Saturday, October 22 2005 14:04 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Baghdad: Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari has ruled out transferring the trial of toppled dictator Saddam Hussein outside the country.

"The process is a purely Iraqi affair, which should take place on the (Iraqi) territory and it is out of the question to transfer it anywhere else," Jaafari told reporters after breaking the Ramadan fast yesterday (Oct 21, 2005) night.

"The idea of such a transfer should not even enter our heads," he said.

Jaafari suggested that the murder of the lawyer of a co-defendant of Saddam Hussein, who was kidnapped just a day after the opening of the former Iraqi dictator's trial over a massacre of Shiites, could be aimed at getting the trial moved out of Iraq.

"They wanted perhaps, through this act, to achieve this objective," he said.

"They think that in acting in this way, they can pose a challenge to the court and let it be known that the lawyer was killed because he was defending one of the officials of the former regime," he said.

The body of the lawyer, Saadoun Janabi, an attorney for Awad Hamad al-Bandar al-Sadun, one of Saddam's seven co-defendants, was found with bullet wounds to the head in the impoverished northern Baghdad neighborhood of Ur yesterday. Saddam and co-defendants went on trial Wednesday for crimes against humanity over a 1982 murder of almost 150 Shiites.

Jaafari expressed 'surprise' at the adjournment of the hearing to November 28 so that witnesses could be questioned about the massacre.

"We have waited a long time to hold the trial and we do not understand why it has been adjourned to such a late date," he said.