Iraq genocide trial for Dutchman

Mr Van Anraat lived in Iraq for several years before March 2003

A Dutch businessman has gone on trial accused of complicity in war crimes and genocide for selling toxic chemicals to Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

Frans van Anraat, 63, appeared before a war crimes court in The Hague, charged in connection with the 1988 chemical attacks on Halabja.

Prosecutors say he continued to supply industrial chemicals to Iraq after an export ban in 1984.

Mr Van Anraat denies knowing what the chemicals would be used for.

According to the prosecution, chemicals he supplied were used in the mustard gas attack on Halabja, in Kurdish northern Iraq, which killed more than 5,000 people.

The images of the gas attack on the Kurdish city Halabja were a shock. But I did not give the order to do that Frans van Anraat Interview, 2003

Evidence being used by prosecutors includes information obtained from the former head of Iraq's chemical weapons programme, Ali Hassan al-Majid, otherwise known as Chemical Ali.

Mr Van Anraat is charged with supplying thousands of tons of raw materials for chemical weapons used in the 1980-1988 war against Iran and against Iraqi Kurds.

In a 2003 interview, Mr van Anraat denied being aware of the Halabja attack.

"The images of the gas attack on the Kurdish city Halabja were a shock. But I did not give the order to do that," he told Dutch magazine Revu.

Prosecutors say the Dutchman had been a suspect since 1989, when he was arrested in Milan, Italy, at the request of the US government.

But he was later released and fled to Iraq, where he remained until 2003.

After the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, he returned to the Netherlands and was arrested in December 2004 at his Amsterdam home.