"I am not a crook!"

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Former Governing Council member Ahmad Chalabi and his nephew Salem rejected charges filed against them by Iraq (news - web sites)'s chief investigating judge, calling the allegations part of a political conspiracy against them and their family.
Ahmad Chalabi, once a Pentagon (news - web sites) favorite to take leadership of the new Iraq, was charged with counterfeiting. A warrant for his arrest issued Saturday pushed him futher from the center of power, over which he seemed to have a firm grip until he fell out with the Americans in the weeks before the U.S. occupation ended in June.
The one-time Iraqi exile opposition leader was in Tehran, Iran, for an economic conference and said that despite his doubts about the Iraqi criminal system, he would return.
"I'm now mobilized on all fronts to rebuff all these charges," Ahmad Chalabi told CNN. "Nobody's above the law, and I submit to the law in Iraq ... despite my serious and grave reservations about this court."

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Murder charges against Salem Chalabi, the U.S.-appointed lawyer supervising Saddam Hussein's trial, will play into the hands of supporters of the toppled Iraqi dictator who condemn the court as a sham.

Iraqi commentators and lawyers said on Monday even though Chalabi was only the administrator of the Special Iraqi Tribunal and not a judge, the arrest warrant could be damaging because he has been the public face of efforts to try Saddam.

"This will have a deep psychological and social impact on the trial. All the supporters of Saddam will now ask 'how can he have a fair trial if the chief administrator of the court is charged with murder," said Sadoun al-Dulaimi, director of the Iraq Center for Research and Strategic Studies