A chastened Saddam Hussein pleaded yesterday for reconciliation in Iraq as he appeared in court two days after he was sentenced to death for crimes against humanity.

Saddam, recalling that both Jesus and the Prophet Muhammad had forgiven their foes, said: “I call on Iraqis, Arabs and Kurds to forgive, reconcile and shake hands.”

But his words are unlikely to impress rebel groups who, more confident than ever, have released a slew of videos touting a sniper named Juba, celebrating his murders of US soldiers and boasting of the production of a new surface-to-surface missile.

Saddam shouted defiantly at the judge on Sunday when he was sentenced to be hanged for ordering the execution of 148 Shia from the town of Dujail after a 1982 attempt on his life.

But yesterday facing charges of genocide for his 1988 Anfal (spoils of war) campaign against the Kurds, he and his six co-defendants listened quietly to testimony from survivors of the massacre.

Iraq’s national security advisor, Muwaffaq al-Rubaie, told The Times: “I believe the verdict of Saddam will have a huge demoralising impact on the insurgency . . . It will dash out all their hopes in regaining power and make them closer to reconciliation.”

Seeking to woo disenchanted Sunnis, the Shia-dominated Government has drafted a law rolling back debaathification, the process that purged thousands from their jobs for membership in Saddam’s Baath party. Officials also announced that charges of torturing prisoners were being brought against 55 police officers. Sunnis regularly accuse the mainly Shia police of harbouring death squads, which target their community.

But these gestures are unlikely to go far enough with an insurgency that presents a defiant public face. In a 28-minute video, the Islamic Army in Iraq, made up mainly of veterans from Saddam’s security apparatus, celebrated the exploits of “Juba the Baghdad sniper”.

Juba, whose name is taken from an African death dance, is shown marking off his kills on a wall before he lays down his sniper rifle. He then writes an ode to Allah (God) and calls on Iraqis to fight the crusaders and Jews.

Between interviews with a man, whose face is wrapped in a checkered keffiyeh, identified as the commander of the group’s sniper brigade, the footage shows about two dozen US soldiers being picked off by a sniper. In each incident, the soldier is marked by a red scope. Then the viewer hears a shell burst, sees a bit of smoke and the spray of blood.

The soldier falls, people run in panic and the words flash in red and yellow “Juba the Baghdad sniper.” The video then cuts back to the commander. With a sniper rifle propped behind him, he brags that the rebels weren’t great fighters but they became skilled over time. “Day by day, the Mujahidin started to gain experience from the battles.”

He claims that his group has trained an elite brigade of snipers and perfected techniques to strike US forces. His sharpshooters learned their trade from a book, called The Ultimate Sniper by a retired US Marine sniper, named Major John Plaster. “The idea of filming the operations is very important because the scenes that show the falling soldiers when hit have more impact on the enemy than any other weapon.”

Juba also has a website, called Juba online. During last month’s Eid festival, marking the end of Ramadan, Islamic Army fighters walked in the streets of western Baghdad’s Sunni neighbourhood, Amariyah, and distributed the video. They knocked on doors, entered shops and handed the video into cars, with no sense of worry.

One resident, who watched it said: “I’m really proud of it. It’s a well-made movie. It is a perfect work. This is the best way to get the Americans out.”

The Times is the only British newspaper to maintain a full-time Baghdad bureau

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