Iraq's top court is due to return verdicts on Wednesday against Saddam Hussein's hatchetman "Chemical Ali" Hassan al-Majid and former deputy premier Tareq Aziz on charges of crimes against humanity.
Majid and Aziz, 73, and six other defendants have been charged over the 1992 murders of 42 Baghdad traders in a trial that opened in April last year. They risk the death penalty if found guilty.
The hearing at the Iraqi High Tribunal in Baghdad's highly fortified Green Zone was scheduled to begin at 11 am (0800 GMT) but was delayed, an AFP reporter at the court said.
The charges relate to the killing of merchants in Baghdad who were accused of speculating on food prices when the country was under punishing UN sanctions imposed after its invasion of Kuwait in 1990.
Wednesday's hearing follows a verdict delivered by the court on March 2 that condemned Majid to his third death sentence over the murder of Shiite Muslims 10 years ago.
However, the court acquitted Aziz, who was Saddam's spokesman to the outside world, on the same charges of crimes against humanity.
Majid was first sentenced to death in June 2007 for genocide after ordering the deaths of tens of thousands of Kurds during the 1988 Anfal campaign, when Iraqi forces strafed villages with poison gas, the source of his grim nickname.
He was also given a second death penalty for war crimes and crimes against humanity over a bloody crackdown on Shiites during their ill-fated uprising after the 1991 Gulf War.
He and Aziz, whose acquittal on March 2 was the first verdict from four trials in which he is a defendant, are also accused of displacing and killing about 2,000 clansmen of Kurdish regional president Massud Barzani.
The two men, along with former interior minister Watban Ibrahim Hassan and Saddam's private secretary Abed Hamud, are among 16 former officials on trial for a brutal 1980s campaign against Shiite Kurds.
They are accused of using members of the Fayli Kurdish community as guinea pigs for chemicals weapons testing and as human shields during Iraq's war with neighbouring Iran from 1980 to 1988.
Aziz, the only Christian in Saddam's inner circle, has said he was proud to have been a member of the now disbanded Baath party.
He has also stated that could not be held responsible for the charges against him in the deaths of the Baghdad merchants.
He turned himself in to US forces in April 2003 after Saddam's regime was overthrown, but his son last year complained that he was being held in very bad conditions in custody and was suffering from a variety of ailments.
Chemical Ali, a former defence minister and cousin of the executed dictator, has shown no remorse for his part in the crimes for which he stands accused.

Last year I started a blog about the late leader of Iraq, Saddam Hussein. This post is not going to deal with his policies or his personality. Plenty of apocryphal stories have circulated about the man over the years. For close to 15 years he was under the public microscope in my country. President Bush, Sr. presented him to the public as a ruthless tyrant after the invasion of Kuwait in 1991. President Clinton occasionally bombed his country on the quiet and maintained crippling sanctions there during his 8 years in the White House. Finally, the current president gave the final death blow to Saddam and his country. Iraq is still limping along though all the focus right now is on another tragic region of the Middle East. We should try to never forget what has happened to Iraq. When the first Gulf War was in its’ infancy, I remember seeing American born Queen Noor of Jordan speak up for the Iraqis on television. She said that the problem between Kuwait and Iraq was a private conflict between those two countries and that others (namely the U.S.) should not interfere. Other countries in the region that was closer in culture and outlook should be the ones to try and calm the situation. Her husband, the late King Hussein, had been a close friend of President Saddam Hussein. I believe she was very correct in her statement. Think of the innocent Iraqis who would be alive today if two wars and years of brutal sanctions had not been applied against them.As for apocryphal or false stories, the last big one was Saddam Hussein being an ally of al-Qaeda. Why would a man who had fought a war for 8 years against Islamic fundamentalists in Iran team up in his mature years with a bunch of young thugs who hated everything he stood for? Saddam Hussein was obviously very secular. He did not have the women in his immediate family cover up in hijabs. The little details like that are important. Saddam was a socialist, secularist, and an Arab nationalist. It never set right with me, but it was sold to the American public that he had hooked up with the terrorists. This was done in such a way that most people, not knowing any facts about Iraq and its’ leader, bought it hook, line, and sinker. The propagandists won. Iraq lost. Saddam found himself on a scaffold on December 30, 2006. He was 70 according to his nephew, not 69 at the time of his death. The man died bravely, which I doubt others who rush into war and other kinds of madness would have done.Love him or hate him, it must be said that Saddam Hussein was gutsy, brave, and strikingly handsome in his young years. Even in his final three years in prison, he wasn’t bad looking for a man who was old by Middle Eastern standards. If one looks on the internet world opinion about the man is evenly split. Some hate him passionately and others love him just as much. There are Facebook groups for people who love, hate, or poke fun at him. There are YouTube videos honoring him. I decided I wanted to do research and explore the less negative aspects of the man. Therefore I began a blog called Saddam Hussein…Need I Say More.Al-Hussain, his nephew, found my blog either in the spring or summer last year. He told me later that he did his best to hunt me down, even finding my CV on an ESL employment site and my old AOL address. Last July, I came home from shopping one Saturday afternoon to see a message on my Saddam blog saying that he found it strange that an American would create a blog dedicated to his uncle, and that I did not think like most Americans. I had taken a neutral stance on his uncle in my writing. I wanted to present little known facts that I had gleamed from the internet. I had even included a video of his highly emotional funeral in al-Awja, Iraq and a video of his body lying in an ambulance after his execution. The blog is still extant, but I have closed it to the public. I started to delete it, but Al-Hussain told me not to.Of course, I felt this Al-Hussain might be playing a prank, but I also felt in my gut that he might actually be Saddam Hussain’s nephew. He was and still is a blogger. At the time he had his blog blocked off from public access. He told me that he would never forgive himself if I and my family got into trouble because we communicated. We e-mailed each other and he gave me and a blogger whom I used to communicate with the password to his blog. I hesitated to talk to and e-mail him at first. It took me a few weeks to say to myself, ‘Hey it might not hurt. The guy might really be Saddam’s nephew. The worst that could happen is Homeland Security might come knocking at my door, or I might be put on the no fly list.’ Fortunately, none of that happened.On his blog al-Hussain had written two posts about his uncle. (The two posts can be read here and here on his current blog.) He then deleted his blog for some reason. Later he started another blog that was public, but under a false name. This blog was about a personal crisis of the heart and emotional matters. In the mean time we had began to chat regularly about everything from his uncle to Iraq to his emotional battles in life. He told me that he would reveal proof that he was who he said he was. I beat him to it because I began to do research using his mother’s name and his father’s. His father was one of Saddam Hussein’s personal bodyguards. One of the many things we have in common besides an interest in writing, books, and strong emotions, is a love for surfing the internet for information. Hussain, as he told me to call him, said that he would show me a photo of his mother and his uncle Saddam on the webcam. He also said that he would show me some of the letters his uncle sent to his family, while in being held by US forces, with the Red Cross symbol on it. Before he did, I found this photo on a website called Day Life. It is at Hussain’s family’s home in a Gulf State that I will not name. Later Hussain sent me photos of the same room. Shortly afterwards he showed the room to me on the webcam.I cannot the describe the feeling I experienced one day when we were chatting and he was in a room and on the mantle were photos of what seemed to be Barzan Ibrahim, who was Saddam Hussein’s half brother who was executed a few weeks after him. I recognized a photo of Saddam Hussein’s mother whom I had seen in some books about her son. Then there was a photo I asked Hussain to move closer. It was of Saddam Hussein and a woman, whom Hussain said was his mother. He had told me about the photo and had promised to show it to me. I was floored again.Though we are from very different cultures and are different genders, I have told Hussain that he is a male version of me when I was in my 20s. There is a 21 year age difference between us, but Hussain says that in 25 years he feels like someone who is about 80. The current war in Iraq actually started on his birthday.Hussain was actually closer to his uncle Barzan whom he resembles more than his uncle Saddam. Saddam was his mother’s older half brother. When Hussain grew hair and a beard last year, he resembled his uncle while he was in prison. He also bears a resemblance to Saddam’s two younger daughter’s Rana and Hala. Rana is here to the right in the top photo. Hala is in the photo below with her mother and sisters. She is the young woman on the left. When I began my blog about these two women’s father, I had naively hoped in the back my mind that Hala might find it. The reason is because I had read that she had been Saddam’s favorite and that she was a very kind person. Hussain verified that Hala was indeed a very nice person. He became close to her when they were all staying in a house together during the first stages of the current war. He said that he and Hala loved to eat, talk, and joke together. She lives in the same country where he does with her mother, but because of a family conflict they have not seen each other for some time. He told me that if they ever are close again, he will put her on the webcam so I can see her. Hala’s husband is still being held by US forces even though he turned himself in at the start of the war and had no political role.Over the months, especially last summer, Hussain and I have had deep discussions on everything to our personal lives to controversial issues such as whether his uncle was a dictator or not to whether I believe Muslims are infidels or not. We occasionally text message each other now that I am in Turkey.Hussain’s English is perfect. We have spoken over the microphone many times and his accent is what he describes as a mix of American, British, and French tones. I think he has a rather smooth and soothing voice.Hussain has criticized me for being too nice, but at the same time I think he appreciates my kindness and compassion. He says that he is sure his uncle Saddam would have liked me. Over the summer months I have shared family photos and videos of his uncle’s family that I discovered online with him. He was not aware that one of the four novels that his uncle wrote was translated into English and could be bought on Amazon.com. When I told him, he said that no one had given anyone permission to translate and sell his uncle’s work online. The novel Zabibah and the King was his uncle’s story about the love he bore for his second wife, Samira Shahbandar. His uncle’s writings were the only thing left of him, he said. For some American guy to have it translated and sell it was like “stealing his uncle’s soul.”When I shared some of the top blogs of other Iraqis with Hussain, I think he was excited, but he noticed that few of them had any praise for his uncle. He was doubtful that the blog Iraqi Blog Count would list his, but I told him they should because even though he was in exile, Iraq was his country and his new blog which he had started publicly was worth getting recognition. No long afterwards his blog was added to Iraq Blog Count on October 1st of last year. I was so proud for him. Then one day after I had finished a class, I received a text message from him that someone at the BBC had found his blog. He had long said that he did not seek fame and did not want journalists to start hanging around his family’s house. He claimed that he was “SO scared.” I doubted that he was. He then admitted that he was not. Actually he was quite pleased. Since that time he has been listed on the website of at least one Arab blogger that I know of. His blog has been on mine for some time now. Hussain’s blog once bore the simple title, Al-Hussain’s Blog like it is listed on mine. He has recently given it a more grandiose title. He always says he is nothing like his uncle Saddam, but I see some similarities.His blog can be accessed here. He can be controversial, so be careful. He even gives a disclaimer. Two of my favorite posts of his are Speculations for the Next Decades and Iraq Needs a Dictator.
Hussain and I have developed a very fun and affectionate friendship. I even call him "little bro"" at times and he has called me "baby girl." We don't always agree on things, but real friendship is when you do not have to always agree. Real friendship is about love and respect. I feel honored, and I have told him so, that we are friends. I also wanted to share a photo taken in Ramallah in the West Bank. It can be accessed here. I think you might find it quite surprising and unusual.