"The information about Tareq Aziz is not accurate. He did not start a hunger strike," said Mohammed Abdul Sahab, spokesman for Iraq's supreme criminal court that had handed down the death sentence. "He is in good health and will continue the other judicial cases," Sahab told AFP.
Aziz was given the death penalty for a crackdown on Shiite religious parties in the 1980s, and is also on trial for a crackdown on Iraqi Kurds.
Aziz's son said on Friday that his father had began a hunger strike the previous day. "My father and 25 other prisoners have been on a hunger strike since yesterday (Thursday)," Ziad Aziz said in the Jordanian capital Amman where he lives. "They are protesting because they could not receive the only monthly visit from friends and relatives set for the last Friday of each month," he said.
On Tuesday, Iraq's supreme criminal court found the long-time international face of the Saddam Hussein regime guilty of "deliberate murder and crimes against humanity," sentencing him to death. Sahab said that Aziz had one month to lodge an appeal, but so far had not done so.
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