BRUSSELS, March 18 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - With a new U.S.-led aggression hanging over their heads, seven Iraqi families filed a lawsuit in Belgium Tuesday, March 18, against former U.S. president George Bush and three other U.S. leaders for crimes perpetrated during the 1991 first Gulf War.

U.S. officials immediately slammed the lawsuit, linked to the killing of some 400 civilians in the bombing of a Baghdad civilian bunker, as "totally baseless" and "clearly political."

The lawsuit cites George Bush, the father of the current U.S. president, Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of State Colin Powell and retired U.S. Army General Norman Schwarzkopf, who led operation Desert Storm against Baghdad, said socialist lawmaker Patrick Moriau.

Cheney was U.S. defense secretary at the time of the first Gulf War, while Powell was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP).

"We are convinced that mistakes will be made again, and we want to signal that all legal means will be taken so that justice is done," said Moriau, a member of an Iraqi-Belgian friendship association.

The action was brought under Belgium's "universal competence" law, which allows legal proceedings against people accused of war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide, regardless of their nationality of location.

The families who brought the action are either victims or relatives of victims of U.S. bombing of a civilian shelter in Baghdad that killed 403 people on February 13, 1991, Moriau said.

Two of the families currently live in Belgium, added the lawmaker, who accompanied the Iraqi plaintiffs when they filed their lawsuit.

Heads of state, prime ministers and foreign ministers are immune from the 1993 Belgian universal competence law while in office.

Some 30 political leaders are facing legal action under the Belgian law, including Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Cuban President Fidel Castro.

Israel recalled its ambassador to Brussels for consultations last month, and summoned the Belgian envoy for a dressing-down, after a legal ruling upholding the validity of the 1993 law in Sharon's case.

Sharon could face legal action for war crimes by 23 Palestinians who survived a massacre by Israeli-allied militia at two refugee camps in Beirut in 1982.

Belgium is fiercely opposed to the looming U.S. war on Iraq, and was among three countries, along with Germany and France, which caused a crisis at NATO in February by refusing to back a U.S. request to boost Turkey's defenses.

Brussels also this month refused to expel an Iraqi diplomat as requested by the United States.