Saddam ordered out of court by new chief judge
Mohammed al-Oriebi al-Khalifah, a Shiite who was deputy presiding judge, took over as new chief judge following the government's sacking of his predecessor Abdullah al-Ameri who had said Saddam was "not a dictator".
Khalifah ordered Saddam removed from the court inside Baghdad's high-security Green Zone when he complained about his appointment to head the trial over the Anfal campaign against the Kurds in the late 1980s.
The defense team also walked out in protest.
"We want to say that the government is interfering in the trial. We cannot continue with our work fairly," attorney Wudud Fawzi said, reading a statement on behalf of the defense lawyers. "We decided to withdraw from the trial for the above reasons, we want no inference with the trial from the government and we will not return until this condition is met."
Saddam and six of his colleagues face charges including genocide, accused of spearheading a military campaign in 1987-1988 against the Kurds that killed 182,000 people. They face the death penalty if found guilty. Before being escorted out by guards, Saddam told his fellow defendants: "You should leave too."
And he told Khalifah: "Your father worked as a deputy in the security services up until the occupation," in an apparent attempt to reveal the judge's family links with his regime.
Fawzi also claimed that the first chief judge in Saddam's first trial over the killing of Shiite villagers had to step down under government pressure.
Judge Rizkar Mohammed Amin resigned on January 23 for "personal reasons" from the trial in which Saddam and seven others were accused of killing 148 Shiites from the village of Dujail after an attempt on his life in 1982.
Sources close to Amin revealed that he had come under pressure from government officials who felt he was too lenient with the defendants, particularly Saddam and his half-brother and former secret police chief Barzan al-Tikriti. "The defense lawyers are under a lot of pressure and we cannot proceed in this trial because it does not provide a fair trial," Fawzi said, adding that the removal of Ameri "confirmed our doubts" in the court that was "formed by the occupation."
Another high-profile defendant, Ali Hassan al-Majid, also known as Chemical Ali, asked to leave the court but the judge ordered him to stay.
Ameri, also a Shiite, was removed on Tuesday by the Iraqi cabinet following accusations he was too soft on Saddam and the other defendants.
"The government of Iraq feels the judge is no longer neutral as could be seen when he described Saddam as not being a dictator," the cabinet said. Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh told AFP that the Shiite-led cabinet had taken into consideration "a big uprising from the people, who feel that there is no longer any neutrality for the victims."
Ameri came under fire from Kurdish and Shiite groups for making his controversial statement about Saddam during an exchange with the former Iraqi strongman at a hearing on September 14.
Dabbagh said the law that established the Iraqi High Tribunal empowered the cabinet "to transfer any judge or prosecutor to the high judicial commission" if they are not fulfilling their duty.
International legal expert Nehal Bhuta of the New York-based Human Rights Watch said the judge's removal was "a blatant violation of the independence of the court".
"The statement of Dabbagh reflects that the government has not adequately understood the independency of the judiciary as a whole," Bhuta told AFP by telephone from New York.
"This act jeopardizes the integrity of the court and damages prospects of justice for the victims themselves," Bhuta added.