Eid al-Adha: a time for Iraq to remember its war dead
Umm Issam, 51, believes that her husband, who was killed during the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and was buried in the Wadi al-Salaam cemetery in Najaf, 160 kilometers (100 miles) south of Baghdad, “expects” her every Eid. He would be sad if she were late to visit. About two years ago, Umm Issam could not make it on time to weep and pray at his gr…
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Terrorists dress as women to escape capture
Recent incidents in which gunmen – some affiliated with al-Qaeda-- disguised themselves as women in order to avoid capture by security forces are an abuse of Iraqi society's respect for women, Iraqi officials and women's organisations say. Iraqi police captured three wanted men disguised as women on February 12th as they tried to pass throug…
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Maliki Wields 'De-Baathification' In Iraqi Power Struggle
Nouri Al-Maliki The former members of the dissolved Iraqi Baath party have become a point of contention in the conflicts between Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his rivals. According to the de-Baathification Law, which was issued by the former administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority of Iraq, Paul Bremer, members of the Baath …
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Iraq hostage to sectarian forces
Iraqi Sunni Muslims take part in an anti-government demonstration in Falluja, 50 km (31 miles) west of Baghdad, February 22, 2013. Thousands of Sunni Muslims protested after Friday prayers in huge rallies against Shi'ite Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, demanding that he step down. The Iraqi National Alliance is facing a series of crises. It se…
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The new and scary face of Iraqi sectarianism
Wathiq Al-Battat, the leader of the “Mukhtar Army,” an armed Shiite militia belonging to Iraq’s Hezbollah, is “the new face on the Iraqi scene,” according to Dubai-based news channel Al-Arabiya. Battat on Saturday threatened to strike Saudi Arabia and to bomb the Mubarak seaport in Kuwait, which he accused of encroaching into Iraqi territory. I…
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Vets feel 'alone' in their guilt
A veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, former Marine Capt. Timothy Kudo thinks of himself as a killer — and he carries the guilt every day. "I can't forgive myself," he says. "And the people who can forgive me are dead." With American troops at war for more than a decade, there's been an unprecedented number of st…
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Iraq Ten Years On: What You Don’t Hear!
As 2013 marks the tenth anniversary of the Iraq invasion, I feel there are some points of focus which the media and campaigners need to address, if they wish to provide substance, to any area of serious discussion. Children, like many other civilians, are the silent victims of violence in war-torn Iraq, with the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs …
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Child Protection needed for 16 Million
In a news release to commemorate the Day of the Iraqi Child, the UN Children’s Fund (UUNICEF) representative in Iraq, Marzio Babille, stated that “UNICEF remains very concerned about the continuing grave violations committed against children in Iraq and calls on all actors to cease indiscriminate acts of violence that harm children.” According to th…
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Syrian conflict settles old scores
Iraqis with old vendettas have taken advantage of the chaos and instability in Syria to pursue Iraqi refugees there, with a string of kidnappings in recent months, according to an official with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR). “We’ve seen a rise in serious protection incidents,” said Paul Stromberg, deputy representative of the UNCHR in Syria. “There …
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Tony Blair Re-invents Himself
Even by the standards of a seemingly increasingly partisan British media, the decision to invite Tony Blair to Guest Edit the London Evening Standard on 27th June, the fifth anniversary of his leaving office was, well, bizarre. The Standard (established1827) gained early eminence for its detailed foreign news. Within little over forty years of its f…
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Refugees can’t be forced home
A new policy in Iraq has forced Denmark to stop its practice of repatriating Iraqi refugees against their will. Thousands of Iraqis fled their country to Europe after the US-led invasion in 2003. Since 2009, the numbers of Iraqi asylum seekers in Danish refugee centres has fallen drastically because many of them have been repatriated. But the gove…
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Suicide bomber kills in northern Iraq
At least three people were killed and 15 wounded on Thursday when a suicide bomber blew himself up in a barber's shop popular with police in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, police and hospital sources said. The attack is the latest and a wave of bombings across the country in recent weeks which have raised fears that Iraq could slip back into secta…
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Iraqis face future of fear
Whenever he leaves his home, Mohammed Jabar, a Sunni Muslim, carries his cellphone so his family can find out quickly whether he is safe if a deadly bomb attack hits. Shukria Mahmud, another Sunni, rarely ventures from her house because of the rash of violence that is gripping Iraq. Laith Hashim, a young Shiite Muslim, is considering moving away from…
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Iraq violence grinds on
Iraqi authorities say bombs have killed four people in two cities as violence continues to surge six months after the last American troops withdrew. A provincial official says three coordinated bombs exploded within minutes Sunday morning in the central city of Tikrit, 130 kilometers (80 miles) north of Baghdad. One civilian walking by died and two …
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Iraq violence surges
A half year after the U.S. military left Iraq, dire predictions seem to be coming true: The country is mired in violence and the government is on the verge of collapsing. With no relief in sight, there’s growing talk of Iraq as a failed state as al-Qaida’s local wing staged near daily attacks that killed at least 234 people in June. Iraq no longer s…
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11 killed in 2 Iraq bombings
Two bomb blasts nearly 150 kilometers apart killed 11 people Monday night, officials said, as Iraq's death toll continued to climb in the second bloodiest month since U.S. troops withdrew late last year. Officials and experts fear the surge in violence may signal Iraq's potential descent into a failed state, despite its oil wealth, billions …
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