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Iraqis Mark Saddam's Birthday
The government-sponsored festivities to mark President Saddam Hussein birthday have been held every year since 1985. This year is his 64th birthday.
New murals and portraits of Saddam bedecked the capital for the occasion and government buildings and schools, wrapped in posters and banners, played host to singers and poets trumpeting the achievements of the Iraqi leader. Iraqis singing birthday songs cruised the streets in cars flying the Iraqi flag.
The most opulent festivities were reserved for Saddam's birthplace at Tikrit, 100 miles north of Baghdad, where he was born to a poor family on April 28, 1937. Troupes of singers and dancers from Lebanon, who have been touring the country since Wednesday, joined Baghdad-based diplomats attending the celebration.
People danced to traditional Arab and Kurdish songs, while groups marched carrying banners expressing love and a long life for the president. A group of young men burned the Israeli flag and called for the liberation of Palestine.
Saddam did not go to Tikrit. Instead, he received Iraqi orphans and pupils who sang and danced, the official Iraqi News Agency reported. Usually, such ceremonies are held at one of his Baghdad palaces, though the state media did not say where it took place.
The growing number of impoverished Iraqis will be treated to mutton and cakes served up in tents set up across the country.
Iraq says the 11 years of crippling U.N. sanctions, imposed after its 1990 invasion of Kuwait, have resulted in deaths of 1.5 million people because of shortages of food and medicine.
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