Saddam Hussein argued with the judge and complained about Iraq's "occupiers" as his trial for crimes against humanity heard its first evidence in a Baghdad court today.
The deposed Iraqi president, carrying a copy of the Koran under his arm, arrived slightly late for the court session, the second in the trial of Saddam and seven aides, which opened on October 19th then adjourned for 40 days.
Trial witness
"They brought me here to the door and I was handcuffed. They cannot bring the defendant in in handcuffs," Saddam said, when asked by chief Judge Rizgar Mohammed Amin to explain his lateness.
He said he had to walk up four flights of stairs because of a broken lift in the heavily fortified courthouse. "I will tell the police about this," Judge Amin told him.
"I don't want you to tell them, I want you to order them," Saddam replied.
"They are invaders and occupiers and you have to order them." Saddam, wearing a white shirt and dark jacket, then argued with the judge about his rights and the fact his jailers had taken a pen and piece of paper away from him.
As his voice rose heatedly, television footage of the proceedings broke away and the sound was cut. The images are being broadcast by US company Court TV with a 30-minute delay to allow officials to interrupt the footage if anything they do not approve of is shown.
The TV footage is not showing the faces of any of the defence lawyers and only one of the five judges. Around two hours before the trial resumed, a mortar landed in the "green zone", the area where the court is based, underlining security risks. No one was injured.
Saddam and his co-defendants are charged with crimes against humanity in relation to the deaths of 148 Shia men from the town of Dujail, north of Baghdad, after an attempt to kill him in July 1982. All defendants have pleaded not guilty. They could face death by hanging if convicted.
At the start of the session, Judge Amin agreed to allow former US Attorney-General Ramsey Clark and a former justice minister of Qatar, Najeeb al-Nauimi, to join Saddam's defence team as advisers.
Mr Nauimi then stood up to present a challenge to the court's legitimacy and said the trial should not proceed until the safety of defence lawyers was assured.
Two defence lawyers were assassinated shortly after the first court session in October. The judge heard him out and said the court would respond in writing in time.
Judge Amin then instructed the prosecution to go ahead with the presentation of evidence, apparently dismissing defence motions for a further delay. Defence lawyers had said they would ask for an adjournment of three months to allow time to prepare.
Grainy sepia-coloured video footage shot by a cameraman of Saddam's in July 1982, on the day the assassination attempt occurred in Dujail, was then shown to the court.
A portion where Saddam stops by the side of the road and questions suspects himself following the shooting was replayed several times, including a moment when Saddam orders aides to "take them away separately and interrogate them".
Then the court saw videotaped testimony given by a witness in hospital late last month, just days before he died of cancer.
The witness, Wadah al-Sheikh, was an intelligence officer under Saddam and was sent to Dujail shortly after the shooting to investigate the attack. In his sworn testimony, read out by Amin, Sheikh described how he had gone to the town and found a few bodies in the palm groves, near where the assault on Saddam's motorcade took place.
He said that based on the number of bullet casings left at the scene, he calculated that between seven and 12 people had been involved in the assassination attempt.
However, he said hundreds of people from Dujail had been seized by Saddam's security forces after the attack.
"They rounded up 400 people from the town - women, children and old men," he said in his testimony. "Saddam's personal bodyguards took part in killing people."
The court rejected defence motions for a further adjournment of up to three months. Instead the trial was adjourned until next Monday, December 5th.