Saddam Hussein is awaiting the verdict in another trial

A former Kurdish guerrilla told the court of the deadly aftermath of what he said was a chemical attack carried out by the then Iraqi leader's forces.

Katherine Elias Mikhail described how people fell to the ground, vomiting and in pain, after a bombing raid in 1987.

The prosecution says that up to 180,000 civilians were killed during the Anfal campaign against Iraqi Kurds.

Saddam Hussein was present in court along with his cousin, Ali Hassan al-Majid. Both men are accused of genocide.

Vomiting

Ms Mikhail told the court she was a Kurdish peshmerga guerrilla in the Kurdish areas of northern Iraq when Iraqi forces bombed the mountainous region with chemical weapons.

Now a writer who lives in the US, Ms Mikhail denounced Saddam Hussein and Mr Majid - whose nickname in Iraq is Chemical Ali - as those responsible for the campaign.

She also criticised the international companies which she said had provided the Iraqi regime with chemical weapons.

Challenged by Mr Majid, Ms Mikhail described how planes carrying chemical bombs had attacked peshmerga bases and Kurdish villages.

"I saw hundreds of people - not dozens but hundreds. They were vomiting and their eyes were watering," she said.

Iraqi flag

Mr Majid interjected often, asking technical military questions.

Saddam Hussein said he inherited the Iraqi flag

But Saddam Hussein restricted his defence to one long intervention, saying he had never been opposed to the Kurds.

But he also attacked the present Kurdish leader, Massoud Barzani, for provoking a national debate over the flag.

Mr Barzani says that the Iraqi flag should not be raised over government buildings in the Kurdish region.

But the former Iraqi dictator said that it was not his flag. It had been inherited.

Awaiting sentence

The trial was adjourned until Tuesday.

All the defendants face charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. They could face the death penalty if convicted.

Saddam Hussein and seven other defendants have already been tried for the killing of 148 Shias in Dujail in 1982.

A verdict is due in October.