Saddam's Lawyer Blames U.S.-Led Forces

Saddam Hussein's lawyer said Wednesday that U.S.-led "occupation forces" bear some of the responsibility for the slaying of a second colleague in the trial, and the defense team signaled it may not show up for the next session without international security guarantees.

Khalil al-Dulaimi, head of Saddam's legal team, spoke one day after Adel al-Zubeidi, lawyer for former Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan, was killed by gunmen in west Baghdad. Thamir al-Khuzaie, attorney for another co-defendant, Saddam's half brother Barazan Ibrahim, was wounded.

The attack followed the slaying last month of another defense lawyer, Saadoun al-Janabi, who was found shot to death the day after the trial began Oct. 19. The killings raise doubts about Iraq's ability to hold the trial, although the Iraqi government dismissed calls to move or halt it. The second session is set for Nov. 28.

In a statement, the defense team said it considered that date "null and void" in the wake of the attacks because of "the very dangerous circumstances that prevent the presence" of the attorneys "unless there is a direct, neutral international intervention that guarantees" security.

After the first slaying, the defense lawyers announced they had suspended further dealings with the special court trying their clients until their security was guaranteed. The latest statement appeared to harden that position in wake of the latest killing.

There was no reaction from the court to Wednesday's statement, but officials have said that if defense lawyers refuse to appear, the tribunal could appoint a new team.

Al-Dulaimi, speaking in the insurgent hotspot of Ramadi, brushed aside government suggestions that pro-Saddam insurgents or religious extremists were behind the killings.

"The occupation forces are responsible for this criminal incident, and they bear the responsibility of preserving the lives of the people regardless of their identity," he said. The "Iraqi government also has the responsibility to protect people and put an end to such actions."

He called on "all free people, the United Nations, the Arab League, Arab presidents and kings and the Arab Bar Association to shoulder the responsibility to face the tyranny of the criminal gangs that are targeting the country."

President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd and longtime Saddam opponent, also condemned the assassination and urged the rest of the defense team to accept government protection, which they had refused.

Regardless of who was responsible, the killing of another defense lawyer reinforced grave misgivings among human rights groups and international lawyers about holding the trial in a country gripped by a brutal insurgency — much of it led by the defendants' supporters in the Sunni Arab minority.

"I don't understand how you can have a fair trial in this atmosphere of insecurity, with bombs going off," said Richard Goldstone, the first prosecutor at the U.N. tribunal for war crimes in the former Yugoslavia and one of the world's most prominent jurists.

He told The Associated Press by telephone that Iraq's government should consider shifting the trial to an Arab country "where there is security."

In another example of the ongoing disorder, five policemen were killed and five others were wounded when a suicide car bomber struck a patrol near Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad.

The U.S. command announced that an American Marine had died of injuries received when a roadside bomb exploded near his vehicle Monday in western Iraq. The latest death brings to 2,055 the number of U.S. military service members who have died since the start of the war in 2003, according to an AP count.

In western Baghdad, a driver for the Sudanese Embassy was shot to death Wednesday as he left the Palestinian mission, police said. The shooting occurred in the Mansour area of the capital, where gunmen have attacked diplomats and foreign businessmen before. The driver was a Sudanese citizen, his embassy said.

The attack followed the abduction last month of two employees of the Moroccan Embassy, who were seized on the highway between Baghdad and Amman, Jordan. Statements attributed to al-Qaida in Iraq claimed responsibility and said the two had been sentenced to death.

The group also claimed responsibility for the kidnap-slaying in July of three foreign diplomats — two Algerians and one Egyptian — as part of a campaign to cut ties between Muslim countries and the Shiite-dominated, U.S.-backed Iraqi government.

Also Wednesday, U.S. Air Force jets destroyed a building near the Syrian border where al-Qaida insurgents hid weapons, the U.S. military said. The attack occurred in the village of Bu Hardan near the cities of Qaim and Husaybah, where U.S. and Iraqi troops conducted a major operation in the past four days.

"The terrorists were seen moving mortars and other small weapons into the targeted building," the statement said. "This weapons cache was directly linked to mortar attacks on Coalition and Iraqi security forces."

The statement said the raid destroyed the building and the weapons cache.

Late Tuesday, the military announced that U.S. and Iraqi forces have secured the town of Husaybah and that al-Qaida-led insurgents there have been neutralized.

Also in Baghdad, gunmen opened fire on a minibus, killing its driver, police Capt. Qassim Hussein said. A roadside bomb in the southern neighborhood of Dora killed a motorist and wounded another man, police said.