Saddam pounds desk in courtroom.
Saddam: This is not a trial. This is not a trial. This is a game. This is a game. A game.[Saddam sits down]
COMM: The trial of Saddam Hussein has often looked more like a theatre than a courtroom. Saddam and other defendants railing at the judge, defence lawyers tousling with guards, the first chief judge resigning after a whispering campaign that he was too soft.
COMM: Heres Barzan al-Tikriti, Saddams half brother and intelligence chief, hauled into court in his underwear.
Barzan: We don't want to sit here! We refuse to attend this trial without our lawyers!
COMM: At one point, the entire defence team boycotted the trial because one lawyer was manhandled out of the room by guards. The court then appointed its own choice of defence lawyers an extreme step which could prejudice a fair trial.
Saddam: We have already chosen our lawyers. They withdrew from the court after being beaten in front of your own eyes, judge!Judge: Who hit them?
Saddam: The Head of the Jordanian Bar Association was struck right in front of you. Judge: Who hit them? Nobody hit them.
Setup of Armouti with clients
COMM: The lawyer who was thrown out of court was Saleh al-Armouti, head of the Jordanian Bar Association.He is scathing about the new chief judge.
Saleh: It is unheard of, either in the Iraqi judicial system or anywhere else. It's unheard of that lawyers are attacked and forced out of court by security personnel.
COMM: He says the old chief judge, Rizgar Amin, resigned because of political interference.
Saleh: Judge Rizgar, who represents Iraq and the Iraqi judiciary, refused to bow to threats and orders to deny the defendants the rights granted to them by the Geneva Conventions and by Arab and international laws.
COMM: Most of the time, the main defence lawyers are not even in Iraq because its just too dangerous for them. Two have already been assassinated. So theyre here in Amman in neighbouring Jordan.Saddams chief lawyer, Khalil al-Dulaimi, says his client cannot have a fair trial inside Iraq.
Al-Dulaimi:I dont think the solution is to move the trial abroad. But if we must have a trial, we cannot have a just and fair trial inside Iraq. Id rather it were cancelled and a settlement reached. Otherwise, it should be moved abroad.
Set up of AlfordPix of normal trial sequence
COMM: One of the British lawyers who trained the judges of the Iraqi Special Tribunal, Stuart Alford, says news clips of courtroom chaos dont do justice to the proceedings.
COMM: Much of the time is being spent on painstaking, detailed giving of evidence as the prosecution tries to prove that Saddam Hussein was personally responsible for ordering the execution of 148 men after an assassination attempt in 1982 in the town of Dujail.Even Alford has concerns about fairness.
Stuart Alford: I think they have a structure which is capable of delivering a fair trial. And I truly believe that these judges want to deliver a fair trial. Ive no doubt, havingspent the time that I have with them, that they are determined that there is a fair trial. Whether they actually manage to deliver a fair trial, we will have to see once the process has reached its conclusion. Interference from the Iraqi government is clearly a worry and what we have heard over the last 6 weeks or so is troubling. That the first presiding judge resigned - in part because he felt that there was interference. And that's a worry if that is right.
COMM: But he says defendants in big crimes against humanity trials like this often try to disrupt the court to make the proceedings look like a farce.
Stuart: People in this situation will find ways to disrupt the proceedings. In Rwanda, the accused would often disrupt the proceedings, either by sacking their lawyers very regularly, so that the court was always left in a situation where the lawyers were never up to speed with the case. Or making applications which slowed things down. There was one series of application because the food wasnt good enough.
TV studio and technician pix
COMM: At least Iraqis can follow the trial on television and at least in theory - make up their own minds about whether its fair or not.
COMM: That never happened in Saddams time. The coverage which comes through the state broadcaster al-Iraqiya is not quite live theres a 20-minute delay and a few times when the courtroom chaos has got out of hand, the feed has simply been cut.
TV PRESENTER:You'll find all Iraqis glued to their TV sets to see those who ruled them harshly for 35 years being judged by Iraqis in a new Iraq. An Iraq that believes in human rights and in lawful government.
COMM: But in practice, most Iraqis watching have already made up their minds about the trial. Lawyers arguments about fairness and international standards mean nothing in a country on the edge of sectarian civil war. The trial of Saddam Hussein has become just one more issue which divides people on sectarian lines.
COMM: This is Kazimiya, an intensely Shiite Muslim area centred on a big shrine. People here all want Saddam punished for the tens of thousands of victims they say he had tortured, executed and bulldozed alive into mass graves.
SHIA 01: As far Saddam is concerned, I'd like to see him executed. He hurt the Iraqi people, killed many of them. I think he should be executed.
SHIA 02: The current government is serious about this issue and Godwilling Saddam will be executed. What he did to Iraq is not a small thing.
COMM: But across the river Tigris in the Sunni Muslim area of Azamiya, everyone thinks the trial is a farce.
SUNNI 01:President Saddam Hussein is the legitimate president of Iraq, whether they like it or not.
Q:What do you think of this trial?
Sunni 01: This trial is fundamentally false, completely false, because it is based on the force of an occupying power.
COMM: Saddam is a Sunni and by and large, Sunnis did better under his rule than Shites.But many Sunnis hated him and their contempt for the trial now shows how much they feel alienated and marginalised in the new Iraq.
SUNNI 02: There's nothing legal about this trial. Just look at how it keeps getting delayed and postponed. And nobody sees the witnesses. They're all hiding behind curtains. And they keep changing the judges and prosecutors. The lawyers don't even live in Iraq. They're always coming and going. So there's no legitimacy. There's nothing legitimate about this court.
COMM: The trial of a dictator can bring closure and healing to a country. But the trial of Saddam Hussein seems just to be driving Iraqis further apart.
Saddam: This is not a trial. This is not a trial. This is a game. This is a game. A game.[Saddam sits down]
COMM: The trial of Saddam Hussein has often looked more like a theatre than a courtroom. Saddam and other defendants railing at the judge, defence lawyers tousling with guards, the first chief judge resigning after a whispering campaign that he was too soft.
COMM: Heres Barzan al-Tikriti, Saddams half brother and intelligence chief, hauled into court in his underwear.
Barzan: We don't want to sit here! We refuse to attend this trial without our lawyers!
COMM: At one point, the entire defence team boycotted the trial because one lawyer was manhandled out of the room by guards. The court then appointed its own choice of defence lawyers an extreme step which could prejudice a fair trial.
Saddam: We have already chosen our lawyers. They withdrew from the court after being beaten in front of your own eyes, judge!Judge: Who hit them?
Saddam: The Head of the Jordanian Bar Association was struck right in front of you. Judge: Who hit them? Nobody hit them.
Setup of Armouti with clients
COMM: The lawyer who was thrown out of court was Saleh al-Armouti, head of the Jordanian Bar Association.He is scathing about the new chief judge.
Saleh: It is unheard of, either in the Iraqi judicial system or anywhere else. It's unheard of that lawyers are attacked and forced out of court by security personnel.
COMM: He says the old chief judge, Rizgar Amin, resigned because of political interference.
Saleh: Judge Rizgar, who represents Iraq and the Iraqi judiciary, refused to bow to threats and orders to deny the defendants the rights granted to them by the Geneva Conventions and by Arab and international laws.
COMM: Most of the time, the main defence lawyers are not even in Iraq because its just too dangerous for them. Two have already been assassinated. So theyre here in Amman in neighbouring Jordan.Saddams chief lawyer, Khalil al-Dulaimi, says his client cannot have a fair trial inside Iraq.
Al-Dulaimi:I dont think the solution is to move the trial abroad. But if we must have a trial, we cannot have a just and fair trial inside Iraq. Id rather it were cancelled and a settlement reached. Otherwise, it should be moved abroad.
Set up of AlfordPix of normal trial sequence
COMM: One of the British lawyers who trained the judges of the Iraqi Special Tribunal, Stuart Alford, says news clips of courtroom chaos dont do justice to the proceedings.
COMM: Much of the time is being spent on painstaking, detailed giving of evidence as the prosecution tries to prove that Saddam Hussein was personally responsible for ordering the execution of 148 men after an assassination attempt in 1982 in the town of Dujail.Even Alford has concerns about fairness.
Stuart Alford: I think they have a structure which is capable of delivering a fair trial. And I truly believe that these judges want to deliver a fair trial. Ive no doubt, havingspent the time that I have with them, that they are determined that there is a fair trial. Whether they actually manage to deliver a fair trial, we will have to see once the process has reached its conclusion. Interference from the Iraqi government is clearly a worry and what we have heard over the last 6 weeks or so is troubling. That the first presiding judge resigned - in part because he felt that there was interference. And that's a worry if that is right.
COMM: But he says defendants in big crimes against humanity trials like this often try to disrupt the court to make the proceedings look like a farce.
Stuart: People in this situation will find ways to disrupt the proceedings. In Rwanda, the accused would often disrupt the proceedings, either by sacking their lawyers very regularly, so that the court was always left in a situation where the lawyers were never up to speed with the case. Or making applications which slowed things down. There was one series of application because the food wasnt good enough.
TV studio and technician pix
COMM: At least Iraqis can follow the trial on television and at least in theory - make up their own minds about whether its fair or not.
COMM: That never happened in Saddams time. The coverage which comes through the state broadcaster al-Iraqiya is not quite live theres a 20-minute delay and a few times when the courtroom chaos has got out of hand, the feed has simply been cut.
TV PRESENTER:You'll find all Iraqis glued to their TV sets to see those who ruled them harshly for 35 years being judged by Iraqis in a new Iraq. An Iraq that believes in human rights and in lawful government.
COMM: But in practice, most Iraqis watching have already made up their minds about the trial. Lawyers arguments about fairness and international standards mean nothing in a country on the edge of sectarian civil war. The trial of Saddam Hussein has become just one more issue which divides people on sectarian lines.
COMM: This is Kazimiya, an intensely Shiite Muslim area centred on a big shrine. People here all want Saddam punished for the tens of thousands of victims they say he had tortured, executed and bulldozed alive into mass graves.
SHIA 01: As far Saddam is concerned, I'd like to see him executed. He hurt the Iraqi people, killed many of them. I think he should be executed.
SHIA 02: The current government is serious about this issue and Godwilling Saddam will be executed. What he did to Iraq is not a small thing.
COMM: But across the river Tigris in the Sunni Muslim area of Azamiya, everyone thinks the trial is a farce.
SUNNI 01:President Saddam Hussein is the legitimate president of Iraq, whether they like it or not.
Q:What do you think of this trial?
Sunni 01: This trial is fundamentally false, completely false, because it is based on the force of an occupying power.
COMM: Saddam is a Sunni and by and large, Sunnis did better under his rule than Shites.But many Sunnis hated him and their contempt for the trial now shows how much they feel alienated and marginalised in the new Iraq.
SUNNI 02: There's nothing legal about this trial. Just look at how it keeps getting delayed and postponed. And nobody sees the witnesses. They're all hiding behind curtains. And they keep changing the judges and prosecutors. The lawyers don't even live in Iraq. They're always coming and going. So there's no legitimacy. There's nothing legitimate about this court.
COMM: The trial of a dictator can bring closure and healing to a country. But the trial of Saddam Hussein seems just to be driving Iraqis further apart.