Is Insurgency Thriving Since Zarqawi?

Soldiers Mutilated, Dozens Kidnapped, Saddam's Lawyer Killed

(CBS/AP)  Married with six children, al-Obeidi was the third member of Saddam's defense team to be killed since the trial began Oct. 19.

In the Saddam trial, Al-Dulaimi and his colleagues said the brutal slaying was an attempt to intimidate the defense before it begins final arguments July 10, a process that will take about 10 days.

"We consider his killing a message to us in the defense: 'To continue what you are doing will result in death in broad daylight on the streets of Baghdad.' It is a message that's written in blood," said Mohammed Moneib, an Egyptian lawyer retained by Saddam.

Chief prosecutor Jaafar al-Moussawi said the trial would continue.

"We will defy terrorism," al-Moussawi told The Associated Press. "We will continue with the trial and will not be deterred," he said. The prosecution has demanded the death penalty for Saddam in the killing of 148 Shiites during a crackdown against the town of Dujail in the 1980s.

Despite the killing, Saddam's lawyers said they would forge ahead with their closing arguments.

However, al-Dulaimi told the AP in Amman, Jordan, that Saddam and his co-defendants "went on a hunger strike today to protest the killing of Khamis al-Obeidi."

"They pledged not to end the strike until international protection is provided to the defense team," he said.

State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli said "every form of protection and assistance" is offered to the prosecution and defense, but "unfortunately, in the case of this individual, he refused" them.

The U.S. Embassy urged the lawyers and their families to "accept the full range of security measures offered for their protection."

"We are committed to helping the Iraqi government bring those responsible to justice," Ereli said.

A spokeswoman for Amnesty International said both Iraqi and U.S.-led coalition authorities need to investigate the assassination.

The kidnapping of the 85 workers north of Baghdad was only the most recent case involving mass abductions.

Police said it was unclear why gunmen seized the workers as they left the al-Nasr General Complex, a former military plant that now makes metal doors, windows and pipes, but noted that the assailants apparently looked at their captives' identity cards. In Iraq, it is often possible to determine someone's ethnic, sectarian and tribal affiliation from their names. The workers were thought to be mostly Shiite, while the plant is located in Taji, a predominantly Sunni Arab area with insurgent activity.

Kamel Mohammed, a plant engineer, said he saw gunmen in three sedans intercept two of the factory's buses and a minivan. The buses are used to ferry workers from the plant to the Shiite areas of Baghdad.

An al Qaeda-led insurgent group said in a Web statement that it has decided to kill four Russian Embassy workers kidnapped in Baghdad on June 3. It said Moscow failed to meet its demands for a full withdrawal of troops from Chechnya.

The statement by the Mujahedeen Shura Council came a day after the same group claimed responsibility for killing two U.S. soldiers whose bodies were found south of Baghdad.

At least one and possibly both of the soldiers was beheaded, a U.S. military official in Washington said Wednesday. The official requested anonymity because the final report on the bodies' conditions has not been formally released.