Saddam case lawyer found dead

Iraqi lawyer Saadoun Janabi in the court on Wednesday's opening session of the trial Saddam Hussein. PIcture / Reuters

BAGHDAD - A lawyer involved in the Saddam Hussein trial who was found dead was abducted by armed men in suits and ties who identified themselves as Interior Ministry employees, witnesses said last night.

Their accounts could not be independently checked. The Interior Ministry has repeatedly denied allegations from minority groups that it sanctions hit squads run by Shi'ite militiamen.

An Interior Ministry spokesman said he had no information on the gunmen who kidnapped the lawyer Saadoun Janabi, whom Baghdad lawyers said was an old friend of Saddam himself.

Janabi was representing one of Saddam's co-defendants, former top judge Awad al-Bander.

"We tried to help him but the gunmen told us to get away. They said they were from the Interior Ministry," said Mohammed Ibrahim, who works in the area.

Several witnesses said more than a dozen armed men entered Janabi's office around 8pm on Thursday and dragged him into an SUV vehicle in the rundown Shaab district of Baghdad.

"They hit him over the head with their rifle butts," said Qusay Kamel, another witness, who works in a furniture shop near Janabi's office. "He didn't say anything."

Police said Janabi's bullet-riddled body was found about an hour later.

The Shi'ite-led government and its interior minister have consistently denied condoning attacks on the once dominant Sunni Arab minority and former figures in Saddam's Baath party.

The government spokesman and senior diplomats in Baghdad have conceded, however, that there have been problems with armed, pro-government groups acting as vigilantes against minorities.

- REUTERS