunday denounced the Iraqi High Tribunal verdict and demanded intervention by the United Progressive Alliance government to get it rescinded.
"The politburo denounces the death sentence to the ousted president of Iraq Saddam Hussein," the CPI-M Central Committee said in a statement in New Delhi.
"This is nothing but a totally rigged verdict delivered after a farcical trial," it said noting that the defence lawyers representing Hussein were murdered and the chief judge was changed twice in the course of the trial.
"The politburo demands that the UPA government should categorically condemn this judicial travesty. It must actively intervene to get this sentence rescinded," the statement said.
It said the British and the US governments should realise that if executed, this sentence will be seen only as a "judicial assassination" and they will be held responsible for all the consequences.
CPI-M has also asked all its party units to protest the verdict and called upon democratic minded citizens to raise their voice of protest.
Iraq's High Tribunal found Hussein guilty of crimes against humanity and sentenced him to hang for the 1982 killing of 148 Shiites in the city of Dujail.
Communist Party of India national secretary D Raja said there will be serious repercussions of the verdict both inside and outside Iraq.
"The trial appears to be a farce as the country has been under occupation of foreign forces," he said.
All India Forward Bloc general secretary Debabrata Biswas said the death sentence to Hussein was "undemocratic" and revealed once again the "nasty face of American imperialism".
"There was no fair trial and the whole trial process was a farce," he said.
CPI (Marxist-Leninist) general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya termed the verdict as "illegal" and a "complete travesty of justice and called on the government to convey India's opposition to this force and demand immediate withdrawal of US-led forces from Iraq.
