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- <text id=90TT1288>
- <title>
- May 21, 1990: World Notes:Iraq
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1990
- May 21, 1990 John Sununu:Bush's Bad Cop
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- WORLD, Page 44
- World Notes
- IRAQ
- Happy Birthday To Me...</hdr>
- <body>
- <p> When you're fiftysomething, you're entitled to a little
- extravagance. But few birthday parties could match the
- spectacle staged by Iraqi President Saddam Hussein for his 53rd
- last month. Saddam invited Cabinet members, prominent
- government officials and diplomats to his home village of
- Tikrit for lavish festivities that included a two-hour parade
- and banners proclaiming YOUR CANDLES, SADDAM, ARE THE TORCHES
- FOR ALL THE ARABS.
- </p>
- <p> At the climax of the parade, the residents of Tikrit wheeled
- out a simple cabin, and people dressed in the robes of ancient
- Babylon and Assyria prostrated themselves before it. When the
- cabin split open to reveal a palm tree from which 53 white
- doves were released, Saddam appeared to a wave of applause.
- </p>
- <p> The President sat and watched the remainder of the show,
- including a tableau--Moses redux?--of a baby Saddam rocking
- in a cradle in the marshes. Remarked a Western diplomat: "Even
- to veteran Saddam watchers, this spectacle reached new
- heights."
- </p>
-
- </body>
- </article>
- </text>
-
-