Let’s do a little credibility recap in the evolving Saddam snuff film whodunit.
Munkith al-Faroun was a prosecutor at Saddam’s trial. And by all accounts he was the one at the execution demanding that the executioners stop their taunts and harangues and complete the process in a dignified way. “Please, I am begging you not to. The man is being executed,” he is heard saying on the now-infamous cell-phone vid.
al-Faroun first said that he saw two Maliki government officials making videos of the execution by holding up their cell phones as the events took place. He later identified one of the two men as Iraqi National Security Advisor Mowaffak al-Rubaie. In response to Maliki government claims that it was one of the guards who took the cell phone video, al-Faroun said, not likely. “I am confident that they were not the guards, for I checked the guards. I kept them under my eye,” he said.
As the intensity of the scrutiny into the story rose overnight, al-Faroun recanted his claim to have seen al-Rubaie making a video of the execution: “I am not accusing Mowaffak al-Rubaie, and I did not see him taking pictures.”
Now, as a result of the Maliki government investigation, one of the guards has been arrested for making the video tape, according to the New York Times. But Maliki’s spokesman, Sadiq al-Rikabi, won’t say who the guard is, why he did the filming or where he’s being held in Baghdad. “It is clear that it was only one person doing that filming, and he has been arrested.”
Remember, at least one Maliki government official had a cell phone in the chamber. Because he answered the phone with Saddam’s body in front of him when CNN called.
Meanwhile, an unnamed Maliki government official tells the AP that the person arrested was not a guard but “an official who supervised the execution.”
So question of the day. Who would you rather be right now? The ‘guard’ who is currently in custody? Or Mr. al-Faroun?
