Iraqi who shot Uday in '96 gives interview
BAGHDAD, Sept. 26 (UPI) -- When Salman Sharif gave the order to open fire on Uday Hussein in 1996, he was certain he was going to die himself, he told the Christian Science Monitor.
In his first ever interview, Sharif, a religious Shiite Muslim who was detained in the 1991 post-Gulf War uprising, said he had spent months planning the "hit" on Uday, the ruthless son of Saddam.
A four man hit squad drawn from Sharif's resistance group decided to go ahead after weeks of surveillance. As Uday Hussein drove his golden Porsche slowly up a busy street in Baghdad's posh Monsour district, just after dark on Dec. 12 1996, two gunmen responded to Sharif's command with a hail of bullets from their AK-47 rifles.
"We were sure we had killed him," Sharif recalled. "We fired 50 rounds into that car."
However, Uday, although struck 17 times, survived. He was crippled for the rest of his life, and - according to popular belief - rendered impotent.
"Everybody in Iraq hated Uday," Sharif said. "The team members were very happy: they said they felt lucky to have been chosen for such an operation."
Protesting Israeli pilots to be ousted
TEL AVIV, Israel, Sept. 26 (UPI) -- The Israeli Air Force is planning to dismiss nine pilots who signed a letter refusing to take part in further operations against Palestinians.
Haaretz newspaper reports that although 27 fighter pilots signed a leter protesting the operation in the Palestinian territories, only nine were still on active duty.
The signatories, who sent the letter to Air Force Commander Dan Halutz, described aerial activity in the territories as "illegal and immoral."
Halutz told Haaretz he planned to treat the signatories "in the same way as the (Israeli Defense Forces) has dealt with refuseniks until now. This method has proven itself." The nine pilots will be called to meetings with the heads of their bases in the coming days and if they do not retract their statement, they will be dismissed from active service.
The newpaper reports that the signatories to the letter wrote they would refuse to take part in aerial attacks on populated Palestinian areas in the territories.
"We, for whom the IDF and the air force are an integral part of our being, refuse to continue to hit innocent civilians," the letter read.
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FTC Chairman disagrees with ruling
WASHINGTON, Sept. 26 (UPI) -- The chairman of the Federal Trade Commission said Friday his agency will seek every recourse to give consumers a choice to stop unwanted telemarketing calls.
The assurance from Timothy J. Muris came in his response to the latest ruling by a federal judge in Colorado that declared the FTC's Do Not Call registry unconstitutional. The registry would have allowed consumers to avoid receiving commercial telemarketing calls.
Muris said tens of millions of Americans who have registered more than 50 million phone numbers disagreed with the ruling. The ruling said the registry would not materially advance FTC's interest in protecting privacy or curbing abusive telemarketing practices.
"This court's reasoning, if adopted elsewhere, would effectively cripple virtually every do-not-call registry in the United States, whether state or federal," Muris said. He said the Constitution allows consumers to choose not to receive commercial telemarketing calls.
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Khomeini seeks more freedom in Iran
WASHINGTON, Sept. 26 (UPI) -- Hossein Khomeini, grandson of the founder of Iran's Islamic Republic, told a Washington audience Friday he wants to see church-state separation in his homeland.
Speaking at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, a think tank closely associated with the Bush administration, Khomeini said "people in Iran should be free to choose what form of government they want."
The grandchild of the Ayatollah Rohallah Khomeini called for a referendum that would allow Iran's current religious leaders to retire gracefully. He said "religion cannot mix with government."
The young Khomeini, himself a theology student who studied in the holy city of Qom, blamed the spate of terror acts in Iraq on Iran's religious leaders, calling them "a troublemaking regime." He said the assassination last month of Iraq's Shiite leader, Ayatollah Mohammed Bakr al-Hakim in the Najaf mosque was done "at the behest of Iran with the cooperation of Saudi Arabia, which is involved in these acts."
Khomeni, whose grandfather was instrumental in ousting the shah from Iran in 1979, said he would not be opposed to the return of the shah's son to Tehran. He also said the United States must help bring about democracy to his country, but did not wish to see military involvement.
