Saddam's letters reveal jail complaints

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NEW YORK, May 5 (UPI) -- Former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein complained of his prison conditions in two letters written after he was captured in 2003, FBI documents show.

The handwritten letters, given to his U.S. jailers, were among hundreds of documents found in Saddam's declassified FBI file, which was requested by The New York Daily News after the former dictator's December 2006 execution for crimes against humanity, the newspaper said.

In the letters, the former president, who ordered the torture and execution of hundreds during a brutal 24-year reign, complained of "beatings that I have received following my capture," in which "not a single part of my body was spared of the severe harm that was inflicted by the detention gang," the Daily News reported.

Also in the letters, Saddam reportedly complained that his jail cell, which is believed to have been at Baghdad International Airport, was inhumane. "My opportunity to sleep in this place is limited and almost scarce. I don't think there is anyone with a sensitive and humanitarian heart who can sleep amidst the screams of the tortured and the many blows of the doors and the squeaking sounds of the chairs," the newspaper quoted Saddam writing.