Reaction to Saddam's execution

By The Associated Press
Some comments on the execution of Saddam Hussein:
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Saddam's execution punishes "a crime with another crime. ... The death penalty is not a natural death. And no one can give death, not even the state." - Cardinal Renato Martino, Pope Benedict XVI's top prelate for justice issues.
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"The test of a government's commitment to human rights is measured by the way it treats its worst offenders. History will judge these actions harshly." - Richard Dicker, director of Human Rights Watch's International Justice Program.
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"Saddam is paying the price for murdering tens of thousands of Iraqis. This is an unprecedented feeling of happiness. ... Nothing matches it, no festival or marriage or birth." - Abu Sinan, a resident of Sadr City, Baghdad's impoverished Shiite slum.
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"He got his last prayer. He got his last meal. I'm assuming he was probably able to talk to his family. And that's something my husband didn't get and something thousands of other soldiers didn't get." - Stephanie Dostie, whose husband, Sgt. 1st Class Shawn Christopher Dostie, was killed by an explosive device a year ago.
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Saddam has "now been held to account for at least some of the appalling crimes he committed against the Iraqi people." - British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett.
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"It will not increase our moral authority in the world. ... Saddam's heinous crimes against humanity can never be diminished, but he was our ally while he was doing it. ... Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth will make us blind and disfigured. ... Saddam as a war trophy only deepens the catastrophe to which we are indelibly linked." - the Rev. Jesse Jackson.
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"It is not a great day for democracy and democrats. Barbarity has to be fought by other means than barbarity. There were other ways to punish the abominable acts of Saddam Hussein." - Louis Michel, European Union commissioner for development and
humanitarian aid.