Saddam Hussein's personal secretary and chief bodyguard executed in Iraq Under Saddam, who was executed in 2006 after being ousted in the US-led invasion, only the ruling Baath party was allowed to exist. Attempts by the country's Shi'ite majority to establish political organisations were crushed. "Abed Hamoud was executed Thursday afternoon," said Haider al-Saadi, spokesman for the justice ministry. Hamoud was the fifth former Saddam official to be executed in Iraq after the dictator. Others, including former prime minister Tareq Aziz and intelligence chief Sadoun Shakir, have been sentenced to death but are still being held in prison. Executions of former Saddam officials have been sensitive in Iraq where sectarian tensions still run high after the last U.S. forces left the country in December last year. The Vatican has appealed to Iraq's Shi'ite-led government not to execute Aziz, saying his death would not help reconciliation efforts.