Sa'dun Hammadi

Sa'dun Hammadi (22 June 1930 – 14 March 2007; Arabic: سعدون حمادي) was an Iraqi politician and economist who held various positions in the Iraqi state, most notably as the Foreign Minister from 1974 to 1983, and later as the Speaker of the National Assembly of Iraq from 1996 until 2003 invasion of Iraq.

In 1974, Hammadi became Iraq’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, a position he held until 1983, thus surviving Saddam Hussein's takeover of power.

Saddam had previously been prime minister in addition to being president, but was forced out due to his reformist views and was made the Speaker of the National Assembly in 1996 and continued to be in position until the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

His last official position was President of the Iraqi National Assembly until the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, which overthrew the Ba'ath Party Hammadi was born in Karbala on 22 June 1930, as a Shi'ite Muslim.

[2] In 1958, Gamal Abdel Nasser declared the formation of the United Arab Republic between Egypt and Syria.

Consequently, the Iraqi Ba'ath leadership sent Hammadi to Damascus on a mission to convince Syrian Ba'athists of the dangers of dissolving the party.

In his memoirs, Hammadi wrote:"I traveled to Damascus via Beirut and attended a leadership meeting with Michel Aflaq, Salah al-Din al-Bitar, and Akram al-Hourani.

"Just months after the union between Egypt and Syria, on July 14, 1958, Baghdad’s radio station broadcast news of a revolution led by a group of Iraqi officers.

Two days later, Hammadi took over as editor of Al-Shaab newspaper, which had previously been a royalist publication but was rebranded as Al-Jumhuriya following the revolution.

Arif and the nationalists, including the Ba'athists, advocated for unity, while Qasim and the communists favored an independent Iraq and proposed a federal union instead.

While in Libya, he secretly worked to establish a Ba'athist organization, but a political statement calling for democracy, the expulsion of foreign forces, and Arab unity led to his arrest and imprisonment for a year.

Upon his release, he returned to Iraq but was arrested upon arrival due to escalating tensions between Arif and Qasim.

He wrote a letter to Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, who became President of Iraq, and Hammadi returned to work again in the state through the Ministry of Oil.

In 1958, Gamal Abdel Nasser announced the formation of the United Arab Republic between Egypt and Syria.

He attended a leadership meeting that included Michel Aflaq, Salah al-Bitar, and Akram al-Hawrani.

In February 2004, after nine months in the custody of the Americans, he was released and subsequently resettled in Qatar while seeking medical treatment abroad He died in a German hospital from liver cancer on 14 March 2007.

Hammadi with Philipp Jenninger at Bonn , 1987