(MENAFN- The Peninsula) Iraq's jailed former foreign minister Tareq Aziz, who used his mastery of English to put a gloss on Saddam Hussein's murderous regime for two decades, died in hospital Friday aged 79.
As Saddam's principal spokesman, the bespectacled Aziz - the only Christian in the now-executed president's inner circle - was a recognisable figure internationally whose rise was attributed to unswerving loyalty to Saddam.
Aziz was found guilty of "deliberate murder and crimes against humanity" for a crackdown on religious parties in the 1980s, and was sentenced to death in October 2010.
He was also handed various prison sentences for other crimes.
"Tareq Aziz arrived at the Hussein Teaching Hospital at 3 pm," Dr Saadi al-Majed, the head of the health department in Dhi Qar, the province where he was jailed, told AFP.
"He died because of a heart attack," the doctor said.
Aziz had long been in poor health, suffering from heart and respiratory problems, high blood pressure and diabetes, and his family repeatedly called for his release from custody.
In 2011, his lawyer said Aziz, in a state of depression, wanted then-premier Nuri al-Maliki to accelerate his execution due to his worsening health.
Aziz's son Ziad complained of his father's "poor treatment" while in prison, telling AFP from Amman that this definitely "led to the deterioration of his health and therefore his death."
Ziad said he did not know when the body would be handed over to the family in the Jordanian capital, or whether his father would be buried in Amman or Baghdad.
Named foreign minister in 1983 and then deputy premier in 1991, Aziz was believed to have wielded little real power over decision-making.
But he became one of the regime's best-known figures abroad as Saddam's voice who matched and at times outshone his US peers in debate.
Born in the northern town of Sinjar on April 28, 1936, Aziz was from a Chaldean Catholic family.
- Thick glasses, cigar -
He changed his name from Michael Yuhanna to Tareq Aziz to allay any hostility to his Christian background.
Aziz had known Saddam since the 1950s, but was kept outside the closed Sunni Muslim circle of the president's fellow clansmen from the city of Tikrit even as he rose to become the top Christian in the Baathist government.
Once omnipresent, haranguing the international media and instantly recognisable in his trademark thick glasses, neat uniform and large cigar, Aziz turned himself over to American custody a month after the March 2003 US-led invasion that overthrew Saddam.
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