Gunmen Kill Saddam Lawyer

One of Saddam Hussein's defence lawyers was shot dead early this morning after he was abducted from his home by men dressed as police officers, security officials said.

Khamis al-Obeidi's body was found this morning dumped in the street in the Shia Muslim district of Sadr City in eastern Baghdad.

Two defence lawyers and an investigative judge have also been killed by suspected Shia militants since the trial started in October 2005, one of them in the first week of the hearings. Two other defence lawyers have been seriously injured in attacks.

The London-based lawyer Giovanni di Stefano, who is on Saddam's defence team, said the climate of fear around the trial was making it impossible for the court to reach a safe verdict.

"If you don't have a safe environment you can't have a safe trial, neither for a conviction or an acquittal," he told Guardian Unlimited.

"Every single one of us has been warned that we would be beheaded there. There is no reason why this trial couldn't have been held in a safe territory, as with [the Liberian war crimes suspect] Charles Taylor in The Hague."

The murdered lawyer was defending Saddam and his half-brother Barzan Ibrahim, who are accused of ordering a massacre of 148 Shias in the town of Dujail in 1982 following an assassination attempt against Saddam there.

The assassination attempt was organised by the Dawa party, which now makes up one of the most powerful blocs in the Iraqi parliament and counts prime minister Nouri al-Maliki amongst its members.

Saddam's lead counsel, Khalil al-Dulaimi, blamed Iraq's interior ministry for Mr al-Obeidi's death. Iraqi Sunnis believe the ministry is infiltrated by Shia extremists suspected of carrying out scores of slayings and executions against Sunnis over the past year.

"We strongly condemn this act and we condemn the killings done by the interior ministry forces against Iraqis," he said.

The defence team has previously threatened to boycott the trial unless more steps are taken to protect them from attack.

Saddam and his six co-defendants have argued that the killings were a legitimate application of the law, and that the court itself is illegal and set up at the behest of the US.

They have used the witness box to grandstand and to call on Iraqis to resist the US-led occupation. Saddam still insists that he is the Iraqi president, and has upbraided witnesses and judges from the dock for insubordination.

Prosecutors closed their case in the trial on Monday, requesting the death penalty for Saddam and three of his co-defendants. It has been adjourned until July 10, when the defence team will make its closing remarks.