World recalls Saddam 19 years after his capture

ALBAWABA - The world recalled late President Saddam Hussein 19 years after his Dec. 13, 2003 capture by American forces in his native Tikrit.

"Saddam was a great leader, who gave us security and stability," said Mohammad Nouri, a 42-year-old Iraqi civil engineer, who hails from Saddam's hometown, where he said a memorial for the late president was planned for the weekend.

"Look at Iraq now, corruption is widespread, Iraqis are living in abject poverty, unemployment hit the roof, there is little clean water, the electricity supply is erratic and the infrastructure is dealt a blow," he told Albawaba in a telephone interview from Baghdad.

Some international newspapers, magazines, and individuals on social media also recalled the Iraqi leader. 

Saddam ruled Iraq from 1979 until the U.S.-led invasion that ousted him in 2003. That year, a multinational coalition, led by the United States, waged a war on Iraq, dismantling its army and police and ending the rule of Saddam's Arab Baath Socialist Party.

The justification, which was debunked years later, was that Saddam possessed weapons of mass destruction, which threatened the security of an already tumult Middle East, engulfed in political turmoil.

Saddam was tried by the Iraqi Special Tribunal on charges of  war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide dating back to the early 1980s. He was hanged on Dec. 30, 2006.