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Just one day after the trial began on 19 October,
defence lawyer Sadoun Nasouaf al-Janabi was
kidnapped from his office by gunmen and found dead
the following day. The defence team had already
threatened to boycott the trial over their security
concerns following his killing. On Monday, they also
called for his trial to be moved outside Baghdad or
abroad to protect their lives and ensure a fair
trial. In a statement, they said the defence team
had received no guarantee from either the court or
the government over their safety following al-Janabi's
murder.
"We're facing daily threats and these threats
prevent us from going to our offices and the court
and from interviewing the witnesses," al-Dulaimi
told journalists. He also called on the
international community to "work on scrapping the
criminal court as illegitimate, and also to pressure
it to release President Saddam Hussein and his
legitimate leadership team."
The eight defendents are being tried for crimes
carried out by government security forces in the
town of al-Dujail, in which more than 140 Shiites
were killed in retaliation for an assassination
attempt on Saddam Hussein as his motorcade passed
through the town.
If convicted on the first charge, the former
dictator could face death by hanging and never be
tried for the many other crimes of which he is
accused, which include the gassing of some 5,000
Kurds in Halabja in northern Iraq.
The murdered lawyers were defending Saddam Hussein's
half-brother Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, former vice
president Taha Yassin Ramadan and former Baath party
official Awad Hamed al-Bandar.
www.adnki.com
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