Terming as "rigged" the death sentence to ousted Iraq president Saddam Hussein, the Communist Party of India-Marxist on Sunday denounced the Iraqi High Tribunal verdict and demanded intervention by the United Progressive Alliance government to get it rescinded.

"The politburo denounces the death sentence to the ousted president of Iraq Saddam Hussein," the CPI-M Central Committee said in a statement in New Delhi.

"This is nothing but a totally rigged verdict delivered after a farcical trial," it said noting that the defence lawyers representing Hussein were murdered and the chief judge was changed twice in the course of the trial.

"The politburo demands that the UPA government should categorically condemn this judicial travesty. It must actively intervene to get this sentence rescinded," the statement said.

It said the British and the US governments should realise that if executed, this sentence will be seen only as a "judicial assassination" and they will be held responsible for all the consequences.

CPI-M has also asked all its party units to protest the verdict and called upon democratic minded citizens to raise their voice of protest.

Iraq's High Tribunal found Hussein guilty of crimes against humanity and sentenced him to hang for the 1982 killing of 148 Shiites in the city of Dujail.