"He had lost weight," Salem Chalabi, director of Iraq's Special Tribunal, told ABC News' Peter Jennings in an exclusive on-camera interview in Baghdad. "He was not the towering figure that one used to see on TV before. He was nervous — physically nervous — because he did not know what was happening."

Chalabi had never met Saddam before today's brief encounter. He admitted he was nervous but said Saddam was not the disheveled, heavily bearded prisoner that the world last saw when he was captured by U.S. forces in December.


It was a surreal experience," Chalabi said. "But he was dressed in Arab gear and was kept in a different place to the others. His hair is a bit long — not terribly long, but longer than I had seen before. Black, not gray, and he didn't have a beard.

Saddam, Chalabi said, was brought into a tiny room that included himself, an Iraqi judge and four U.S. officials. The former Iraqi dictator sat down as if he was accustomed to receiving people. When he looked up, Chalabi said, the judge told him, "You are no longer in U.S. custody. You are now in Iraqi custody. Good morning."

According to Chalabi, Saddam appeared nervous and agitated when he heard he was being transferred from U.S. legal custody to Iraqi custody. His deputies appeared similarly surprised, and the first question many of them asked was, "Do I get a lawyer?"

Officials tell ABC News that they intend to make the first court appearance of Saddam and his deputies very public so that the Iraqi people can see for themselves what has happened to the man who led their country for almost 24 years. Even after Saddam's capture, many Iraqis could not bring themselves to believe that he was in U.S. custody.

Some believe that he had just disappeared altogether, that there was an American plot to get him out of the country or that he was living in Europe. Seeing Saddam arraigned on television in an Iraqi court, interim government officials feel, will convince the people that a new chapter has begun in their country.
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/GMA/World/Chalabi_Iraq_Jennings_040630-1.html