Key witness in Saddam case dies of cancer

Wadah Ismael Al-Sheik died on Oct. 27, four days after talking to court officials, said Jafaar al-Mousawi, the main prosecutor. He said the testimony at a US detention centre was "on the side of the victims."

Al-Sheik, was a senior Iraqi intelligence officer at the time of the Dujail massacre in 1982 that Saddam and seven other co-defendants are charged with. The trial is set to resume on Monday.

If convicted, the Saddam and the others could face the death penalty for their role in the killing of 148 people from the mainly Shiite town of Dujail north of Baghdad after a failed attempt on Saddam's life.

In violence Thursday, a suicide bomber blew up his car outside a hospital south of Baghdad while U.S. troops handed out candy and food to children, killing 30 people and wounding about 40, including four Americans.

Three women and two children were among the dead in the attack outside the hospital in Mahmoudiya, 20 miles south of Baghdad in the "triangle of death" notorious for attacks on Shiite Muslims, U.S. troops and foreign travellers.