The Sun newspaper published another picture for its Saturday edition showing Saddam in a white robe behind a coil of barbed wire. He holds his palms outstretched and his head is slightly bowed, possibly in prayer.
(Photo Source: Xinhua/CNN)

Despite outcries from the United States and a threat of legal suit by Saddam Hussein's lawyers, Britain's tabloid newspaper The Sun ran new photos Saturday after publishing controversial pictures of the former Iraqi president Friday.

The new photos show a fully dressed Saddam in a white robe-like garment at a prison compound. He is behind barbed wires in one of the pictures.

The newspaper also ran photos of two top officials of the former Iraqi regime, who were identified as Ali Hassan al-Majid, better known as "Chemical Ali," and Huda Salih Mahdi Ammash dubbed "Mrs Anthrax."

The newspaper carried an article alongside the photos in vindication of the controversial publication.

"This is a man who has murdered a minimum of 300,000 people and we're supposed to feel sorry for him because someone's taken his picture? " asked the article written by the newspaper's defense editor, Tom Newton Dunn.

"Our extraordinary photos yesterday of Saddam in jail got the whole world talking - and wooly-minded liberals into a predictable lather. They bleated on about infringing his rights - apparently forgetting who this depraved monster is," said the article.

It is "an important news story the world deserves to know," it said.

On Friday, the newspaper ran pictures of Saddam wearing only his underpants and doing washing.

Graham Dudman, managing editor of the newspaper, said Friday's pictures are a "fantastic, iconic set of news pictures that I defy any newspaper, magazine, or television station who were presented with them not to have published."

The newspaper said it obtained those pictures from a US military source who hoped to deal a "body blow" to Iraq's insurgency.

It vowed to fight any legal action after Saddam's chief lawyer threatened to sue it for one million US dollars.

Ziyad Khasawneh, head of Saddam's international defense team, said Friday it would sue The Sun and those providing the photos to the newspaper.

It is a "devaluation of the dignity of human rights and against the Geneva Convention and international laws," he said.

The US military said it would "aggressively" investigate the issue, questioning the troops guarding Saddam and prosecuting the culprit if discovered. The White House also condemned the publication of the photos.

It is suspected that the photographer was a prison guard who took the pictures a year ago.

The 68-year-old former Iraqi leader has been in US custody since he was captured in December 2003. He is facing trial on numerous charges, including murdering rivals, gassing Iraqi Kurds and using violence to suppress uprisings.