1. Interim Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi enters press conference and walks to podium, then zoom out to wide shot of press conference 2. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ayad Allawi, Interim Iraqi Prime Minister: "I have today signed the Amnesty law. This law is directed toward individuals who have committed minor crimes and have not yet been apprehended or prosecuted. Examples of this amnesty is for individuals that possess or have dealt in light arms, possession of explosive devices or materials that can be used to create explosives, hiding intelligence, or covering for individuals or groups who are planning or financing terrorist criminal or terrorist acts. participating with terrorist groups with the intent to affects the nation's internal security." 3. Cutaway 4. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ayad Allawi, Interim Iraqi Prime Minister: "This order has been established to allow our citizens to rejoin civil society and participate in the reconstruction of their country and the improvement of their lives, instead of wasting their lives pointlessly toward a lost cause." 5. Cutaway 6. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Ayad Allawi, Interim Iraqi Prime Minister: "We do not feel that there's a need for an emergency law, the situation is still under control despite what the media is trying to propagate. There are some elements outside of Iraq, and there is a third kind of people who are involved in crimes against the stability and security in some provinces. Iraqi police forces have been in control, and as in the press release, there are more than 1-thousand people, that are not from Najaf, have been apprehended there. Some have come from Abu Ghraib and some Saddam released." 7. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Adnan al- Janabi, Interim Iraqi Minister of State: (Question: The original amnesty plan covered people who killed Americans as well as Iraqis. Why was there a change in those covered by the plan? Can they join the government? "I'm not aware of any draft which included amnesty for killing people - Iraqis or non Iraqis. However this final resolution says very clearly that killing is not pardoned, in any way or form." 8. Pan from al-Janabi to Allawi 9. SOUNDBITE (English) Ayad Allawi, Interim Iraqi Prime Minister: "This amnesty is not for people who have committed crimes, who have killed. The criminals will be brought to justice." STORYLINE Interim Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi on Saturday signed a long-awaited amnesty law that would pardon Iraqis who had committed minor crimes, but not those guilty of killing, he said. The amnesty had been expected to be a key element in the government's efforts to end a 15-month-old insurgency, but had been the object of controversy since it was first proposed soon after the government took office June 28. Early drafts reportedly would have forgiven most people involved in the insurgency, but the law was apparently changed to exclude anyone who had killed. "This law is directed toward individuals who have committed minor crimes and have not yet been apprehended or prosecuted," Allawi said at a news conference. "This amnesty is not for people who have committed crimes, who have killed. Those people will be brought to justice, starting from Zarqawi down to the person in the street," he said, referring to Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Those eligible for the amnesty include people in possession of light arms and explosives, those who hid intelligence about terrorist groups and people who helped those groups commit crimes, Allawi said. "This order has been established to allow our citizens to rejoin civil society and participate in the reconstruction of their country and the improvement of their lives, instead of wasting their lives pointlessly toward a lost cause," he said. You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/089b97443a0af743929ab379fd098148 Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork

• published: 21 Jul 2015
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