Saddam Hussein was back in court in Baghdad on Monday for the latest hearing in his trial for genocide against ethnic Kurds in the late 1980s.
Updated at 1.45 pm
BAGHDAD: Saddam Hussein was expelled from the courtroom for the second hearing in a row on Monday after the new chief judge dismissed his request to be allowed out of the metal pen where defendants must sit.
“I have a request here that I don't want to be in this cage any more,” he said, waving a yellow paper. “Get him out,” the judge ordered court guards.
Earlier, Saddam was back in court in Baghdad for the latest hearing in his trial for genocide against ethnic Kurds in the late 1980s.
Lawyers for the ousted Iraqi president and his six co-defendants said on Sunday they would stay away from the court, partly in protest at the Iraqi government's sacking of the chief judge in the case last week.
Last week, the Iraqi government sacked chief judge Abdullah al-Ameri after he said Saddam was not a "dictator," and replaced him with Mohammed al-Oreibi al-Khalifah, a Shiite who was a deputy presiding judge.
Saddam was in court on Monday, but on Sunday chief defence attorney Khalil al-Dulaimi had said the defence team planned to boycott the hearing and it was not immediately known if they were present.
"In light of the latest developments, and the fundamental mistakes made by the court before that, as well as the huge pressure the government has put on the court, the defence team has decided to boycott Monday's hearing," he said.
"The defence team will not recognise the legitimacy of this court and does not accept the tailor-made decision taken by the occupying forces.
"It is not about this judge or that judge, but from day one we have protested the legitimacy and the bias of this court."
At the last hearing on Wednesday, Khalifah stamped his mark on the proceedings by throwing Saddam out of the court when the former military strongman rose to complain against him.
The defence team also walked out of court to protest the sacking of Ameri.
Saddam and six of his former colleagues face charges including genocide for spearheading a military campaign against the Kurds in 1987-1988 that the prosecutors say left 182,000 people dead.
They face the death penalty if found guilty.
Dulaimi had criticised the competence of the new judge, saying Khalifah graduated only in 2004 and "does not have the experience needed".
"The defence team will mull its next move in consultation with our client," Dulaimi said.
Khalifah, meanwhile, has provided court-appointed lawyers for the defendants.
Last week, government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the decision to transfer Ameri was taken to preserve the "neutrality of the court".
Iraqi Kurds, who are still nursing their wounds from the Anfal attacks, had welcomed Ameri's dismissal.
At Wednesday's hearing, the court heard from five Kurdish witnesses who told how their villages were gassed by Saddam's forces during the so-called Anfal campaign against Kurds in the final years of the Iran-Iraq war.
Ahmed Qader described how after an attack on a nearby village, he and his brother collected dozens of gassed bodies and buried them.
"My eyes were watering and I was shaking, but there was no other way to help," he said.
"Their eyes were popping out and their noses and mouths were bleeding."
Other Kurdish witnesses described their time in Iraqi prisons, including one woman who watched her niece and nephew die causing her to break down.
"A woman asked me what's the matter and I told her that my nephew and niece had died and she said that her own son had just died as well and we cried together until morning," said Shamsa Rustum.
She only found out about her husband's death when their identity cards turned up in a mass grave in 2005. She then asked the court to return the two identity cards, which were being used as evidence, in memory of her lost husband.
Saddam and seven former aides are awaiting a verdict due in October in a trial over the killing of 148 Shiite villagers after an attempt on the ousted Iraqi leader's life in 1982.
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