Security clampdown ahead of expected Saddam verdict

US and Iraqi forces set up extra checkpoints, boosted patrols, and blocked traffic across a main Baghdad bridge today, one day before the expected announcement of a verdict – and possible death sentence – in the trial of former leader Saddam Hussein.

Leave for all military personnel has been cancelled indefinitely and holidaying soldiers recalled to active duty, in of one of the heaviest security crackdowns in Baghdad since the unleashing of rampant sectarian violence following the bombing of a main Shiite shrine in the city of Samarra in February.

Authorities are widely expected to extend a night-time curfew for all or part of Sunday, when Saddam is expected to be sentenced by the Iraqi High Tribunal.

New checkpoints were set up around main roads, including within the heavily fortified Green Zone that houses Iraqi government offices and the US and British embassies.

Larger than usual numbers of policemen and US troops were seen patrolling city streets, while US Army Stryker armoured vehicles blocked traffic on both sides of the al-Jumhuriyah Bridge, one of the capital’s most heavily guarded because it carries traffic past the Green Zone.

“We received orders to tighten security measures and to use any available policemen to tighten the security,” police Lt. Ali Abbas said.

Any violence would be met with a stern response, said a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, which commands the police. He refused to give any details about additional security measures.

“We warn anyone who intends to exploit this event that our response will be tough and severe,” police Brig. Abdul-Karim Khalaf said.

Violence has already been running high in recent days, with police finding the bodies of 87 torture victims throughout the capital between 6am Thursday and 6pm Friday.

The announcement of a verdict is expected to set off even greater bloodshed, underscoring the trial’s failure to bring reconciliation to a country that has fractured ever deeper along sectarian lines.

Many of Saddam’s fellow Sunni Arabs, along with some Shiites and Kurds, are predicting a firestorm if the ex-president is sentenced to death. On the other hand, majority Shiites, who were persecuted under Saddam but now dominate the government, are likely to be enraged if he escapes the gallows.

Setting the tone, Prime Minister Nouri Maliki, a Shiite, said late last month that he expects “this criminal tyrant will be executed”.

That, he said, would help break the will of Saddam followers in the largely Sunni Arab-led insurgency against US forces and their Iraqi government allies.

Saddam and seven co-defendants – including a half brother – have been on trial since October 19 2005, for their alleged roles in the deaths of about 150 Shiites in the town of Dujail after an assassination attempt against the president in 1982.

A second trial against Saddam – for alleged genocide against the Kurds – began in August and more charges are expected to follow. It is unclear whether those cases would move forward if Saddam is condemned to hang.

On Wednesday, one of Saddam’s lawyers said a death sentence would “open the gates of hell” to the roughly 140,000 US troops in Iraq.

Bushra al-Khalil, a Lebanese lawyer who was thrown out of Saddam’s trial in May, also accused US President George W. Bush of exploiting the verdict – which comes two days before hotly contested US Congressional elections – for ”electoral purposes”.