His last words were:

“Muqtada.”

As his executioners placed a noose around his neck, Hussein blanched but betrayed no emotion, [Iraqi High Tribunal Judge Munir] Haddad said.
Hussein refused to wear a hood. The charged silence that settles over the execution chamber was broken by an exchange between Hussein and four guards, who were apparently followers of Muqtada Sadr, the militant Shiite cleric whose father was killed by Hussein.

“Muqtada Sadr!” they cried out.

Hussein scoffed in reply.

His last word was a sarcastic “Muqtada,” Haddad said. “And then he was hanged.”

–From the L.A. Times, 12/30/06, by Molly Hennessy-Fiske and Solomon Moore