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Saddam Hussein wins UN's Most Helpful Dictator award

A surprise win at last night's UN World Achievement Awards may seriously undermine the US's planned assault on Iraq.

Attendees gasped as Saddam Hussein was named Most Helpful Dictator in the third annual ceremony, narrowly beating Ghana and Yemen. He could not attend the event, but sent along one of his most trusted colleagues to collect the award.

Sadly, that colleague was murdered just hours before the ceremony — most likely because Hussein feared he would upstage the dictator with an entertaining speech of his own — so a trusted member of the Republican Guard eventually delivered Saddam's words.

As expected, Mr Hussein used the opportunity to deliver a rhetoric-heavy anti-American diatribe. It read: "Almighty God is digging pits along the Americans' path. These dark and covered pits may get deeper with the passage of time, especially whenever their nervousness and disappointment exacerbate."

The speech continued in the same vein for two hours, before finishing: "And I'd just like to thank everyone that has made this possible. There are too many people to name, and most of them are now dead so they won't benefit from my mentioning them — they know who they are. Most of all though I'd like to thank myself for being the one person I could always rely on."

The UN award panel defended its decision, saying that under renewed pressure, Saddam had recently offered to open up his country for weapons inspection, offered intelligence on a number of feared organisations and halted persecution of people within his borders.

A grim-faced Ronald Dumsfield — the US Secretary of Defence — was said to be "well pissed" at the result. "This will not in any way affect the plans we have set in motion with regard to Iraq," he told The Rockall Times. "Saddam is toying with us and has no plans to allow UN inspectors back into the country."

"Actually, he's just given us permission to return," noted a passing UN weapons inspector. "We're off to Baghdad next week."

"This will still not affect our plans," Dumsfield continued. "He continues to oppress his own people and we can't let that happen."

"No, it's okay," said the Kurdish representative at an adjacent table. "Saddam lifted restrictions on Thursday. We're free to do as we please." "This will not in any way stop us from doing the right thing," Dumsfield reiterated. "Iraq remains a worldwide threat and is maintaining its nuclear and biological weapons programme. Saddam must be ousted."

"Well no, actually," interjected UN secretary general Kofi Annan. "Since Mr Hussein has meet all the UN's demands, we now have no trouble with him maintaining a responsible weapons programme appropriate to his own defence needs."

"He continues to persecute his political enemies and remains a destabilising influence in the Middle East," Dumsfield grasped.

"Ah well, funny you should mention that...," chipped in a member of the US-sponsored Iraqi "government in exile".

He did not, however, have time to finish his sentence before Dumsfeld stormed out of the room with his fingers in his ears shouting "Where's the friggin' suitcase, you fuc*k? Give me today's goddam launch codes. I'm going to nuke his Iraqi ass back to the stone age."

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