Chemical Ali and his five co-defendants, who face the death penalty if found guilty of slaughtering 182,000 Kurdish villagers in the 1980s, were all present as the court convened for the second time since Saddam's hanging.

Defendants had previously refused to occupy Saddam's former seat at the front of the dock, but on Thursday his cousin and defence minister Ali Hassan al-Majid, dubbed Chemical Ali for allegedly gassing Kurds, took it up.

The defendants arrived after the court readjusted the seats, lining them up in three rows with Majid and Hussein Rashid al-Tikriti, former deputy chief of operations in the armed forces, in the front row.

Prosecutors said they would present video tape evidence which they said proved the guilt of the defendants in massacring Kurds.

On Monday, the Iraqi High Tribunal in Baghdad dropped its charges against Saddam after he went to the gallows on December 30, executed for crimes against humanity for killing 148 Shiite villagers in 1982.

The case centres on the killing of 182,000 Kurdish villagers during the so-called Anfal campaign between 1987 and 1988.

All six remaining defendants have been charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity, which carries the ultimate penalty of death, and meticulously carrying out military attacks against the Kurds, some using chemical weapons.

The accused say the campaign was a vital counter-insurgency operation against Kurdish guerrillas who sided with the enemy during Iraq's devastating 1980-88 war with Iran.

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