Salem Chalabi said as a first step he will be pushing for the group of 11, who include the likes of Saddam's presidential adviser and first cousin Ali Hassan al-Majid and former vice-president Taha Yassin Ramadan, to be jailed in separate cells as soon as Friday.

"Right now only number one (Saddam) is isolated from the rest," Chalabi told reporters.

"One bad thing for the investigation is when they start coordinating their statements."

Meanwhile, the legal team appointed to represent Saddam by his family said yesterday it had been joined by a daughter of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi as it presses its case for access to its client.

"Dr Aisha Gaddafi is henceforth part of our team as she requested. I have sent her a letter confirming her retention as part of the team," lawyer Mohammed al-Rashdan said.

Rashdan said the team, which has so far been denied entry into Iraq let alone access to its client, had renewed its request with both Iraqi legal and US military authorities.

"We sent a formal request today (Saturday) to the Iraqi Bar Association," he said, adding that a similar request had been sent to US Colonel John Sharvel whom he described as "responsible for lawyers' visits to Iraq."

Rashdan said his team was still receiving death threats for taking on the case of the ousted dictator.

Chalabi explained another reason he is pushing for them to be separated is that isolating the defendants will make it easier to cut plea bargains with them in the event that becomes an option.

"From my meetings with them, they each want to do different deals, one individual in particular is desperate for a deal," said Chalabi.

He cautioned that it was too early to speak about deals while many other former members of the regime remain uncharged.

"What if we work out a deal with someone and it turns out later that he in fact committed crimes," said Chalabi.

Although legal custody of the detainees passed to Iraqis on Wednesday and they were hauled in the dock the next day, Saddam and his henchmen remain guarded by US forces at an undisclosed location.

Chalabi said his immediate tasks over the next few weeks include appointing more judges to the tribunal and finalising its procedures and meeting with each of the defendants separately.

Chalabi refused to be specific on how soon Saddam and the other defendants would be allowed to meet their lawyers.

He said a group of Jordanian lawyers headed by Mohammed Rashdan who have expressed a desire to defend Saddam contacted him about a month ago.

Meanwhile, insurgents attacked an Iraqi checkpoint south of the capital yesterday, killing five national guard soldiers and wounding five more, hospital officials said.

West of Baghdad, a US Marine died of wounds suffered the day before during operations in Anbar province, the military said, giving no other details. The Marine was the fourth to die this month in Anbar, a Sunni-dominated area that includes Fallujah, Ramadi and Qaim that's has been a hotbed of anti-US resistance.

Saboteurs set a southern oil export pipeline ablaze yesterday in the first reported attack on Iraqi oil facilities since the US-British handover to an interim government, an oil official said.

"Fire is raging in the 42-inch pipeline on the Faw Peninsula," he said, referring to one of two pipelines feeding Iraq's export terminals on the Gulf. "It was sabotage."

US-led troops and Iraqi forces have been on alert for any attacks aimed at disrupting the formal transfer of sovereignty.

(Read trial opinion in our Law & Our Rights page)