Day: December 30, 2006

Six junketing U.S. senators Friday said they will seek to extend trade benefits for Ecuador, despite a promise by its leftist President-elect to halt a key U.S. anti-drug operation in the Andean nation.

Rafael Correa, who takes office in January and is a friend of U.S. foe President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, has said Ecuador has done its share to be part of a preferential tariff program for countries in the region that fight drug trafficking.

In the three-day blitz launching his 2008 presidential campaign, John Edwards has prodded enthusiastic crowds to get active.

“We cannot stay at home and wait for the next election. The power is not with the politicians in Washington, the power is with you,” he told nearly 1,000 people gathered in the convention hall of a Reno casino Friday.

President Bush and first lady Laura Bush were moved to an armored vehicle on their ranch Friday when a tornado warning was issued in central Texas, the White House said.

The vehicle was driven to a tornado shelter on the ranch at 1:30 p.m. CST, and the president, Mrs. Bush and their two Scottish terriers, Barney and Miss Beazley, sat inside until the weather cleared, deputy White House press secretary Scott Stanzel said. They were never moved into the shelter, he said. The shelter is a few hundred yards away from the president’s house on the ranch.

With tears in his eyes and a grin on his face, 13-year-old Ali Al-Najjar watched his father celebrate the death of Saddam Hussein.

The Dearborn resident was emotional Friday night — not only did his dream of the former Iraqi president’s execution come true, but he said he was witnessing a rare occurrence.

“This is the first time I’ve seen my dad this happy,” he said as he watched the crowd of about 200 Iraqi-Americans cheer outside a Detroit-area mosque as drivers honked horns in jubilation. “I’ve been praying for this all my life.”

Stephanie Dostie says she thinks it’s ironic that former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was executed on the one-year anniversary of her husband’s death. “I think it was a very generous death for him,” said Dostie, whose husband, Sgt. 1st Class Shawn Christopher Dostie, was killed in Iraq in a blast from an improvised explosive device on Dec. 30, 2005. “He got his last prayer. He got his last meal.”

Three more Marines and a soldier were killed in battle in Iraq, the military said Friday, making December the year’s deadliest month for U.S. troops with the toll reaching 108.

In violence Saturday, a bomb planted aboard a minibus exploded at a fish market south of Baghdad, killing 15 people. The explosion came hours after the execution of Saddam Hussein Saturday morning, but there was no indication that it was related.

Clutching a Quran and refusing a hood, Saddam Hussein went to the gallows before sunrise Saturday, executed by vengeful countrymen after a quarter-century of remorseless brutality that killed countless thousands and led Iraq into disastrous wars against the United States and Iran.

In Baghdad’s Shiite enclave of Sadr City, people danced in the streets while others fired guns in the air to celebrate the former dictator’s death. The government did not impose a round-the-clock curfew as it did last month when Saddam was convicted to thwart any surge in retaliatory violence.

Within days of taking power, Saddam Hussein summoned about 400 top officials and announced he had uncovered a plot against the ruling party. The conspirators, he said, were in that very room. As the 42-year-old Saddam coolly puffed on a cigar, names of the supposed plotters were read out. As each name was called, secret police led them away. Twenty-two people were executed. To make sure Iraqis got the word, Saddam videotaped the entire proceeding and distributed copies across the country.