“U.S. involvement will raise questions about the impartiality of the tribunal,” added Scheppele, who made her observations during a reunion-weekend panel discussion on Hussein’s trial. The annual “Classes Without Quizzes” also featured Evan Kohlmann L’04, an international terrorism consultant; Jonathan Fredman, special counsel for counterterrorism at the Central Intelligence Agency and lecturer in law at Penn; and Paul H. Robinson, a criminal law expert who is the Colin S. Diver Distinguished Professor of Law at Penn Law School.

Kohlmann presented what he considers ample justification to convict Hussein. Under his rule, he said:

• Between 50,000 and 100,000 Kurds were killed during a chemical weapons campaign in the late 1980s, as estimated by Human Rights Watch; • Another 30,000 to 60,000 Kurds and Shiites were slaughtered to quell their rebellion in 1991;

• Chemical weapons were also used during the Iran-Iraq War to kill approximately 5,000 Iranians – a violation of the 1925 Chemical Weapons Treaty signed by Iraq;

• More than a thousand Kuwaiti POWs were murdered during the Gulf War, which also produced environmental crimes such as the destruction of Kuwaiti oil wells.