In another setback to the Saddam Hussein case, a defense lawyer who was wounded in an ambush that killed one of his colleagues said Tuesday he had fled Iraq and was seeking asylum in the Gulf state of Qatar.

Thamir al-Khuzaie represented two of Saddam’s seven co-defendants in the trial, which is scheduled to resume Nov. 28. He spoke on condition that his current location outside Iraq not be reported.

“I was only a lawyer who practiced his profession in Iraq. Yet I was subjected to an assassination attempt and to danger that might have even touched my family,” al-Khuzaie told The Associated Press by telephone. “So I decided to leave the country.”

Al-Khuzaie was injured in a Nov. 8 ambush in western Baghdad in which another defense lawyer, Adel al-Zubeidi, was killed. Al-Zubeidi was the second defense lawyer involved in the case to be assassinated since the trial opened Oct. 19.

Al-Khuzaie insisted that he was simply practicing his profession and did not take the case because of his own political views. He represented former Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan and Saddam’s half brother, Barzan Ibrahim.