BRITAIN: British MP Mr George Galloway yesterday described allegations that he was in the secret pay of dictator Saddam Hussein as a "deeply wounding dagger through my political heart".
Giving evidence from the witness box during his High Court libel action against the Daily Telegraph, he said such allegations were "outrageous" and "incredibly damaging".
A series of articles published in the newspaper in April 2003 - following discovery of documents in Iraq by one of its reporters - "claimed that I had made very substantial secret profits from Saddam Hussein and his regime".
The 50-year-old MP for Glasgow Kelvin, who says he was a vociferous opponent of the Saddam Hussein regime, said an allegation that he was flying around the world doing Saddam's business was a "deeply wounding thrust by a dagger into my political heart".
Mr Galloway, who was expelled from the Labour Party in October last year, said: "As a direct result of the Telegraph's allegations, the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards commenced an investigation against me which is currently in limbo pending the outcome of this action." The MP denied that he had ever sought or received payment from Saddam Hussein.
Mr Galloway, leader of the anti-war Respect coalition party, said: "I would ask that the court recognises that the Telegraph did not act responsibly in publishing the allegations it did about me in the manner that they did.
"These highly damaging allegations have caused my reputation severe damage which needs to be repaired."
Before the MP took the stand, his QC, Mr Richard Rampton held up a copy of the Daily Telegraph with its headline "Galloway was in Saddam's pay, say secret Iraqi documents" and its assertions that he received at least £375,000 a year and that cash came from the oil-for-food programme.
Mr Rampton said it was accompanied by "a great big picture of him smoking a fat cigar, no doubt from Havana, and no doubt bought from the proceeds of Saddam's regime".
He went on: "The message of that heading and that article backed up by the various other pieces in the same issue is this, it's unequivocal: Mr Galloway was in Saddam Hussein's pay."
The barrister said by the second day the newspaper had published reams of material all to the same effect: "He's in Saddam's pay and the money he's had from Saddam has been used, among other things, to buy a fancy villa with a swimming pool."
Mr Galloway told the court that he did not have a £250,000 villa in the Algarve: "I have an £82,000 cottage on a 100 per cent mortgage . . . a blind man in a hurry could have spotted the clear imputation that the £250,000 villa was somehow connected to these documents."
He said that if he had solicited funds from the Iraqi regime for his own enrichment, he would have been "a knave, a thief, corrupt" - and there was not a "scintilla" of evidence to support such a claim.
The case is expected to focus on detailed legal submissions on the so-called "Reynolds qualified privilege defence". Named after the case in which it was first developed, involving former Taoiseach Mr Albert Reynolds, it involves considering whether it was responsible journalism and in the public interest for the newspaper to publish the contents of documents on which their story was based.
Counsel for the Daily Telegraph, Mr James Price QC, told the court: "If it be accepted, as it now is, that the Daily Telegraph had a right and a duty in the public interest to publish these documents, what is left of the case? We say nothing."