Uday Hussein - Allegations of Crimes

Allegations of Crimes

A report released on 20 March 2003, one day before the American led invasion of Iraq, by ABC news detailed several allegations against Uday:

• As head of the Iraqi Olympic Committee, Uday oversaw the imprisonment and torture of Iraqi athletes who were deemed not to have performed to expectations. According to widespread reports, torturers beat and caned the soles of the football players' feet—inflicting intense pain without leaving visible marks on the rest of their bodies. Uday reportedly kept scorecards with written instructions on how many times each player should be beaten after a poor showing. He would insult athletes who performed below his expectations by calling them dogs and monkeys—considered insults in the Arab world—to their faces. One defector reported that jailed football players were forced to kick a concrete ball after failing to reach the 1994 FIFA World Cup finals. The Iraqi national football team were seen with their heads shaved after failing to achieve a good result in a tournament in the 1980s. It was widely circulated that Uday ordered the shaving as part of the punishment. Another defector claimed that athletes were dragged through a gravel pit and subsequently immersed in a sewage tank to induce infection in the victims' wounds. After Iraq lost, 4–1, to Japan in the quarter finals of the 2000 AFC Asian Cup in Lebanon, goalkeeper Hashim Hassan, defender Abdul Jaber and forward Qahtan Chatir were labelled as guilty of loss and eventually flogged for three days by Uday's security.

Other allegations include:

• Kidnapping young Iraqi women from the streets in order to rape them. Uday was known to intrude on parties and otherwise "discover" women whom he would later rape. Time published an article in 2003 detailing his sexual brutality.
• When U.S. troops captured his mansion in Baghdad, they found a personal zoo stocked with lions and cheetahs; an underground parking garage for his collection of luxury cars; paintings glorifying him and his mother with Saddam (which was known to have infuriated his father); Cuban cigars inscribed with his name; and millions of dollars worth of fine wines, liquor and heroin. An HIV testing kit was also found among his personal effects. He amassed millions of U.S. dollars by running façade corporations illegally trading with Iran (although, at that time, UN restrictions did not allow foreign trading. Only later, Iraq was allowed to import certain commodities such as food and medical supplies legally under the UN Oil For Food programme).
• Usage of an iron maiden on persons running afoul of him.
• Beating an army officer unconscious when the man refused to allow Uday to dance with his wife; the man later died of his injuries. Uday also shot and killed an army officer who did not salute him.
• Stealing approximately 1,200 luxury vehicles, including a Rolls-Royce Corniche valued at over $200,000. A Lamborghini LM002, given to him as a gift by former Leader of Libya Muammar Gaddafi, was later blown up by U.S. forces to demonstrate the effects of a car bomb.
• Plotting, in 2000, to assassinate Ahmed Chalabi, the leader of the Iraqi National Congress, presumably to impress his father after Qusay was named heir apparent.