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Saddam hears torture testimony

The trial of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein on charges of crimes against humanity resumed yesterday with a witness describing the killings and torture of men from an Iraqi village where the former dictator survived an assassination attempt.

Rizgar Mohammed Amin, the Kurdish judge trying Saddam, entered the court shortly before 11:30am and Saddam, who had boycotted the court's last session after telling judges to "go to hell," followed 10 minutes later with his seven co-defendants.

Amin said he planned to call five witnesses in what was expected to be the final hearing of the year before proceedings are adjourned for about a month. There is a chance, however, of another hearing tomorrow before the adjournment.

Prosecutors accuse Saddam and the others of ordering the killings of 148 people from Dujail, north of Baghdad, following a failed bid to assassinate the then-president in the town in 1982. The defendants face hanging if they are convicted.

So far, the trial has heard from 10 prosecution witnesses who have told the court of the torture, beatings and hardships they suffered under Saddam in the wake of the Dujail killings.

Eight have testified from behind a curtain out of fear for their lives and their names were withheld from the court.

But the first witness called yesterday appeared openly, standing just meters from Saddam who took notes and followed proceedings from inside the caged defendants' dock at the heavily fortified Baghdad courtroom.

The witness gave his name as Ali Hassan al-Haidari and said he was only 14 at the time of the massacre in Dujail.

Dressed in a brown suit and white shirt, he spoke calmly and coherently, telling the court his brother was executed under Saddam and his family had been rounded up after the killings.

He said he was taken to the headquarters of Saddam's Baath Party in Dujail where he saw nine corpses lying outside.

"I recognized all of them," he said, before listing names of the alleged victims.

He said he was then taken to the headquarters of Saddam's intelligence service in Baghdad where he saw horrific torture.

Guards applied electric shocks to detainees, and heated up plastic tubing and allowed the hot plastic to drip on to the bodies of their victims, he said.

"They would be in such pain as the plastic solidified on their bodies," he recalled.

"A man would leave on his feet and come back thrown in a blanket," he added.

His testimony was among the strongest heard so far in the stop-start and often chaotic trial, which opened on Oct. 19 but has been adjourned three times.

Haidari then also made a direct accusation against Saddam's co-defendant, half-brother and feared former intelligence chief Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti.

He said Barzan had been present in the building where the torture had taken place and, on one occasion, had kicked Haidari hard as he lay suffering from a fever.

"I was in pain for weeks because of that kick," he said.

Saddam's behavior was calmer during the early parts of the trial yesterday. After greeting the court with a traditional ``Peace be upon you,'' he sat quietly in the defendants' area and appeared to pay close attention to the proceedings.

Later on, Saddam, interrupting a witness, asked the judge if the court could take a break for prayer. Though the witness agreed that the trial should pause, the judge ordered it to continue. Saddam later closed his eyes and appeared to be praying from his defendant's chair.
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