Alliance Internationale pour la Justice online

http://www.i-a-j.org

 

 

Safia Taleb Al Souhail, Advocacy Director for Middle East and Islamic World at International Alliance for Justice organized a press conference, “The Unheard Voices of Iraqi Women”, on Friday October 04, 2002 at the National Press Club, in Washington DC.

She will organize a conference in London within the next two weeks.

 

Alliance Internationale pour la Justice would like to present to you the speakers’s statements delivered at this conference “THE UNHEARD VOICES OF IRAQI WOMEN”.

PRESS CONFERENCE
National Press Club, Washington DC

October 4, 2002

By Safia Taleb Al Souhail

 

Safia Taleb Al Souhail, Advocacy Director for Middle East and Islamic World at International Alliance for Justice, Publisher of the independent newspaper Al Manar Al Arabi and daughter of Sheikh Taleb Al Souhail the prominent Iraqi personality and chief of Bani Tamim Tribe who was assassinated by the Iraqi regime in Beirut in 1994

 

 

Good Morning ladies and gentlemen,

On behalf of my self and my colleagues I would like to welcome you to our press conference entitled “The Unheard Voices of Iraqi Women”.  We appreciate your participation. Your presence today is a sign of solidarity with millions of suffering Iraqi women in the hands of one of the world’s most brutal dictators. The voices of the Iraqis are rarely heard; especially the voices of Iraqi women are totally absent in the international media. We are here to appeal to you and through the international media and community that we Iraqi women are united in our voices asking for justice, freedom and democracy for our people and our country.  We need your help to bring out our message and the voices of the many victims of the Iraqi regime.  The international community, women organizations and defenders of women rights expressed a wonderful and tangible solidarity with our suffering sisters in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Kosovo and elsewhere.  We call upon everyone to help us to gain our freedom, liberty, and country; also, the long during suffering of the Iraqi women deserves to come to an end.

 
We are a group of independent Iraqi women from various parts of Iraq (South, Central and Iraqi Kurdistan). We come from various ethnic and religious backgrounds.  We are here because of our common wounds and common aspiration, which is to see our country free from repression of Saddam Hussein and his regime. We, the women of Iraq for the last three decades have suffered under an extraordinary brutal regime, every body in this panel has lost beloved ones in various wars launched by Saddam and the rulers of Baghdad in the most aggressive and inhumane ways possible.

 

 Iraq under Saddam’s regime has become a land of hopelessness, sadness and fear. A country where people are ethnically cleansed; prisoners are tortured in more than 300 prisons in Iraq. Rape is systematic; decapitation of women and displaying of their heads on the walls and doors of their houses is an ongoing activity by the sons of the dictator. Pregnant women are committing suicide because of neuro psychological damages inflicted upon them as a result of the use of chemical and biological weapons; congenital malformation, birth defects, infertility, cancer and various disorders are the results of Saddam’s gassing of his own people.  Hundreds of thousands of women are grieving the disappearances of their beloved ones in the Anfal campaigns against the Kurds and all others who disappeared; two hundred thousand Shiites who were slaughtered in the uprising of 1991 by Saddam’s troops; the ecological damages and the uprooting of the Arab Marshlands as well as the drainage of their magnificent land known as the “Venice of the Middle East”; the killing and torturing of husbands in front of their wives and children; the deportation and displacement of millions of Iraqis is a fact and very wellknown.Iraq under Saddam has become a hell and a museum of crimes.

 

On a personal level, my father Sheikh Taleb Al Souhail who was an eminent Iraqi personality and the head of the bani tamim tribe and a wonderful father and husband was assassinated by 4 diplomats of the Iraqi embassy in Beirut in 1994. The disguised Iraqi diplomats were all members of Iraqi Intelligence service known as “Mukhabarat”. He was killed by direct orders by Saddam Hussein; the disguised Iraqi embassy terrorists attacked us inside of our house. The Lebanese police found a lot of weapons inside the houses of the Iraqi diplomats, I am still wondering how much and what type of weapons that the immune Iraqi embassies in the world might contain and hide?
These embassies have escaped from all kind of UN inspections.  Do we have to wait and not inspect them until others like my father will be killed?  By their act the so-called Iraqi diplomats violated all known diplomatic norms. The terrorists confessed their crimes but they were released and sent back to Iraq by the Lebanese authorities, which also was a deal between the governments of Syria, Lebanon and Iraq. Justice was never done.

 

The Vienna Convention does not accord diplomatic immunity to diplomats to practice terror; this is a flagrant violation of the convention in1961. This act of state terrorism is also in clear violation of the UNHCR 687’s Article 32, which warns Iraq of severe consequences if it supports, or commits any terrorist acts. Since the assassination of my father, my mother and my six sisters have been asking for justice and also to keep this file open, but in vain. There are no instances in the Arab world where we can seek justice. The Iraqi government agents continue to harass and to intimidate my family and myself for our search for justice.  This act of state terror is well documented but the criminals have not yet been prosecuted, nor have they been punished.

 

Saddam is the world’s biggest terrorist. It is a shame and an insult to humanity that he is still in power. The international community has a moral responsibility putting an end to the nightmare that the Iraqi people have been through for three decades.  It is a world security that Saddam is removed from the power.  Stability and peace can’t be discussed in exception of the Iraqi people and their need for a better future where Iraq will be in peace within itself, their neighbors and the rest of the world.  The Iraqi people will never forget those who stand with them and those who stand with the tyrant of Baghdad. As Europe was helped to be free from the Nazis, the Iraqi people need you and your support in order to be liberated.  

PRESS CONFERENCE
National Press Club, Washington DC, October 4, 2002
By Safia Al Souhail

 

The Assassination Of Sheik Taleb Al Souhail

 

There is no doubt that the Iraqi government has Weapons of Mass Destruction and used them massively against the Iraqi people and against its neighbor Iran.  The US State Department’s Annual Report on terrorist groups has documented the Iraqi regime harboring and sponsoring of terrorist groups.  Also, it has been reported that the Iraqi regime has links to Al Qaida terrorists.  What is missing in the debate on the Iraqi regime’s terrorist background is that the Iraqi state’s terrorism is against the Iraqis.  The Iraqi Intelligence Service “Al Mukhabarat” in the Middle East, Europe, US and Asia has assassinated many Iraqi personalities.

 

My father Sheikh Taleb Al Souhail, was one of the many victims of the Iraqi state terrorism who was assassinated in Beirut on April 12, 1994 by four Iraqi diplomats.  He was killed by the personal orders of Saddam Hussein.   My father was known as an eminent Iraqi opposition personality and the leader of Bani Tamim tribe, one of the major tribes in Iraq and the Arab World.  He was a democrat and a liberal man who opposed the regime since they took power in Iraq. 

 

My father lived in Jordan as a political refugee.  He was a personal friend of King Hussein of Jordan and he had a large network in the region.   He was a holder of a Jordanian diplomatic passport when he was killed. He left behind seven daughters and a wife. The Lebanese authorities, which in the beginning of the event cut off its diplomatic ties with Iraq due to this event, later under the pressure of Syria and in a deal between Lebanon, Syria and Iraq they sent the killers back to Iraq via Syria. Despite that the killers acknowledged their own terrorist act in the police interrogations in Beirut the Lebanese authorities never prosecuted them.  This act is in a clear violation of Vienna Convention of 1961, which does not give immunity to diplomats who are murderers.  Also, this act is in plain violation of the UNSCR 687, in specific, article 32 thereof, which warns Iraq for the consequences of committing or supporting any terrorist act, and obliges the UN Security Council to intervene in case of the occurrence of such act. 

 

We have no leverage on the UN Security Council and obviously it is more difficult for us as women to pursue these kinds of issues before the juridical and political authorities in the region but we will continue to ask the Lebanese authorities to keep the case open.  The Iraqi Mukhabarat continues to harass and threaten my family and myself because we ask for justice. In the Arab World there are no legal mechanisms for individuals or collectivities too seek justice, there are no Arab Human Rights Court.  We hope that you can help us to stop the Iraqi state’s terrorism against its own citizens.  My father’s case is the only murder case in which Iraqi diplomats acknowledged their own act of terror.  I am pleading to you with the belief that it is necessary to end the Iraqi regime’s terrorist acts abroad in which my father’s case is a striking example.

PRESS CONFERENCE
National Press Club, Washington DC

October 4, 2002
By Hetau Ibrahim Ahmad

 

Hetau Ibrahim Ahmad, She is a prominent Kurdish activist, who has engaged in politics at a very young age. Her father Ibrahim Ahmed was a famous writer, poet and the General Secretary of the Kurdistan Democratic Party. She has lived most her life as internally displaces and as a refugee fleeing from one place to another.

 

As the world enters a new chapter in history, it is with great sadness that we are seeing an increase in random acts of terrorism.  The killing of innocent human lives has become a means in which groups and/ or individuals assert themselves onto the world arena.

 

Since last year alone, there have been some very catastrophic acts of terrorism worldwide.  No one can forget the images of the planes crashing into the world trade center buildings, causing it to come crumbling down taking with it hundreds of lives, or of the burning Pentagon building or of the plane crash in Pennsylvania.

 

The people of Iraqi Kurdistan have experienced their share of terrorism as it affects our global community.  The Kurds have been subjected to all kinds of cruel, inhumane, and violent acts over the years.  One of such acts in recent Kurdish history is the massacre of the village of “Kheyli Hama”.

 

A group calling themselves Jund-Al-Islam at the time, which means soldiers of Islam, surfaced in September of last year.  This group, which is now known as Ansar-Al-Islam (Supporters of Islam), is an armed extremist Islamic movement in Iraqi Kurdistan.  Its members use might and terrorism as a means of getting to power and forcing “Islamic Rule” similar to that of the Taliban in Afghanistan.  There is evidence connecting this group to Osama Bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda.

 

On 23 September 2001, forces belonging to Jund-Al-Islam ambushed the village of “Kheyli Hama”, which lies in the Halabja district, and captured the village and 41 members of the PUK forces.  The PUK forces were caught off-guard by this assault and did not have a chance to counter the attack.

 

The Jund terrorists slaughtered all 41 members of the PUK Peshmarga, by decapitating them using swords while tying their hands and feet. These murderers proceeded to remove the eyes of the victims after beheading them.

 

The attack on Kheyli Hama has caused most of the residents of the village to flee for their lives.  Most of the 185 families left their homes and belongings and were forced to live in camps and under tents, to spare their children and families the terror that these extremists have imposed upon them.

 

This tragedy has only added to the plight of the Kurdish woman. This act of terrorism has robbed families of the murdered Peshmargas of their sons, their children of their fathers and the women of their husbands. 

 

Not to mention, many of the families that left the village have not been able to find alternate schools for their children to finish their studies for the year.  Also, the psychological damage that befell the children and residents who were made to watch the Peshmargas being decapitated is irreversible. 

 

The oppression that the residents had to face was unbearable to many; a little boy had his head shaved by members of the terrorist group because his hair was styled “after the infidels”, meaning that he had his hair styled like a westerner. The women of the village became victims to these terrorists as well. Mandatory Hijab was imposed on all the women, and the girls were not allowed to attend school.

 

These are but a few examples of the consequences of terrorism.  Terrorism has never been and never will be a noble means to achieve ones goals. It will only result in complicating the lives of many innocent people who are usually affected unwillingly.

 

In closing I call on the US administration, the US congress and the world community to come together to make the world a more peaceful place, and to ensure every human being a life without fear.

 

I also urge all of you here today to call your members of congress and tell them about the suffering and hardships of the Kurdish women on the hands of the current regime. And that it is time that Saddam the tyrant is replaced with a democratic leadership in Iraq.

 

Thank you

PRESS CONFERENCE
National Press Club, Washington DC

October 4, 2002
By Judge Zakia Ismail Hakki

 

 

The Iraqi Faylee  kurds and their catastrophic case.

 

Zakia Ismail Hakki, Lawyer and the first woman Judge in Iraq. She advocated for minorities and women human rights. She has defended individual political detainees before military courts. She was President of Kurdish Women Federation between 1958-1975.

 

 

As you all know the Kurds are a distinct nation living all their history in Mesopotamia stretches back several thousand years. However, the traditional homeland of the Kurds is wide ranging.

Their original lands reached the Mediterranean sea in north and the Persian Gulf in the south. It encompassed Mesopotamia, modern day Iraq and the huge rang mountains called Zagross .
The Kurdish people are made up of three major groups, each using its own dialect of the Kurdish language.
The Kirmang / Badini our largest group living in the northern part of Kurdistan which reaches as far as the Mediterranean sea. These are the people whose land was divided between five countries after World War 1, namely the Former Soviet Union , Turkey, Iran , Syria and Iraq. The Sorani Kurds are living on both sides of Zagross mountains in the middle part of   Kurdistan which was divided between Iraq and Iran after the First World War. The Faylee Kurds are living in the southern part of Zagross mountains which was also divided between Iraq and Iran after the First World War.

 

The Faylees ancestors were the founders of the first civilization in southern Mesopotamia  in Ur the capital of  Sumer four thousand years BC.  Their second Kingdom was built few miles western of Baghdad on Euphrates River by the Cashian  civilization two thousand years BC.
The Faylee Kurds and their homeland are an integral part of the Kurdish nation and Kurdistan. In Iraq they are the most genuine Iraqis and they have the deepest roots through all their history in the area beginning as straight line from Khanaqin close to the recent Iranian border in the East towards Baghdad in the West with most Villages , Towns and Cities Southern Baghdad between Tigress River and the Iranian border.
Despite their history of being the most genuine Iraqi natives they have been subjected by the successive Iraqi regimes to all sorts of discriminations and numerous atrocities including disappearances, mass killing, executions, torture, and imprisonment.
 
 

But all the oppressions which was inflicted upon them could not suppress their struggle against Iraqi totalitarian regimes to achieve democracy for all their fellow Iraqi people and the self- determination for their nation in Iraqi Kurdistan.
 Their suffering  were culminated when Saddam Hussain came to power and began his savage campaign of ethnic cleansing which was practiced against the Kurdish people in general and the Faylees in particular. Still the Iraqi regime is carrying on intensively this policy under the direct orders of the tyrant Saddam Hussain
This ordeal has happened to the Faylees for two main reasons. Firstly, because the Faylees are proud of their Kurdish ethnicity. Secondly, because they are Shia’a Muslim which gave the tyrant justification for considering them Iranian in origin which enabled him  to carry out his Arabization  policy of all Faylees villages and towns in middle and southern part of recent Iraq.
The continuous suffering of the Kurdish people  in Iraq under the iron fist of the tyrant is well documented and requires no explanation , but the continuous suffering of the Faylees are however unique.
 Half a Million Iraqi Faylee Kurds have been suffered the infamous forcible deportation  from their country, after the Iraqi regime confiscated their personal identities and  documents , all official certificates, driving license , real estates, the school / college / and the university certificates ..etc .The tyrant and his gang have robbed these victims of their country and their identities and over – night turned them into anonymous stateless lost people on the border of a foreign country.
They were herded onto trucks and taken to the Iraqi – Iranian border at the time when these two countries were involved in a bloody war. They were ordered at gunpoint to disembark from the trucks and walk towards the Iranian border without giving them any food or water. Women, children, elderly and handicapped people of different ages were forced to walk for days through minefields.
 Needless to say not all could make it, Some of these refugees died on the road Some were killed either by exploding  landmines caught in the crossfire of warring Iranian-Iraqi troops. or during the clashes between the Iraqi and the Iranian troops. Their children were severely traumatized. Those who survived are now scattered around the world. To add to their tragedy the Despot Saddam Hussain ordered that members of those deported should be kept as hostages in Iraqi prisons, mainly men between the age of 16 to 28 years and some were even younger these children were kept as hostages in Iraqi prisons their fates unknown to this day. There were among these hostages four housewives, one with nine children , a female doctor , a female engineer, a ten days toddler kept hostage with his mother and a retired civil servant was born in 1923.

 

In the first six months the estimated number of the Faylee hostages reached almost twenty thousand but this number increased as more people were being deported.
The hostages have not been charged with any crime except the crime of belonging to the wrong race and the wrong faith “ Iraqi Kurds and shia’a” . These people have been detained unlawfully since April 1980 as their families being deported to Iran.

 

The deportees have been deprived of any news about the fate of their sons, husbands and brothers. Some uncertain reports from time to time claim that they are still existing in Iraqi prisons, others claim that they have been annihilated by exposing them to experiments using chemical and biological weapons, such abominable news have prolonged the suffering of their miserable and grieving mothers, sisters and wives. The fate and the exact number of those hostages remains unknown to this present day. 
 
 

We the Iraqi women call upon and demand from the United Nations Institutions, the Arab League and all organizations of human rights to pay attention to these crimes which are considered a flagrant violation of the Human Rights Convention. We need the support of all other International political and humanitarian bodies to put an end to this human tragedy. We seek International pressures on the Iraqi regime and the tyrant Saddam to put an end for this continuous suffering and unveil the truth about the fate of those hostages.

 

Many mothers have died in exile around the world and their last wishes were just to hear about their sons or to have a chance to see them again.

 

The Iraqi women call upon the free world to put pressure on Saddam Hussain to force him to apply the UN resolution # 688 regarding  human rights for Iraqis. We need your support regarding the possession of weapons of mass destructions which he always used  against the Iraqi people and our neighboring countries.

 

The Iraqi women looking forwards to gain your support for our Iraqi freedom fighters in their efforts to topple this outlaw regime. We demand the establishment of an International Tribunal to prosecute the tyrant Saddam Hussain and his key figures for the crimes they have committed against,  Iraq, the Iraqi people and the humanity. We need your help to free our country Iraq and our Iraqi women in order that we may participate in building a new free and peaceful Iraq .

 

 Thank you
 
Zakia Hakki

PRESS CONFERENCE
National Press Club, Washington DC
October 4, 2002
By Dr katrin Michael

 

Dr Katrine Michael, She is an Iraqi Chaldean and a Christian. She joined the Kurdish resistance forces called Peshmerga in 1982. She was victim of chemical weapons in 1988. She fled to Turkey with thousand of Kurdish families as a result of chemical bombardments where she stayed for one year at a refugee camp. She arrived to United States in 1997.

 

 

Our society is a traditional society, Where social habits and costumes play a major role in the behavior of the people and their relationships .At the same time, the law has been written with these customs in the minds of our people. Women are subjected in our society to a variety of different insults in Iraq.
The problems that women face are the following:
1-Women in our society have not been given opportunities outside the home in the same way as men.
2-Women have not secured their rights in education in the proper way. An approximate view shows that more than 60% of our women are at a low education level.
3-Many obstacles to completing their study have been placed in their way. The First is financial situation of the family.
4-80% of our women are poor because of their dependence on men.
5-Most girls feel that there is discrimination between them and the boys in the family. This puts
Women in a psychologically disadvantaged position.
6- most divorced women confirm that social customs played a role in their marriages. Mostly negative.

 

The law and constitution:
According to article 19 of the 1970 interim Iraqi constitution, all citizens are equal before the law, with no distinction in gender, race, language and social and religious background. Nevertheless, much legislation was issued since then that contradicts the constitution. The following are a few examples
1- women are prohibited from traveling abroad, unless accompanied by a mahram (a close male relative. This law came into effect in 1953. It is considered one of the first Arab civil laws where Islamic ‘figh’Law  and western laws came together in quality. This did not prevent it from including several articles that violated the rights of women.
2-only male and not female children carry the lineage of the family and name.
3-Article 102 of the law states that the guardian of the minor is first the father, and then a relative of the father, then the paternal grandfather, then the guardian identified by the court. The mother’s role is neglected, as the father’s relative and the grandfather’s come before he, even if she was identified by court as the guardian.
4-The minors care law needs amendment as follows:
 Violation of women’s rights in the Iraqi personal status law:
This law is from 1959. Several amendments took place, but women’s rights still need to be addressed.
Here are violations of women’s rights in the Iraqi penal law number111of 1969
Legalization of death sentence: because of infidelity and honor killing and the different punishments for men and women for adultery.

Women and work:
If we look at our community, we can’t find women in big business, because of the following reasons:
1. They don’t have good skills in business.
2. Women always are busy in the kitchen and with housework. Our women are used to taking care of all the members of the family.
3. Men always are looking to make more money; they change their jobs often to better jobs. Women very rarely change their jobs. Because they feel insecure.
4. Women don’t participate in meetings very actively. They feel this is a waste of time. Second they don’t trust their skills because nobody in the family encourages them to improve their skills or allow them to work.
5. If our women want to enter big business, mostly they are in older than 50.They need to have a good record in the community; otherwise the community is not going to be helpful for their business. This comes from the traditional community that we have.

Women have seven responsibilities in their lives. These are the following:
1- Childcare.
2- Being a wife.
3- Housework.
4- relatives.
5- Job.
6-Community service.
7-Care of herself.

These responsibilities take women away from other fields of life. As they are mothers they can’t be active in business. Because they are responsible for the house, they can’t travel the same way as men travel. Mostly they try to be home at certain times, because they know other members of the family are going to need their attention or their presence in the home. Because of the modern life or because of financial issue, the new family tries to plan for the number of children.

If we want to build the civil society in future Iraq, we should complete the following:
1-Woman should have equality in the Rights and duties in the constitusion and civil law.
2-The work right by equal wages with the man
3-The body protection right from any violence treatment, rape crimes and circumcision.
4-The right of husband selection.
5-Protection from polygamy.
6-the kindergarten Right.
7-Protection from honor killing.
8-The right of traveling with out Muharam.
9-Protection Right from coercion on the marriage. And the Right of non –marriage before the maturity.
10-we need the law legislation to prevent sexual harassment.
11-Woman should hold leadership position.
 

PRESS CONFERENCE
National Press Club, Washington DC
October 4, 2002

By Nizal Muhi Al Sheikh Shalal Aljuburi

 

 

Nizal Muhi Al Sheikh Shalal Aljuburi, Diploma in Trade / Business Management from Al Kreat Al Jubur Trib. Her brother disappeared in 1980 and three of her female cousins were executed by the Iraqi government.

 

Brothers and Sisters: Good Morning!

 

I greet you on behalf of the widows from among Iraqi women who have been struggling against the criminal Iraqi regime with all their strength, the regime that has turned the Iraqi woman into a sad and depressed one all the time because of having lost the loved members of her family. The Iraqi woman has lost the loved one, the husband, the brother and the father. You are fully aware of the fact that the woman in Iraq is an integral part of the society. She has greatly participated in the establishment of the civilization of the valley of Two Rivers since time immemorial. She is the poetess, the women of arts, the journalist, the physician, the lawyer, the cabinet minister. After 1958, the first female cabinet minister in the Middle East was from Iraq: she was Nazeeha al-Dulaymi. The Iraqi woman received her share of torture, murder, confinement, execution, banishment just like others in the Iraqi society at the hands of Saddam Hussein's criminal gang. Since 1968 and till the present time, the whereabouts of many women are unknown. Figures point to a large number of dissident women who have no traces since that date. I shall narrate to you some points from which the Iraqi woman suffered at the hands of the murderous regime in Baghdad:

 

1. When the Baathists came to power in 1963, they invented the dragging of woman on the streets. Till now, women, especially the women of families opposing the regime, have been suffering from killing and banishment.

2. The government in Baghdad issued many decrees against women, including one banning women and men from marrying foreigners.

3. Involving the Iraqi women in wars by force.

4. The phenomenon of unmarried women has become widespread. Women could not get married because of the wars waged by Saddam Hussein. Many youths have been jailed. Add to this the deteriorating economic situation.

5. The heads of many Iraqi women have been publicly cut off in the streets in the pretext of being liars, while in fact they mostly belong to families opposing the Iraqi regime.

6. Women, especially dissident women, have been raped by force by members of Saddam Hussein's gang.

7. Polygamy became widespread among those in power in Iraq. For example, Saddam is married to five women, Izzat al-Douri to seven, Taha al-Jazrawi to four, and so on.

8. Lies have been published about the Iraqi woman in the Babil newspaper owned by Uday son of Saddam who accuses her of being an adulteress.

9. The wives of dissidents have been either killed or tortured in front of their husbands in order to obtain confessions from their husbands.

10. The wives of dissidents have been expelled from schools, universities and government jobs and they have been forced to enlist in the Baath Party.

11. Women have been kidnapped as they walk in the streets by members of the gangs of `Uday and Qusay then raped. This happened to many Iraqi women.

12. Mass executions were carried out indiscriminately as took place in Halabja and in the marshland areas, and women were led as captives to the houses of the residents of Tikrit.

 

Now I have before me a list of eleven Iraqi women who were executed by the regime only because they are the wives or relatives of Iraqi dissidents:

1. Tarfa Muhammed `Abb s Muhammed al-Jibouri: She is my cousin, and she was executed together with her husband Ja`fer Hassan Hassoun after being accused of belonging to a religious party.

2. Layla Muslim al-Jibouri: She, too, is my cousin, and she was executed with her father who was 75 years old and with her brother Hassan Muslim al-Jibouri. This martyr was a student at the Department of Physics, College of Sciences, Baghdad University. She was executed after being accused of belonging to a religious party.

3. F tima Ali Ni`ma al-Jibouri: Also my cousin; she was the wife of the martyred Mu'ayyad Husain Muhammed al-Jibouri. She was executed together with her husband after being charged with the same.

4. Safaa Yasin al-Jibouri: She was executed together with her brother `Im d al-Jibouri after being charged with the same accusation.

 

As for the rest, take, for example, the martyred poetess, novelist and writer Bint al-Huda ( mina al-Sadr) who was executed in 1980 in front of her martyred brother, the world renown philosopher, author, economist and thinker Muhammed B qir al-Sadr. Both she and her brother were personally tortured by Saddam Hussein who cut their parts one by one. The list of other martyred women includes the following:

Layla Shaikh `Abd al-Razz q, Hadiyya Majeed, Nawfa Muhammed, Rahma Sayyid Mehdi, Jabra Salm n, Hadiyya Ali D w n, Zainab al-Hilli, Dr. Najat Muhammed Haider.

 

Others are many. The world is called upon to save the Iraqi people from the demon called Saddam. There can be no ethics in the world, nor human rights, nor democracy nor humanity unless the criminal Saddam Hussein is tried in front of the whole world so that he may receive his fair punishment just as his fellow criminal Slovodan Milosovitch did. The world as a whole is in danger and so are peace and world security so long as Saddam Hussein remains in power.

Wassalamo Alaikom.
Nidal Muhyi al-Shaikh Shallal:

I am the wife of Shaikh Jabur Shallal Muhammed al-Shallal, tribal chief of the Grai`at-Jibour (a branch of the Jibour tribe).

 

My family is one of the affluent ones in Iraq, owning orchards and real estate. The name of my grandfather, al-Shallal, is given to one of the streets of Baghdad. There is also a bazaar carrying his name as well as a residential quarter in the city of Azamiyya called the Shallal Quarter.

 

In 1972, the regime executed the son of my maternal aunt, namely Muhammed Husain Muhammed al-Jibouri, may All h have mercy on his soul, for participating in a coup attempt against the regime. Then my cousins attempted to assassinate Saddam in 1981, a coup led by my cousin, the martyred Ali Ahmed al-Alwan al-Jibouri as mentioned by the criminal Barzan al-Tikriti (a cousin of Saddam Hussein who was assassinated in Kuwait by Saddam Hussein's men who worked at Iraq's embassy in Kuwait city) in his book about the attempts to assassinate Saddam Hussein. My uncle was a Member of the Parliament during the monarchy; his name is Muhammed Ali Ab  Nayla al-Jibouri. Then he became the Head of the Baghdad Municipality. My brother was arrested in 1980. Since then, we have no idea what happened to him. The regime sent us a statement of his death in order to provoke us. My husband's brothers, who are also my cousins, were executed. They were: Martyr Ra`ad Shallal Muhammed al-Shallal and Martyr Wa`d-All h Muhammed al-Shallal. After that, our possessions were confiscated and we were expelled from our lands. Till now, one of our orchards has been turned into a secret factory for making chemical weapons. It is located in Grai`at (a suburb of Azamiyya in northern Baghdad).

 

I was interrogated many times. It was then that my husband fled away and went into hiding. Then I was expelled from my government job. Many attempts were undertaken to have my husband arrested because of his dissent. His brothers were executed. In 1991, he participated in the Intifada (uprising), but he was captured then jailed for four months at the prison of run by the Iraqi Military Intelligence. His left rib and nose were fractured as he was being tortured, and he was exposed to several electric shocks the marks of which are visible on his body.

 

Our tribe, the Jibour tribe, has been subjected to almost a total extinction. Al-Grai`at [branch of the Jibour tribe) is famous for its struggle against the Iraqi regime. As many as 882 (eight hundred and eighty-two) men from among my relatives and tribal members have been arrested and their fate is unknown. The daughters of my uncle, namely Layla al-Jibouri, F tima al-Jibouri, Tarfa al-Jibouri and Safa al-Jibouri, have all been executed...

 

Surely we are God's and to Him is our return, Wassalamo Alaikom.

Nidal Shaikh Shallal

PRESS CONFERENCE
National Press Club, Washington DC
October 4, 2002

By Sabria Mahdi Naama 

 

 

Sabria Mahdi Naama, She was married to Abbas Kareem Naama a military General in the Iraqi army then and a Pharmacit. She joined the 1991 Intafada in southern Iraq and had to escape with her five kids from village to village. She is now active in the Iraqi community in California.

 

 

Dear My Friends ,

 

I warmly greet you and  would like to thank you for inviting me to your meeting to present my case to you.

I been frequently asked: who am I ? Well, am a refugee, a representative of the   voiceless in this world Iraqi people. Yes, I escaped from my homeland that I love. I am a daughter of the Mesopotamian –Iraq. I am the daughter of Euphrates and the legacy of Imam Hussain and his sister Zainab, who a thousand year ago stood  courageously against a whole army of  tyranny.  I am the daughter of Iraq, the country of palm trees, the first civilization, Epics and poetry, civil codes, peace and forgiveness, where I grow up in my village famous for its fragrant Amber Rice!

I bitterly left my homeland when it was absolutely unsafe to my kids and my family to stay even one day more. Our guilt: we protested in  March 1991 the destruction of our life and the death of two members of our family by Saddam aggression war. We participated in the  uprising to defend our life and our kids. My husband managed to escape to the borders of Saudi Arabia, and Saddam tanks and his security surrounded our village to take us, like many Iraqi people, to his destruction camps. Yes, we are Shiites and Saddam has to get rid of the sons and daughters of the revolutionary Imam Hussain! We can not live with the injustice.

It was the darkness of the night that gave us the safe escape from his security, me and my five kids , we left toward the desert, to the Saudi border. After a whole day of continuous walk, at the border, we saw Saddam’s security shooting people who tried to cross the border. We returned back but we were not able to continue. I decided to head further in the desert ..there is a chance to survive, but if we go back we do not have it. Only after three days we found the Saudi  border  again.. during all these days me and my kids, we did not have any food or a cover from the desert night wind. When at last we arrived to Rafha camp in the Saudi desert we were ghosts in the shape of human bodies. My kids were at the edge of death. We met our dad there and stayed two years in this desert camp known for its rough conditions.

It was morning on September 17/1992 when we arrived at J.F. Kennedy airport. We shouted : happy birth day and the crew members shouted with us. We could never imagine what is America!  Here we are able to breath without terror. I cannot describe to you the surprise of my kids, their faces were smiling ..when they saw America first time, possibly they felt safety is surrounding them.

Yes, we are enjoying here safe and honorable life after losing it for long years under the rule of the most crucial dictator Saddam in history.

It is my family ambition  to get back to our village, to liberate our country, to establish  a democratic and free Iraq.

Let the entire world hear the voice of Iraqi women, from here, from Washington:

Support the Iraqi people to establish honorable life, to establish a peaceful government, to set the people rule, to have peace and freedom in Iraq.

Down to the dictators and people tyrants!
Down to Saddam!
Long live to Iraqi people!

 

Thank you.

Sabria Mahdi Al-Niima   

PRESS CONFERENCE
National Press Club, Washington DC
October 4, 2002

By Peyman Halmat

 

Genocide & Systematic Murder of the Kurds

 

Peyman Halmat, She was a teatcher and a long-time Kurdish activist. She has lost several members of her family.

 

 

 

We, as Iraqi women, are here to call on the international community to address the ongoing tragedy that has befallen the Kurds and the other people of Iraq.  Saddam Hussein and his inner circle must be held accountable for the crimes they have committed, which are too many to mention.  The most horrific of those crimes were the use of chemical weapons and nerve agents on a civilian population, and the Anfal campaign of 1987 to 1989.

 

It has been the Iraqi regime's policy to change the demography of Iraq, by eradicating the Kurdish population from areas that are deemed important in the north of the country.  The regime has done this through forced
deportation, arbitrary arrests and systematic torture.   In the late eighties (80s), Saddam felt that he must speed up the Arabization of the Kurdish areas.  This is when a campaign known as the Anfal went into effect.
Anfal, meaning "the Spoils" is the name of the eighth (8th) chapter of the Quran. It is also the name given by the Iraqi regime to a series of military actions, which lasted from February 23 until September 6, 1988.  There were eight (8) stages of this campaign:

 

.   The first Anfal, took place in Sargalou and Bergalou from February 23 to March 19, 1988
.   The second Anfal was in Qaradagh, from March 22 to April 1, 1988
.   The third Anfal was in the Garmian Region from April 7 to April 20, 1988
.   The fourth Anfal was at the Valley of the lesser Zab, from May 3 to 8, 1988
.   The fifth, sixth and seventh Anfal were in the mountain valleys of shaqlawa and Rawanduz from May 15 to August 26, 1988
.   The eighth and final Anfal was in the Badinan region from August 25 to September 6, 1988

 

The Anfal campaign was characterized by mass summary executions and the mass disappearance of many tens of thousands of noncombatants, including large numbers of women, children and the elderly, and sometimes the entire population of villages.  It is estimated that more than 182,000 people are still unaccounted for to this date as a result of the Anfal, and more than 4000 villages were destroyed: the homes, schools and mosques were bulldozed and burnt; wells were shut with cement; civilian property were looted; and many of the orchards and farm were burnt to mere ashes, causing devastation to the livelihood of the countryside.

 

The arbitrary arrest and jailing in conditions of extreme deprivation of thousands of women, children and the elderly people and the forced displacement of hundreds of thousands of villagers have but contributed to the destruction of the rural Kurdish economy and infrastructure.

 

It is important not to forget that Saddam and his regime were the first in history to use chemical and biological weapons against a civilian population.  While many of you maybe familiar with the chemical attacks on Halabja, you maybe surprised to learn that the first use of chemical and nerve agents against the Kurds by the central government occurred eleven

(11) months earlier.  There are records indicating that there were forty
(40) separate attacks on Kurdish targets, some of them involving multiple sorties over several days, between April 1987 and August 1988.

 

However, Halabja was the most significant attack. It is the largest attack on a civilian population using unconventional weapons since Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  The attack on Halabja occurred on March 16, 1988, while women and children were preparing for the feast of Nawroz, which is a celebration of the beginning of spring.

 

Without any warning on that dreaded morning, a cocktail of toxic gases, mixed with nerve agents were dropped on the town of Halabja.  This inhumane attack took the lives of more than 5000 people, mostly women and children.
And has left more than 10,000 people injured.  There has been irreversible long-term damage to this population; from burns and blisters to psychological trauma.  The numbers of miscarriages have increased; there has been a rise in the number of cancers, especially among children, and the population is suffering from respiratory and genetic deficiencies as a result of these attacks.
Saddam had used the ultimate way to perform genocide on his people, the ultimate human right abuse. They all died the horrible death, not knowing why?

 

The Iraqi people should not be left to suffer at the hands of the tyrant Saddam and his regime any longer.  We call on you to help our people live in peace and with out fear that Saddam's forces will come for the son or the brother or the husband of another Iraqi woman.  Do not let our cries go unheard, for we are the true victims of this current regime, and the future of Iraq should guarantee us our right to live with out fear.

 

Thank you.