US President George W. Bush said Saddam Hussein could have been hanged in a "more dignified way" and one his closest Arab allies said today a video of Shia officials taunting him on the gallows was "barbaric".
George Bush
In Mr Bush's first comments on Saddam's unruly televised hanging, which has inflamed sectarian passions in Iraq ahead of his announcement next week of a new Iraq strategy, he said he expected the Iraqi government to conduct a full investigation but said the ousted leader was given justice.
"I wish, obviously, that the proceedings had ... gone in a more dignified way. But nevertheless, he was given justice. The thousands of people he killed were not," said Mr Bush
who is planning to change his top military and civilian officials in Baghdad in moves that would wrap up a change of officials responsible for the war.
"We expect there to be a full investigation of what took place," Mr Bush told reporters in the White House yesterday.
President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, one of Washington's closest allies in the Middle East, joined the growing chorus of criticism, saying pictures of the execution were "revolting and barbaric".
Violence in Iraq has heightened regional sectarian and ethnic tensions between the mainly Sunni Muslim Arab world and Shias who dominate Iraq and Iran.
In an interview with Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth, Mr Mubarak said the timing was "unreasonable" and that he had written to Mr Bush asking him to postpone the execution.
The Iraqi government has said the US envoy asked for a two-week delay.
"Then the pictures of the execution were revolting and barbaric, and I am not discussing here whether he deserved it or not. As for the trial, all experts in international law said it was an illegal trial because it was under occupation," Mr Mubarak said.
"Also, there was a conspiracy to carry out the execution before the end of the year."
The hanging took place on Saturday, the first day of the Eid al-Adha holiday.
Two of Saddam's aides also convicted for crimes against humanity will hang shortly, officials said.
Iraqi investigators said they have identified two guards who illicitly filmed the images, which show observers yelling "Go to hell" and chanting the name of a radical Shia cleric and militia leader before Saddam falls through the trap.
Suspicious of the Shia majority's rise to power, thousands of Sunni Arabs have vented their anger at the execution.