Mutalib Mohammed Salman, a 78-year-old man in traditional Kurdish headdress, told the court how he and his fellow villagers were rounded up during the 1988 'Anfal' campaign and shipped off to a desert prison in southern Iraq.

"One day I counted 20 dead bodies as I went over to see two of my relatives in the prison after I heard that they were sick," he told the court in Kurdish. "When I reached them, I found them dead."

Salman said at least 30 prisoners were dying each day because of a lack of water and food on top of deteriorating health conditions and regular beatings by guards. "They were giving just two pieces of bread for each," he said.

The defendants listened quietly to the testimony, in contrast to often rowdy behavior that has seen Saddam ejected nearly every court session. At one point last week, a defendant struck a bailiff before being bodily thrown out.

One of the biggest points of contention between the defendants and the court may finally have been resolved, however, when the judge began the trial by agreeing to a request from a defendant to allow the return of their legal team.

For the past month, the defense team has boycotted the trial in protest at alleged interference by the Iraqi government, and Judge Mohammed al-Oreibi al-Khalifah has assigned seven court-appointed lawyers to conduct the defence.

"Your honor we talked to our lawyers and they want to attend," said former defence minister Sultan Hashim al-Tai, who sits next to Saddam in the dock. "It is in our benefit for them to attend."

After the judge agreed to the request -- likely to take effect later in the week -- testimony resumed on atrocities allegedly committed in the Anfal campaign which prosecutors say killed 182,000 Kurds in death camps, bombings and gas attacks.

Salman ended his testimony with a plaintive call familiar to the ears of court observers: "I demand Saddam to tell me about the fate of my relatives, the 33 of my relatives who were 'Anfalized'," he said.

The former Iraqi president and his co-defendants insist the operation was a legitimate military campaign against separatist guerrillas and fighters who sided with Iran, with which Iraq was at war during the 1980s.

Events outside the courtroom in recent days, meanwhile, have rivalled the unfolding drama within its walls.

On Monday, the brother of chief prosecutor Munqith al-Faroon was murdered in front of his wife while returning to pick up some possessions from the west Baghdad home they had abandoned amid the sectarian strife rocking the capital.

Saddam himself, who protested in the last session about the judge's tendency to cut off his microphone whenever he starts discussing political matters, made himself heard in a letter transmitted by his lawyer Monday.

The former dictator weighed in on the brutal sectarian struggle convulsing much of the nation and called on Iraqis to focus on the true enemy.

"Do not forget that your goal is to liberate your country from the invaders and their followers and is not a settling of accounts outside this goal," he said.

Saddam and his cousin Ali Hassan al-Majid, a former military commander who became notorious for anti-Kurd gas attacks as "Chemical Ali," are accused of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.

The five others are charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity, and all seven accused face the death penalty if convicted.

The Iraqi High Tribunal itself has finally set a November 5 date for the verdict in Saddam's earlier trial for crimes against humanity in the devastation of the Shiite village of Dujail and more than 140 killings in the 1980s.