HUSSEIN TRIAL UPROAR AS DEFENSE TEAM WALKS OUT
5 December 2005

The trial of deposed Iraq Ba'athist dictator, Saddam Hussein, is again temporarily suspended as the defense team walked out. The walk out came just after the defense team had tried to present arguments regarding perceived flaws in the process, which the judges refused to hear.

Reuters reports that Iraq's national security adviser claims the gov't thwarted a plot to rocket the courthouse. Two defense lawyers have been assassinated, and last week the court gave an extra week, on top of the initial 40 day suspension, during which the defense team would have time to find replacements.

Another lawyer for the defense team have reportedly fled the country in fear for their lives, and now one judge has stepped down, citing conflict of interest. It appears one of Saddam's co-defendants is linked to the murder of the judge's brother. An "alternate" judge took his place on the tribunal.

John Pace, the UN's top human rights official in Iraq, has said the ongoing attacks on lawyers and the widespread corruption of the Iraqi justice system mean the tribunal will never satisfy international standards for a fair trial. Pace has also noted large numbes of detentions in Iraq without due process of law, that Iraq's government is illegally maintaining a network of secret prisons across the country, refusing orders to release innocents.

He even cites a "total breakdown in the protection of the individual in this country", especially the case of one judge himself imprisoned after finding that police have violated court orders to release prisoners. The UN is calling for an independent, official inquiry into the assassinations of two defense lawyers.

The UN has expressed "deep concern" over the staging of the tribunal through a panel of judges appointed directly by the occupying forces and suggests the process would be more legitimate if internationalized, either through an ad-hoc tribunal such as the court for the former Yugoslavia or the permanent International Criminal Court at the Hague. [s]