JURIST - Paper Chase: Dutch prosecutors appeal genocide acquittal for Iraq chemical supplier

[JURIST] The Public Prosecutor's office in the Netherlands filed an appeal on Friday against the acquittal of Dutch businessman Frans Van Anraat [BBC profile] on charges of complicity in genocide by Saddam Hussein [JURIST news archive]. In December, the court sentenced Van Anraat to the maximum term of 15 years [JURIST report] in prison for complicity in war crimes for selling chemicals used to produce poison gas to Hussein's government. While the court acquitted Van Anraat of the genocide charges [JURIST report], the prosecutor's office wants the appeals court to decide if Van Anraat was an accomplice to genocide by providing the chemicals used to manufacture gas used by Hussein's forces in Iraq and Iran. The trial court found that the prosecution failed to prove that Van Anraat knew of Hussein's purpose in using the chemicals. The gas was used by Saddam's military in Iraq's 1980-1988 war against Iran and its own Kurdish population, specifically during the 1988 attack on Halabja [JURIST report]. Anraat is also appealing his conviction and sentence. Expatica has more.

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