Defending the devil

Saddam’s lawyers keep getting bumped off:

Gunmen killed a second defense lawyer acting in Saddam Hussein’s trial on Tuesday, renewing questions over whether the former president can get a fair trial amid Iraq’s daily violence.

Another defense lawyer was slightly wounded in the attack on their car in Baghdad, police and defense team sources said.

The shooting followed the murder of another defense lawyer who was shot the day after the televised start of proceedings on October 19.

Meanwhile in Germany, it turns out that Holocaust denier Ernst Zundel’s lawyer was disbarred and jailed for – what else? – inciting racial hatred:

Judge Ulrich Meinerzhagen ruled that Horst Mahler, a disbarred lawyer associated with the violent far-left Red Army Faction in the 1970s who has since become a supporter of far-right and anti-Semitic ideas, could not be part of the defense team.

He also dismissed Zuendel’s publicly appointed defender Sylvia Stolz on the grounds that Mahler’s ideas were reflected in her written submissions to the court.

Mahler, whose license to practice as a lawyer was withdrawn last year, was sentenced to nine months in prison in January for inciting racial hatred.

One of the cornerstones of a free and fair justice system is the right of everyone – including the most despicable excuses for human beings – to a fair trial and to a competent defense.

Now, Zundel made the decision himself to hire an incompetent defense lawyer, and his trial will surely continue once he has secured new representation. Germany’s legal system has provisions for this, and Zundel will be tried – and likely convicted and punished appropriately.

But Iraq is not Germany, and the notion of an impartial judiciary there is extremely shaky. Saddam’s trial was never going to be anything other than a political circus – but it was also supposed to have important symbolism to the people of Iraq that a judicial system can work. Unfortunately, that’s not working out so well.