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IRAQ - Investigators have arested a second guard over the filming of Saddam Hussein's execution, an official said yesterday, as the Iraqi Government sought to dampen growing outrage from Sunni Arabs over the unruly hanging.
The mobile-phone video of Shiite officials taunting Saddam on the gallows has inflamed sectarian passions in a country on the brink of civil war.
"Two Justice Ministry guards have been arrested after other guards identified them as having filmed the hanging," Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's aide Sami Askari said.
President George Bush spoke to Maliki in a secure videoconference call yesterday and agreed that investigating the recording of the execution was the right thing to do, White House spokesman Tony Snow said.
Bush, who is developing a new strategy on Iraq that could be unveiled as early as next week, spoke to Maliki about the "way forward" but not about his specific plan.
One option is a temporary increase in troops, but Snow would not say whether that was discussed in the conversation with Maliki and that "they were talking about the importance of having sufficient force within Baghdad to create a stable situation within the city".
- REUTERS
