[JURIST] The Iraqi High Tribunal [official website] heard closing arguments Sunday from defense lawyers in the genocide trial [JURIST news archive; BBC trial timeline] of Ali Hassan al-Majid [JURIST news archive] and other former officials in the Saddam Hussein [JURIST news archive] regime. Al-Majid - Hussein's cousin known in the Western media as "Chemical Ali" - and his co-defendants are being tried for their alleged involvement in the slaughter of tens of thousands of Kurds by using nerve agents and mustard gas during the so-called "Anfal campaign" [HRW backgrounder]. Earlier Sunday co-defendant Sultan Hashim Ahmad al-Tai, a former Hussein defense minister who was an Iraqi Army corps commander at the time of Anfal, testified that he had had no access to chemical weapons and had received no orders to use them, echoing testimony from previous defense witnesses [JURIST report]. Prosecutors have sought the death penalty [JURIST report] for Al-Majid and three other defendants and have asked that charges be dropped against one of the six total defendants due to lack of evidence. Al-Majid became the leading defendant [JURIST report] in the trial following Hussein's execution [JURIST report] last year.

According to defense lawyer Giovanni Di Stefano [firm website], previously one of Hussein's lawyers, the defendants are waiting for the court to rule on several motions, including a motion challenging the legality of the indictments [DOC text] and a motion calling for exhumations [DOC text] of the deceased killed during Anfal to allow for forensic testing. In a statement to JURIST, Di Stefano said:

I have filed a submission in order that the Defence is able to obtain its own independent forensic pathologist and toxicologist. The indictments claim that the victims were murdered using chemical weapons. No post mortum or autopsy reports have been furnished to the defence (and Court) proving that anyone died from chemical attacks. It was and remains unconceded that any such deaths occurred without proper admissible evidence. I have requested the court to permit the Defence to exhume victims and to be examined by a forensic pathologist. No response has been forthcoming from the Court.

I have filed a submission to be permitted for the defence to examine documents held by the Iraqi Survey Group and the FBI in its storage facilities in Qatar. No response has been forthcoming from the Court.

I have provided the Court with two documents [DOC text] from many of an exculpatory basis for Saddam Hussein which clearly show that Saddam Hussein ordered no chemical attacks or weapons to be used. He further ordered that villages be 'relocated' not destroyed as the documents show. It was for this reason that there was a rush to execution of Saddam Hussein as I would have introduced these and more documents in my possession to the court.

Finally, we have filed submissions regarding the vagueness of the indictments. How can anyone defend what I term a 'carte blanche indictment'? Iraq was accused of cheating at football but in this case the Iraqi High tribunal with the current form of the indictments have created a 'perpetual moving goalpost' to ensure the Defence is always hindered. I am well aware that in the Anfal case three defendants will be sentenced to death, one to imprisonment and one set free. It has been made crystal clear. Yet despite such all involved regardless of the sever handicaps and unfairness will simply proceed to do our best. Both Dujail and Anfal are being held in grossly unfair and unsafe conditions. It is for these reasons that I am prosecuting Judge Rahman in the UK and will do the same to any Judge in any jurisdiction if unfair conditions are imposed on the defence.

[JURIST] Suspended Pakistan Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry [official website; JURIST news archive] appeared Sunday to raise the stakes in his defense against President Pervez Musharraf's charges of abusing authority, telling tens of thousands of supporters at a Lahore rally that the "Era of dictatorship is over" and that "It is the responsibility of the courts to defend human rights of the people and protect the constitution." He told the crowd - which included many lawyers [Daily Times report] in the nation's leading legal center - that in standing up for the independence of the judiciary they were campaigning for "supremacy of the constitution and rule of law" and declared that "God will definitely give us success in this struggle." A provincial chief minister who supports Musharraf told a local TV station that Chaudhry's speech had changed the character of the confrontation between the two, definitively moving it out of the legal arena; it is clear, he said, "that this campaign has become political." AFP has more. Meanwhile in Sindh province, Musharraf himself sought to damp down any further challenge to his authority, saying in reference to ongoing disciplinary proceeding against Chaudhry that he wanted to give lawyers "a warning that their designs will not succeed, because they need the people on their side....I want to tell these lawyers, don't get into politics, and live peaceably, let the Supreme Judicial Council decide the reference in a constitutional way." The Hindu has more

Chaudhry was technically made "non-functional" [JURIST report] by a March 9 presidential order. No specifics were provided at the time of his suspension but documents subsequently disclosed [JURIST report] suggest he was officially removed on suspicion of misusing his influence to get his son jobs and promotions. Lawyers and opposition leaders critical of the move say, however, that the suspension was an assault on the independence of the country's judiciary and an indirect bid by Musharraf to continue his eight-year rule in an election year.

[JURIST] A report [DOC; press release] released Sunday by Israeli human rights groups B'Tselem and the HaMoked Centre for the Defence of the Individual [advocacy websites] says that the members of the Israeli security services routinely maltreat Palestinian detainees during interrogations and in some cases even "torture" them, as that term is defined by international law. The report was based on a survey of 73 Palestinian residents of the West Bank who were arrested between July 2005 and January 2006 and interrogated by the Israeli Security Agency . Sixty-six percent of them reported they had been subjected to "beatings, painful binding, swearing, humiliation and denial of basic needs" in the time between their arrest and their incarceration. "Ticking bombs" believed to have critical that could percent attacks were treated most harshly, and were subjected to extensive sleep deprivation and physical abuses. The joint report additionally concluded that Israel's "State Attorney's Office covers up these illegal acts, thereby assisting in the breach of international law and of High Court of Justice's prohibitions."

Israel's Ministry of Justice [official website, in Hebrew] issued a statement Sunday saying that the rights survey was based on a limited sample and contained errors and misinformation. B'Tselem acknowledged that it was "not a representative sample", but insisted that "it does provide a valid indication of the frequency of the reported phenomena." AFP has more.

[JURIST] The government of Ecuador has set up a truth commission [declaration and articles, in Spanish] to investigate rights abuses committed in the country beginning in the early 1980s, a period that includes the 1984-88 presidency of right wing politician León Febres Cordero [Wikipedia profile]. The four-member commission, announced Thursday by current leftist President Rafael Correa [personal website] and Interior Minister Gustavo Larrea, is comprised of a lawyer, two human rights activists, and a member who lost two sons who were apparently "disappeared" during the regime of Febres Cordero. Correa said the commission was intended to "halt impunity;" it will explore some 327 unsolved cases of disappearance, torture and political assassination.

The commission follows in the wake of others recently established in Guatemala, Peru and Chile to address wrongs and abuses committed during recent "dirty wars" and harsh regimes. AP has more.