White House vows a strong defence

WASHINGTON, Jan 17: President Bill Clinton's 'corruption' warrants his removal from office, the lead prosecutor at his impeachment trial charged Saturday, in the last of opening arguments for the prosecution, reports AFP.

The spotlight of the second presidential impeachment trial in US history now shifts to the White House, which has vowed a 'strong, vigorous defence' when it kicks off its opening arguments Tuesday.

Republican Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, asked Saturday what she hoped to hear from Clinton's defenders, replied: "The White House has to refute the charges on the merits. I don't think they did that on the House side."

Few expect that a requisite two-thirds majority of senators will vote to convict and oust Clinton, who faces the first such vote since Andrew Johnson escaped removal from office by one ballot in 1868.

But few expected the House of Representatives to pass the two articles of impeachment of perjury and obstruction of justice against Clinton, which it did last month in largely party-line votes.

The defence comes after House-appointed trial 'managers' told the Senate that Clinton's conduct in the Monica Lewinsky affairs met that standard of 'high crimes and misdemeanours' cited in the Constitution as grounds for presidential ouster.

The 13 managers marshalled often harsh rhetoric over three days of arguments aimed at persuading the Senate's 45 Democrats and 55 Republicans to convict the popular president.

"The matter before you is a question of willful, premeditated deliberate corruption of the nation's system of justice, through perjury and obstruction of justice," Republican representative Henry Hyde said in closing remarks.

Hyde had launched the managers' opening arguments Thursday, as they urged the Senate to convict Clinton of wrongdoing stemming from efforts to hide his affair with Lewinsky.

After Hyde's summation, White House attorney Greg Craig fired off a statement saying "nothing (in the three-day presentation) has proven their case."

"The House Republicans' case ends as it began, an unsubstantiated, circumstantial case that does not meet the constitutional standard to remove the president from office," he said.

Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist, presiding over the historic proceedings, recessed the trial some five hours after he reconvened it shortly after 10:00 am (1500 GMT).

Clinton's defence was set to kick off at 1:00 pm (1800 GMT) Tuesday, the same day as Clinton was to deliver his annual 'State of the Union' speech to the full Congress and the nation.

Like the House managers, they have up to 24 hours over several days.

There will be no session tomorrow, a US federal holiday marking the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr.

Republican Senator Fred Thompson stressed that the House case was "very well presented, very powerful, but we need to keep in mind that we've only heard half the case."

"Some of them did a good job ... a better job in the Senate than they did in the House," said Democrat Charles Schumer, who voted against the articles in the House and on its judiciary committee before moving up to the Senate earlier this month.