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The Public Cannot Imagine How Brutal These Guys Are
(December 27, 2002)
By Raed Ahmed
as told to Tom Farrey
Special to ESPN.com
http://www.iraqfoundation.org/hr/2002/cdec/27_public.html
Don't look at Bill Clinton.
That's the word that came down from Saddam Hussein's son Uday Hussein, conveyed by the head of the Iraqi Olympic delegation in Atlanta. As we entered the stadium during the opening ceremonies of the 1996 Games, our small delegation of three athletes and two administrators was under orders to show no respect to the country that we went to war with a few years earlier. We were ordered to ignore the American leader.
Well, I sometimes go against the rules. So, while my fellow athletes were scared to do so, I glanced up at Clinton. And what I saw didn't fit the image that had been created by our government: This man who supposedly hated Iraq was applauding! As we walked by the stage where he was seated, and our delegation was announced with me as the flag-bearer, he did not seem to me like someone who wanted to start trouble.
The moment left an impression on me. Before the end of the Atlanta Games, I would defect to the U.S. and apply for political asylum. While preparing to visit the zoo in Atlanta, I jumped in a car with a member of an exiled Iraqi opposition group, the start of a new life in a country far different from the one where I had come to be its top weightlifter.
Back home, my defection came as a big shock to Uday, who is president of the Iraqi National Olympic Committee. Iraqi television immediately reported that I had been sentenced to death in absentia, and that I was to be executed if I was apprehended. Uday ordered my wife to divorce me. My whole family -- my father, mother, sisters and brothers -- was rounded up at 3 a.m. in our hometown of Basra, in southern Iraq, and driven seven hours to the Olympic headquarters in Baghdad. They even interrogated my little sister, who was just 9 at the time.
My parents were transferred to the National Security headquarters and spent two weeks in prison. They were allowed to return to Basra, but they still cannot leave town without notifying the authorities. Some people encouraged me not to talk to the media because they want me to protect my family from retribution. But I'm willing to speak out about Saddam and Uday because the public cannot imagine how brutal these guys are.
Athletes around the world take steroids. But in Iraq, they take them for a different reason. They take them to avoid being tortured upon returning to Iraq. Before every international competition, we are interviewed by one of Uday's assistants and asked how we expect to fare. If, for example, you say you are going to finish in the top three, then
you become committed to bringing this result back home. If you come in fourth place, you have to expect that your head will be shaved and that you'll be thrown in jail -- until Uday wants to let you out. You will also have to pay back the government for the money it spent on you for the trip.
If you're from a poor family, where do you find the cash? Certainly not from the prize money or fees you earned as an athlete. Uday steals it, habitually. For participating in the Atlanta Olympics, each Iraqi athlete was supposed to receive $8,000 as a reward. The head of our delegation had the checks in his hands but told us he didn't have the authority to cash them because he was under orders to give the money to Uday.
I avoided problems with Uday by letting him think ahead of time I was hurt. I would get a doctor's note saying I suffered from a leg or shoulder injury, for example, and that I had no chance to win. That's what I did for Atlanta. That way, I could participate but wasn't forced to win. If traveling meant being forced to win, I would not go.
Other times, nothing more than good fortune kept from me being tortured. In 1990, I was unable to travel to the former Soviet Union for an Iraqi training camp because university exams were held at the same time. While there, some members of the team acquired steroids and tried to bring them back to Baghdad. Uday heard about it and had the whole 13-member delegation picked up at the airport. Their heads were shaven -- an embarrassing social punishment in Iraq -- and they were sent to the al-Radwaniya prison, where they were beaten for an entire month.
Uday is fine with athletes taking steroids. As long as it doesn't hurt his reputation.
This article was written with the help of ESPN.com senior writer Tom Farrey, who interviewed him in his new hometown. He requested that city not be disclosed, to avoid any potential harm from Iraqi agents.
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A Brief History of Human Rights in Iraq
http://www.iraqfoundation.org/hr.html
Iraq has been a police state in the Stalinist model since July 1968, when Saddam Hussein and his collaborators seized power in the name of the Ba'th Party. The state is built on an interlocking framework of internal security organizations, secret intelligence services, Ba'th party security apparatus, with additional layers of military and militia organs designed for internal repression. The principal business of government is domestic repression and aggressive militarism. Thus Iraq devoted 37.9% of its oil revenue to military expenditure in 1975, 75% in 1980, 77% in 1985, and 89% in 1989.
From 1980-1991, the Iraqi regime provoked two wars ruinous to the nation. The first, against Iran, lasted from September 1980 to August 1988. An investigation by the United Nations judged that Iraq was the aggressor. There are no exact figures for casualties, but they are believed to number one million on both sides, including dead and wounded. The Iraqi treasury, which held $35 billion in reserves at the start of the war, was depleted. Iraq emerged from the war with a crippling external debt of $46 billion, with a further $40 billion contributed by Arab states. Iraqis lived the last years of the war in a state of siege, with dwindling resources and sealed off from the world. Cities in the south like Basra were ruined, and Iraq's infrastructure lay in tatters. Meanwhile, all of Iraq's revenue, including heavy borrowing and outright assistance, were steered to the military industry. Its human resources were diverted to the war, while other Arabs and foreign nationals had to be imported to carry on the country's business.
In August 1991 the regime plunged Iraqis into the abyss of a second, far deadlier war. The invasion of Kuwait in August 1991 was kept a secret from even senior military officers. Iraq's unilateral abolition of the state of Kuwait and its annexation as a province of Iraq was accompanied by crimes of war documented by Kuwaitis and Allied forces. Iraqis, who had not yet recovered from the consequences of the war with Iran, witnessed the destruction of their country and more needless deaths. The sanctions regime imposed as a result of the Iraqi leadership's policies, has killed children, reduced Iraqis to the status of paupers, and set back Iraq's development by decades. And because of the regime's policies, Iraq now has an additional war compensation bill of $200 billion.
The history of internal repression is a story of repeated state violence against the Iraqi people, mass murder, execution, torture, extra-judicial detention, rape, forced displacement and deportation. In pursuit of the hegemonic appetite of its leader, the regime forced Iraqis into two wars that killed hundreds of thousand of Iraqis, ruined Iraq's economy, and robbed Iraqi children of their future.
State violence is practiced against any form of real or imagined political opposition or rivalry. Thus some of the first victims of the regime were military officers who had aided the Ba'thist coup of 1968. Non-Ba'thists were purged from state institutions. Fellow Ba'th party members who were viewed as possible future rivals were either removed or liquidated. Elimination of Ba'thists continued throughout the 1970s, and was stepped up on the accession of Saddam Hussein to the presidency in 1979. Finally, the party became a pliant tool in the hands of a single individual.
In 1971 the regime began its campaign of deporting Iraqi citizens to Iran, which was to continue into the 1980s. The campaign gathered additional momentum in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Estimates put the number of people deported at 250,000-300,000, including Arabs, Kurds, and Turkoman, almost all of them Shi'a. Shi'a religious scholars were executed throughout this period.
In 1975, the regime waged its first war against the Kurdish citizens of Iraq, forcing thousands to flee to neighboring countries. In 1987, the regime carried out the notorious "Anfal" campaign, an operation of extermination that killed thousands of Kurds, with 100,000-180,000 more deemed "disappeared". Waves of Kurds fled across Iraq's borders to avoid the pursuit of the Iraqi army.
In 1978, the Iraqi regime turned against the Iraqi Communist Party and carried out a wave of mass executions and detentions against ICP members. ICP sources estimate the number of members killed at 7,000.
In 1988 the regime used chemical weapons against the Kurdish town of Halabja, killing over 5,000 civilians and leaving a legacy of environmental poisoning that affects newborns even today.
In March 1991, immediately following the Gulf war, the Iraqi regime turned its Republican Guard units against citizens who had risen in rebellion against the regime's oppression. Two million Kurds fled across the mountains into Turkey and Iran, as many children and elderly died of exposure and starvation. In the south, the regime's then defense minister boasted that the Republican Guard had killed 300,000 people. Conservative estimates place the number of dead at 30,000.
From 1992-1995, the regime waged a military and environmental campaign against the ancient region of the southern marshes, draining the waters, burning villages, killing and arresting civilian inhabitants. As many as 300,000 marsh Arabs are believed to have been driven away from their homes. Many thousands were forced to flee to Iran, where they live in refugee camps. The regime continues to wage war on the inhabitants of the region surrounding the marshes: villages have been razed, inhabitants have been killed in shelling and men have been jailed.
Since 1992, the Iraqi regime has conducted a campaign of ethnic cleansing against Kurds and Turkomans in the Karkuk province (Ta'mim). Several thousand families have been evicted from their homes, stripped of their identification cards (and their ration cards), lost their property and possessions, and told to leave the area.
Human rights abuses by the state are practiced daily in Iraq, against all sectors of the population indiscriminately. The prisons are overflowing, and the regime periodically conducts "prison-cleaning": mass executions to reduce the population of inmates. Officers and officials are executed regularly for their alleged involvement in conspiracies. Families are thrown out of their homes, stripped of their assets and forcibly deported to other parts of the country.
In 1993, the International Commission of Jurists said that there was "sufficient evidence of the fact that torture has become widespread in Iraqi prisons" and deplored the fact that Iraq "disregards the most important right, namely the right to life." The UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Iraq said in November 1999 "Extreme and brutal force is threatened and applied without hesitation and with total impunity to control the population" and has frequently expressed the sentiment that the human rights situation inside Iraq is worse than any country since the end of World War II.
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Iraq Foundation -- human rights in Iraq
http://www.iraqfoundation.org/hr.html
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Scheffer's Satement on Iraq
August 3, 2000
Ambassador David Scheffer, Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes issues, held a briefing on August 2nd to mark the 10th Anniversary of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait below is the text of the statement:
Permit me to remind everyone of what happened in Kuwait 10 years ago. Terms such as brutal, aggression and war crimes barely begin to describe the reality of what Saddam Hussein's forces did during six and a half months of occupation of Kuwait. We need to remember that reality to understand why the international community, and not just the United States, should hold accountable those who gave the orders for these crimes to be committed.
After the liberation, US Army war crimes investigators and lawyers conducted a comprehensive assessment of Iraqi war crimes. Kuwaiti authorities have since conducted even more comprehensive investigations. Between August 2nd, 1990, and the liberation of Kuwait, we now know that Iraqi forces killed approximately 1,000 civilians. Investigators documented at least two dozen torture sites in Kuwait City. Photographic evidence confirms torture by amputation or injury to various body parts, including eyes, ears, tongues, noses, lips and genitals. Electric shocks were applied to every sensitive body part. Electric drills were used to penetrate chests, legs or arms of victims. Some victims were killed in acid baths. Women were sexually assaulted. Members of families were sometimes forced to watch as other family members were dragged from their homes and shot dead by Iraqi forces.
In addition, as Saddam Hussein's forces were forced to flee Kuwait in February 1991, he ordered his forces to destroy or release into the Gulf what turned out to be between 7 and 9 million barrels of oil; 590 oil well heads were damaged or destroyed, 508 were set on fire, and 82 were damaged so that oil and gas flowed freely from them. If ever there was a case of a gross violation of military necessity and wanton destruction, the oil fields of Kuwait was such a case.
There is also clear evidence that Iraqi forces engaged in systematic looting, which is a war crime. The orders to loot Kuwait are so clear and widespread that it seems as though Saddam Hussein's son Uday must have thought Kuwait was his personal used car lot. Equipment from universities and hospitals were systematically looted and sent to Iraq.
In addition to the crimes against Kuwait and the Kuwaiti people, Iraqi forces took thousands of hostages and used many of them as human shields, which is a violation of the Geneva Conventions. A number of third-country nationals were murdered or sexually assaulted by Iraqi soldiers. All but 2 of the 21 US soldiers who were taken prisoner during the Gulf War were mistreated, in violation of the Geneva Conventions. More than 600 Kuwaitis remain unaccounted for to this day. The fact that Iraq continued to hold Iranian prisoners of war more than ten years after the end of the Iran-Iraq War gives us hope to this day that these Kuwaitis are alive.
Today, we have access to the evidence of crimes that have been committed against the Kuwaiti people and their environment. The Kuwaitis have done an outstanding job in gathering the evidence of the atrocities committed against them. Block by block, they have documented Saddam's campaign against the Kuwaiti people. Through translations of thousands of documents captured by Kuwaiti forces during the liberation, the Center for Research and Studies on Kuwait and other Kuwaiti universities and research centers have compiled an extensive record of the crimes committed on the orders of Saddam Hussein. For our part, the United States is doing a lot to assist in the documentation of the crimes committed by Saddam Hussein's forces in Kuwait. For example, I am announcing today that we have begun to declassify and make available through the nongovernmental organization The Iraq Foundation the first of many documents captured by American forces during the liberation of Kuwait.
These first few documents give a sampling of what is in these thousands of documents. They describe hostage-taking, looting, wanton destruction of property not justified by military necessity, and orders for the destruction of Kuwaiti oil wells. These documents are being made available through The Iraq Foundation's website, which is www.iraqfoundation.org. By collecting and examining the evidence we are working hard to bring Saddam Hussein to justice. We believe the evidence justifies an international tribunal like what exists now for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. In addition, where other countries have laws that permit prosecution under international treaties like the Torture Convention, we encourage them to apply those laws.
By collecting and examining the evidence, we are working to hold Saddam Hussein and his top henchmen accountable for two decades of crimes against the peoples of Iraq, Iran and Kuwait. Thank you.
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Iraq: Conference Highlights Human Rights Abuses
By Beatrice Hogan
http://www.google.com/search?as_q=%22saddam+hussein%22+%22human+rights%22+iraq&num=100&hl=en...
Human rights activists are expressing outrage over what they say is Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's crimes against the people of Iraq. Calls to bring the Iraqi leader to justice gained momentum during the weekend at the Iraqi Opposition Conference in New York. RFE/RL's Beatrice Hogan reports:
New York, 1 November 1999 (RFE/RL) -- Human rights activists say Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, operating within a closed regime, continues to commit crimes with impunity against the people of Iraq.
Human rights advocates rallied during the weekend at the Iraqi Opposition Conference in New York to gain international support, network with Iraqi dissidents and bring Saddam to justice.
Ann Clwyd, member of the British Parliament, chairs Indict, a London-based organization launched in 1997 that aims to bring Iraqi war criminal suspects to justice. Speaking to RFE/RL at the conference, Clwyd explains why Iraq must account for its actions.
"Any country that signs the convention on torture or the convention on genocide is obliged by those rules to prosecute someone who comes into their country and is thought to be guilty of torture or genocide."
But gaining an international consensus to bring Saddam to justice is not easy. U.S. Ambassador David Scheffer, who heads the war crimes division at the State Department, explains why:
"The United States government is well aware of the tension that exists in the international system today between a small number of governments that believe that there is something to be gained by maintaining relations with Saddam Hussein's regime and by weakening the UN sanctions program, and others who recognize the need to continue to isolate Saddam Hussein and work toward the day of his downfall and that of his closest associates."
Critics say the Iraqi leader has been able to capitalize on the international dissent and to demonize the West to his people, blaming UN economic sanctions - and those countries that enforce them - for causing the suffering of Iraqis. The sanctions were ordered by the UN Security Council following Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.
Indeed, disagreements within the international community have hampered the establishment of an International Criminal Court (ICC), which was set up by the 1998 Rome Treaty. Only four countries - out of the necessary 60 -- have so far ratified the treaty.
Even when the court is set up, its jurisdiction only covers crimes committed after its establishment. Under its provisions, Saddam would be immune for alleged crimes committed against Iraqis thus far.
This means that Saddam could walk for alleged crimes committed in the past, including the poison gas attacks on Iraqi Kurds in 1988 and on Iranians during the Iran-Iraq war; war crimes against Kuwaitis and the Coalition forces in 1990-1991; and illegal human experimentation in the 1990s.
Scheffer says that Saddam's crimes continue.
"In Iraq today, atrocities are being carried out by Saddam's army against the people of the southern marshes with a ferocity that is as widespread, albeit over a longer period of time, as that waged by [Yugoslav President Slobodan] Milosevic's goons against the Kosovar Albanians."
Documenting the crimes requires the help of eyewitnesses and "human rights detectives." Clwyd says a proper indictment - one that cannot be overturned by technicalities - requires precise evidence, including names, times, dates and places.
"I'm sure that there are plenty of people who have come out of Iraq who were in Kuwait at the time the Iraqis invaded, who perhaps knew something about the Iranian prisoners of war who were killed. Those people exist all over the world and we want to hear from them."
Human rights activists say this evidence Clwyd and other international advocates are collecting will provide the basis for Saddam's ultimate indictment. The human rights organizations represented at the conference say they hope to expand their research network on the front lines and collect more evidence from Saddam's alleged crime scenes in Iraq.
Scheffer is working behind the scenes to create a court where the evidence against Saddam can be presented. He says he is working with member states of the United Nations Security Council to establish an international criminal tribunal to close the legal loopholes and tighten the noose around the Iraqi regime.
01-11-99
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Alliance Internationale pour la Justice
http://www.wadinet.de/News/archiv/iraq/nw923_violations.htm
Human rights violations and Saddam Hussein's crimes
The debate on Iraq must be based on an overview of all the events that together have led to the current situation, for Iraq is a highly complex country, every facet of which merits closer inspection.
Iraq is a multi-ethnic and multi-religious state with a population of 23 million. It is composed of two main ethnic groups, the Arabs and the Kurds, the vast majority of whom are Muslim. Of these Muslims a majority are Shi'ites with a significant Sunni minority. But Iraq also has several other ethnic, religious and linguistic groups such as the Turkomans, other Kurdish groups such as the Yazidis, Shabaks, and Kakais, Assyrians and Armenians who make up a significant proportion of the Catholic and Orthodox Nestorian Christian minority, Saebas and so on.
In addition, although the Shi'ites comprise a majority of the population they enjoy only limited representation in the various spheres of power and are oppressed by the clannish Sunni power structure.
At the end of World War I, the decision to cobble together an Iraqi state without consulting the peoples in question and in so doing granting a monopoly on power to the Sunni Arab minority condemned the people of Iraq to perpetual conflict and instability.
A strategic region with vast oil riches, Iraq - and in particular the Iraqi people - were left in the clutches of an unscrupulous, machiavellian dictator. The exactions committed by the regime were hushed up for years, concealed in the conspiratorial silence of the international community.
Human rights violations and the regime's crimes have always been kept in the background. Since Saddam Hussein took power, Iraq has been home to all manner of crimes. Any proposed solution for the future of Iraq must in no way rehabilitate a regime guilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.
The system of government established by Saddam Hussein only serves the interests of a family that pillages the country's wealth for its profit while martyring a helpless population. There is no room for human liberties in Iraq. All associations, unions and newspaper are controlled by the government. Civil society cannot exist in a country where the majority of resources are used either to develop a host of repressive tools, or to produce or buy arms.
Below are some examples that illustrate the extremely serious nature of these violations:
** two bloody wars leading to the deaths of Iraqi civilians and inhabitants of neighbouring countries;
** elimination of one million people (5% of the population) since Saddam Hussein took power (this figure does not includes victims of wars with neighbouring countries). Not even the Sunni minority and his own family were spared;
** disappearance of 8,000 men in Kurdistan (Barzan region) and 10,000 Feyli Kurds;
** destruction of 4,500 Kurdish towns and villages;
deportation of more than one million Kurds in southern Iraq and a quarter of a million Feyli Kurds to Iran;
** continuation of the policy of ethnic cleansing in Kurdish regions under Baghdad's control, such as Kirkuk, Sinjar, Khanaqin, Mandeli, Makhmour, Tuz and Mossul;
** destruction of more than 150 Assyro-Chaldean villages, along with their ancient monasteries and churches, and repression targeting the Turkoman minority;
**disappearance of more than 180,000 people during Anfal campaigns. UN Special Rapporteur Max Van der Stoel said that these campaigns were a form of genocide;
** massive deployment of chemical weapons (gas) against the Kurdish population in Halabja;
** deployment of more than 10 million anti-personnel mines in the Kurdish region (nearly 15,000 individuals have been killed or wounded since the end of the Gulf War);
** inhumane and degrading treatment (decrees legalising the amputation of various parts of the body);
** systematic torture, including the rape of women;
** beheading of women (at least 130 women were executed between June 2000 and April 2001 for alleged prostitution);
** destruction and systematic drainage of the marshlands of southern Iraq;
** summary executions (2000 prisoners in March 1998 in just one day in the Abu Greb prison as part of the 'prison cleansing' operation).
In humanitarian terms, despite various UN resolutions the Iraqi regime has used sanctions as weapons of repression and propaganda by taking its own people hostage.
Despite a steadily rising income under the 'food for oil' resolution, plus additional exports to neighbouring countries providing a heaven-sent source of non-UN-controlled income, the people of Iraq still have trouble surviving.
The distribution system deprives the families of government opponents and all those who do not pledge their allegiance to the regime of the essential minimum for survival. Nearly 50% of income from the 'food for oil' resolution is not spent on the population but on the regime's leadership. The use of protein- and vitamin-enriched flours is prevented by the government, aggravating malnutrition and leading to serious medical consequences.
As staggering as that may seem, exports of foods and medicines to other countries continue.
WHO has pointed out that the government is very slow to state which medicines are needed. In a letter sent on 14 February 2001 to the Iraqi authorities, the UN Secretary-General urged Baghdad to feed its people better and asked for clarification on the extremely limited resources the authorities devote to health care and child nutrition.
Today, there are increasing calls for the sanctions to be lifted. There is no doubt whatsoever that the people of Iraq are suffering, but the key role played by the Iraqi authorities - who are in large part responsible for this suffering - must be clearly identified.
A simple comparison with northern Iraq shows that in the autonomous region governed by the Kurds, infant mortality is on the decrease, even when compared to figures from before the second Gulf War. Moreover, the incidence of malnutrition is much lower than in the rest of Iraq.
The Kurds have rebuilt their towns and villages that were destroyed in the wars waged by the Iraqi government. They enjoy relative stability, not because the portion allocated to them under the 'food for oil' resolution is too big, as the Iraqi government maintains (this region has 805,000 internally displaced persons), but because the United Nations and non-governmental organisations go about their business unhindered in collaboration with the Kurdish authorities.
Advances unprecedented in Iraq's history are being made in this region with the development of a civil society, media diversity and rights for ethnic and religious minorities. These advances must be supported by Europe. Indeed, Europe must pledge to guarantee the security of the Kurd population who are constantly under threat from the Iraqi government.
What future can we imagine for the 3.5 million people living in northern Iraq if, in the debate on the situation in Iraq, no long-term protection is found for them and if the 13% of oil income that the Kurdish administration can use to feed its population is eliminated?
With its track record of violating human rights and international humanitarian law, Saddam Hussein's regime and - if nothing is set up to protect the Kurds - the autonomous Kurdish region as well as the Kurdish people will be severely 'punished' and all aid they need to survive taken away. Fear of the regime and its violations can only encourage the people to flee to Europe and other parts of the world.
Studies carried out into the long-term impact of chemical weapons in Kurdistan show that survivors suffer multiple pathologies which appear years later. For instance, people affected by gas attacks and who initially seemed unharmed have subsequently developed respiratory, muscular and neurological diseases. The chemical and bacteriological products used have modified the DNA of contaminated individuals, which in turn will have a devastating impact on future generations in Kurdistan.
None of these victims has received any compensation. No programme has been set up to help these people receive the care they need.
The debate on Iraq must aim to come up with solutions to the serious problems facing all peoples living in Iraq.
R E CO M M E N D A T I O N S
ensure that the Iraqi government complies fully with the spirit and the letter of Security Council Resolution 688 on protecting the entire population of Iraq;
ensure the establishment of a mechanism to monitor the human rights situation and deploy human rights observers in Iraq;
call for the creation of an international commission to investigate disappearances throughout Iraq;
call for the release of prisoners of war from Iran, Kuwait and elsewhere. Exchanges with Iran have led to the release of prisoners, but Iraq stopped attending ICRC discussion meetings on Kuwaiti prisoner of war issues several years ago. Like the Gulf War hostages used as human shields, these prisoners are a means for putting pressure on the governments in question;
demand that Iraq halt the policy of 'Arabisation' and ethnic cleansing in the Kurdish regions, racial discrimination, the policy of destroying marshlands in the south, and the repression and deportation of civilians under the control of the Iraqi government;
take on board the prevailing situation in Iraqi Kurdistan and the progress made in terms of humanitarian issues, reconstruction and human rights;
ensure the long-term, unceasing protection of the Kurdish and Shi'ite populations, who must benefit - both in Iraq's interior and its border areas - from genuine, long-lasting security. The protection and overfly interdiction zone must be extended to include the Kurdish regions on the other side of the 36th parallel;
establish an ad hoc International Criminal Tribunal to judge the Iraqi regime. In November 2000, the European Parliament approved the request to establish just such a tribunal, which should make it possible to distinguish between the Iraqi people and its leaders who are guilty of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. The people of Iraq can finally believe that the international community's concern about them is genuine. Too many arms have been sold and economic contracts signed while turning a blind eye to the grave violations of fundamental rights. This would also allow victims and their families to obtain the reparations they require to survive, and would give civil society as a whole a chance to look forward to a more positive outlook in the future (as was the case in the former Yugoslavia).
It is critical that the European Parliament respect its commitments and take action vis-a-vis the Member States of the European Union and the UN Security Council so that the tribunal can be set up as soon as possible;
improve people's access to consumer goods and repair infrastructure needed for the survival of the Iraqi people.
Essential aid must be contributed as part of humanitarian programmes managed directly by UN agencies, not the Iraqi government. The 13% of oil income allocated to the Kurdish region must be maintained and managed by the autonomous Kurdish administration as is currently the case. The sanctions must affect the Iraqi leadership, not the Iraqi people. Any change in the sanction scheme must be made for the sole purpose of reducing the suffering of the civilian population, not to encourage the rehabilitation of the regime. The lifting of sanctions must therefore be accompanied by politically and diplomatically isolating the regime and its representatives;
call for a freeze on Iraqi assets, in particular those belonging to the Iraqi leadership. These funds must be used to compensate the families of Iraqis who have disappeared, the families of victims of terrorism by the Iraqi state, Kurdish families who have fallen prey to gas attacks and internal displaced persons who have been the victim of ethnic cleansing;
call for the maintenance of the arms monitoring mechanism in Iraq. All sales of arms to Iraq must be banned and very stringent financial controls established in order to prevent the regime from re-arming. Iraq's repeated refusals to comply with UN requests to let in disarmament teams are very worrying given that this government has caused two wars, gassed its own people and waged more than 20 years of war against the Kurds. Lifting the sanctions unconditionally will give the Iraqi government all the power and would allow it access to all its income in order to reinforce its military arsenal and its tools of repression.
http://www.i-a-j.org/droits_generalites.php?selectmenu=1&nommenu=Generalities
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08 February 2002
NGO Report Details Human Rights Abuses by Saddam Hussein
(Iraqi Women Are Among the Regime's Victims)
Washington -- Two human rights groups based in France have released a joint report, accusing the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein of committing "massive and systematic" human rights violations, particularly against women.
The report, "Iraq: An Intolerable, Forgotten, and Unpunished Repression," said in June 2000, the Iraqi regime began a campaign of public beheadings of women accused of being prostitutes, of opposing the regime or of being related to an opponent of the regime.
The report was researched and written by the Paris-based International Federation of Human Rights Leagues and the Human Rights Alliance (France)/Coalition for Justice in Iraq. Investigators working for the two groups gathered the information for their report during fact-finding missions in July 2001 to Jordan and Syria where they interviewed dozens of recently arrived Iraqi refugees, who gave eyewitness accounts of atrocities.
Eyewitnesses told the investigators that the beheadings of women took place in front of family members, including children, and the heads were publicly displayed over signs reading, "For the honor of Iraq," the report said. The report documents about 130 women who have been victimized in this campaign, but warned that the actual number may be higher.
The report was published in French on December 14, 2001. The English version was released on February 6, 2002, as Andreas Mavrommatis, Special Rapporteur of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights for the situation in Iraq, prepares to travel to Baghdad in February at the invitation of the regime in Baghdad.
Mavrommatis is the first U.N. human rights rapporteur to visit Iraq in a decade. Since 1991, when the Commission established the mandate of a special rapporteur on Iraq, Iraq has accepted only one visit. That mission was conducted in 1992 by the former Special Rapporteur Max van der Stoel.
In addition to atrocities against women, the report described the Iraqi regime's military training and indoctrination of children, arbitrary arrests and detentions, ethnic cleansing, and imposition of Saddam Hussein's personality cult.
"In Iraq, not a day passes without us hearing that someone from a family we know has been executed," one refugee is quoted as saying.
"For example, my neighbor's son was shot outside her house and no one could save him. When he died, the special security forces came and asked her to pay 50,000 Iraqi dinars per bullet to be able to recover the body. She sold everything she had and paid to be able to bury him, on her own, with two police cars accompanying her, and the police buried him. Three days later they came to demolish her house and she was left on the street with her three daughters. I saw that with my own eyes," the refugee added.
Human rights violations are also directed against children, according to the report. It describes how children, as young as five, are recruited into the "Ashbal Saddam," or "Saddam's Cubs." Indoctrinated to adulate Saddam Hussein and denounce family members, they are also subjected to military training, which includes cruelty to animals.
"From the age of nine, children are put through proper military training. A firearm is a physical part of the child's body," a mother was quoted as saying.
The report gives accounts of children being subjected to arrest and imprisonment because of the opposition of one or both of their parents to the regime. For example, a woman from Najaf, whose husband had been executed for refusing to preach in favor of the war against Iran, said that her two children, aged eleven and thirteen, were imprisoned for three and six months, and that she had to pay to get them released.
Another witness said that the imprisonment of women and children is used to pressure opponents of the regime.
"In 1999, while I was under arrest in Abu Ghreb, I saw a group of women brought into prison with children of between three and five. It became standard practice to arrest women and children to put pressure on husbands, brothers, and father. They were kept from one to three months and released only if they confessed," the witness said.
"We children were between four and twelve in 1981 when we were taken to prison with my mother and my aunt. I can remember the hunger that I felt. When we ran to embrace my mother, who had instruments on either side of her head and was screaming, we felt pain because she was full of electric current," another witness quoted in the report said.
The human rights report provides detailed about the Iraqi regime's activities in ethnic cleansing and forced population removal, known as Arabization, which is responsible in large part for the roughly one million internally displaced people in Iraq.
Under Arabization, many members of the Kurdish, Turkmen, and Assyrian populations have been forced to leave their oil-rich regions in the north and relocate to other areas. Under this policy, non-Arabs are prohibited from inheriting or buying businesses or real estate. Their farmland is confiscated, and they are routinely subject to harassment, arrest, torture, and expulsion, according to the report.
An estimated three to four million Iraqis have fled their country, making Iraqis the second largest refugee population in the world, after Afghans, according to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The Iraqi exile community, according to the report, lives in fear, and high-profile Iraqi exiles have been assassinated in their countries of refuge.
The report says many Iraqi exiles expressed bitterness and despair at the silence surrounding the large-scale repression by the Iraqi regime.
"The terror in Iraq is ubiquitous," the report says. "Every Iraqi, man, woman and child is a potential enemy -- of the party, of the regime, of the leader Saddam Hussein -- and must be dealt with accordingly."
The full report, published in French by the International Federation of Human Rights Leagues and the Coalition for Justice in Iraq, is available at www.fidh.org/magmoyen/rapport/2001pdf/iq315f.pdf.
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Iraq
Amnesty International exposes recent abuses
http://web.amnesty.org/ai.nsf/Index/MDE140131999?OpenDocument&of=COUNTRIES\IRAQ
"...they forced me to lay down on the floor. The hooded man started beating the soles of my feet with a cable. A few minutes later I lost consciousness... Every night from 12 until around 4 am they would call me into the interrogation room and would do the same thing ... They also threatened that they would use electric shocks..."
Against all the odds "A", a 59-year-old medical doctor in Baghdad, bribed a prison officer and fled the country. She told her story to Amnesty International just three weeks ago. Her crime? She was arrested in June 1999 on suspicion that she had contacts with an Iraqi opposition group. She denies the accusation.
"Those suspected of any involvement in opposition activities can expect to be arrested without a warrant; held in secret detention, without access to family and lawyers; be brutally tortured -- including in one case known to Amnesty International, having their eyes gouged out --and finally, could face execution," the human rights organization revealed in a new report today.
In its report, Amnesty International is shining a spotlight on these grave human rights violations in Iraq, that are taking place systematically and with total impunity. These violations range from arbitrary arrest and detention, to torture, extrajudicial and judicial executions after unfair trials, "disappearances" and forcible expulsions on the basis of ethnic origin.
The majority of the victims of Iraq's relentless repression are Shi'a Muslims in Southern Iraq and in some districts of Baghdad, as well as Kurds in the north. Summary executions are being carried out on a regular basis. The Iraqi Government rarely announces executions or makes public any official statistics in relation to the death penalty. In many cases it is impossible to determine whether the reported executions are judicial or extrajudicial given the secrecy surrounding them.
On 11 July 1999 Ibrahim Amin al-'Azzawi, a 70-year-old lawyer, was executed. His family, who have now fled the country, believed it was because his son-in-law, Riyadh Baqer al-Hilli, a Shi'a Muslim, was suspected of involvement in underground anti-government activities. No information on any charge, trial or sentencing was ever available. No information is available to Amnesty International either as to the fate of Riyadh, who was also arrested and taken away.
"This is the length the Iraqi security forces are prepared to go to identify any opposition views and silence them," Amnesty International said. "This has created a climate of terror which has forced thousands of Iraqi nationals to flee the country illegally and seek asylum elsewhere."
In the last 18 months alone, a number of prominent Shi'a Muslim clerics have been killed in Southern Iraq in circumstances suggesting that they may have been killed by government forces or forces acting on government orders. This includes the assassination of a prominent Shi'a cleric, Ayatollah Sadeq al-Sadr, on 19 February 1999, which sparked clashes between the security forces and armed Islamist opposition groups. Dozens were left dead on both sides, and arbitrary mass arrests and summary executions followed.
Thousands of Kurdish families have been forcibly expelled by the security forces from their homes in the north to areas controlled by the two Kurdish political parties in Iraqi Kurdistan on the basis of their ethnic origin.
Amnesty International is making a number of recommendations to the Iraqi Government. This includes:
•adopting the necessary legal and practical measures to ensure effective implementation of all the provisions contained in international human rights treaties ratified by Iraq;
•releasing all political detainees held without charge or trial if they are not to be promptly charged with any recognizable criminal offence; and
•stopping the policy of forcible expulsions of non-Arab families.
Amnesty International also believes that the Security Council, as the body that has imposed sanctions on Iraq, should give urgent attention to the humanitarian situation in Iraq, and take all necessary measures to protect the rights of the Iraqi population.
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IRAQ
Systematic torture of political prisoners
http://web.amnesty.org/ai.nsf/Index/MDE140082001?OpenDocument&of=COUNTRIES\IRAQ
1 INTRODUCTION
Torture is used systematically against political detainees in Iraqi prisons and detention centres. The scale and severity of torture in Iraq can only result from the acceptance of its use at the highest level. There are no attempts to curtail or prevent such violations or punish those responsible. This total disregard for a basic human right, the right not to be tortured or ill-treated, grossly violates international human rights law which prohibits torture in all circumstances. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which Iraq ratified in 1971, states that 'No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment'(Article 7).
Amnesty International has over the years received numerous reports of torture and interviewed hundreds of torture victims. The organization has also published many reports documenting a wide range of human rights violations in the country, including torture and ill-treatment. Victims of torture in Iraq have been subjected to a wide range of forms of torture. The bodies of many of those executed had evident signs of torture, including the gouging out of the eyes, marks of severe beatings and electric shocks to various parts of the body, when returned to their families. Some detainees died as a result of torture. Many torture victims now live with permanent physical or psychological damage.
Torture is used both to extract information or confessions from detainees and as a punishment. Political detainees are tortured immediately following arrest and their torture generally takes place in the headquarters of the General Security Directorate in Baghdad or in its branches in Baghdad and in the governorates. Torture also takes place in the headquarters of the General Intelligence (al-Mukhabarat al-'Amma) in al-Hakimiya in Baghdad, its branches elsewhere, as well as in police stations and detention centres such as al-Radhwaniya. Detainees in these places are held incommunicado for months or even years without access to any lawyers or family visits.
Victims of torture have included suspected government opponents who range from army, security and intelligence officers suspected of having contacts with the Iraqi opposition abroad or accused of plotting against the government, to followers of leading Shi'a Muslim religious personalities. Torture has also been used against women suspected of having links with Shi'a Islamist groups in the country or simply because of family links. In many cases relatives of those active in the Iraqi opposition abroad have been tortured or ill-treated as a way of putting pressure on those opposition leaders to cease their activities.
Iraq's legislation prohibits the use of torture. Article 22(a) of Iraq's Interim Constitution states that 'the dignity of the person is safeguarded. It is inadmissible to cause any physical or psychological harm'. Article 127 of the Code of Criminal Procedure states that 'it is not permissible to use any illegal means to influence the accused to secure his statement. Mistreatment, threatening to harm, inducement, threats, menace, psychological influence, and the use of narcotics, intoxicants and drugs are all considered illegal means.' In fact the Iraqi Penal Code criminalizes the use of torture by any public servant. Article 333 states that 'any employee or public servant who tortures, or orders the torture of an accused, witness, or expert in order to compel that person to confess to committing a crime, to give a statement or information, to hide certain matters, or to give a specific opinion will be punished by imprisonment or detention. The use of force or threats is considered to be torture'. Amnesty International is not aware of any instances where officials suspected of torture of detainees have been brought to justice.
In the mid-1990s Iraq introduced judicial punishments such as amputation of hand and foot, branding of forehead and cutting off of the ears, and many people have been left with permanently mutilated bodies as a result of such punishments. Such punishments have been described as cruel, inhuman and degrading by international human rights bodies. The Iraqi Government justified the introduction of these punishments by the increase in the crime rate which it attributed to the impact of economic sanctions imposed on the country since 1990.
Iraq continues to be subjected to comprehensive trading sanctions imposed by UN Security Council resolutions since 1990 in the aftermath of its occupation of Kuwait. The sanctions have, according to many international experts, journalists, non-governmental organizations and UN agencies, crippled Iraq's economic infrastructure and have resulted in the breakdown of the socio-cultural fabric of the society, acute poverty, malnutrition, wide-spread corruption and crime, and the reported deaths of over half a million children under the age of five.(1) It is, however, the responsibility of the Iraqi Government to uphold the rule of law and respect of human rights.
The international community has been concerned about the human rights situation in Iraq for many years and therefore decided in 1991 to appoint a Special Rapporteur in order to report regularly to the UN Commission on Human Rights on the situation of human rights in Iraq.
2 METHODS OF TORTURE
Torture victims in Iraq have been blindfolded, stripped of their clothes and suspended from their wrists for long hours. Electric shocks have been used on various parts of their bodies, including the genitals, ears, the tongue and fingers. Victims have described to Amnesty International how they have been beaten with canes, whips, hosepipe or metal rods and how they have been suspended for hours from either a rotating fan in the ceiling or from a horizontal pole often in contorted positions as electric shocks were applied repeatedly on their bodies. Some victims had been forced to watch others, including their own relatives or family members, being tortured in front of them.
Other methods of physical torture described by former victims include the use of Falaqa (beating on the soles of the feet), extinguishing of cigarettes on various parts of the body, extraction of finger nails and toenails and piercing of the hands with an electric drill. Some have been sexually abused and others have had objects, including broken bottles, forced into their anus. In addition to physical torture, detainees have been threatened with rape and subjected to mock execution. They have been placed in cells where they could hear the screams of others being tortured and have been deprived of sleep. Some have stayed in solitary confinement for long periods of time. Detainees have also been threatened with bringing in a female relative, especially the wife or the mother, and raping her in front of the detainee. Some of these threats have been carried out.
3 VICTIMS OF TORTURE
3.1 Followers of Shi'a Clerics
Over the years many victims of torture have been Shi'a Muslims from Baghdad or from southern Iraq. They were arrested and tortured because they were suspected of anti-government activities. Many of them were students at al-Hawza al-'Ilmiya in al-Najaf in the south, which is considered to be one of the most prestigious theological teaching institutions in Shi'a Islam. Mass arrests and torture often took place during the periods of unrest which southern Iraq has witnessed intermittently over the last few years. The murder in al-Najaf of Ayatollah Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr, a prominent leading Shi'a cleric, and his two sons on 19 February 1999(2) sparked off riots in predominantly Shi'a districts in Baghdad, especially in Saddam City (also known as al-Thawra City), and in southern towns of al-Hilla, Karbala', al-Nassiriya and al-Najaf. Protests in Saddam City resulted in the killings of dozens of protesters by the security forces and the arrest of hundreds of people. The riots lasted for three days and according to press reports at least 100 people were killed in Baghdad alone.(3)
A month later riots erupted in Basra for three days between 17 and 20 March 1999 during which the local headquarters of the ruling Ba'ath Party was attacked and several government officials were killed by armed Iraqi Shi'a Islamists, some of whom were reportedly sent by Iraqi Shi'a opposition groups based in Iran. As soon as government forces regained control of Basra on 20 March the repression started with dozens of people executed following torture and hundreds of others were arrested and tortured.
On 16 April 1999 violent clashes were reported between protesters and security forces when the latter attempted to prevent Shi'a Muslims from taking part in Friday prayers at the al-Hikma Mosque in Saddam City in Baghdad. These clashes reportedly left scores of protesters dead. An eye witness told Amnesty International that 'when people were prevented from prayers they started shouting slogans against the authorities. Some protesters were armed and started shooting at the security forces but the latter were using tanks against the population and many people, including children, were killed. Initially the security forces did not remove the dead bodies. They waited for families and relatives to come and collect them so that they could arrest them. However, the families were too frightened to do so and in the end the security forces had to collect the bodies to clean the streets.' As a retaliation, armed Islamist activists killed the director of Abu Ghraib Prison, Major Hassan al-'Amiri, and several other security officers the following day in an attack on a house close to the mosque, which was used as a temporary headquarters for the security forces.
The Iraqi government denied all reports of unrest which followed the assassination of Ayatollah al-Sadr. However in mid-May 1999 a government official admitted for the first time that disturbances had taken place in Basra claiming that 'some agents who came from behind the border, from Iran, carried out sabotage acts in the city of Basra on March 17 in order to harm Iraq and its people'.(4)
Among those arrested in Basra were several university lecturers. One person A (name withheld) told Amnesty International that he was arrested on 7 June 1999 at night from his home in Basra. He was taken to the General Intelligence prison in Basra and was tortured during interrogation. Methods of torture included extinguishing cigarettes on his feet and beating. He was also made to lie naked on the floor of the prison's concrete courtyard which was unshaded from the heat of the sun. He was then dragged by his arms from one side of the courtyard to another. This left his back, buttocks and thighs bleeding. A was taken to a special courtroom in Basra. There was a judge and several security men in the court. The judge told him that he was guilty of six charges, including criticising the government in his lectures and collecting money to help families of those executed in Basra. A stated that he was innocent. He was then hit by a security officer on the back of his head with a weapon which left his head bleeding. He was taken back to the prison. He was then released on 19 July 1999 after his family had bribed local miliary and security officials. A few other lecturers remain detained until now after they had been tortured. They include Khaled al-'Adeli and 'Abd al-Hussain Hanin, lecturers in Chemistry and Computing, respectively, at Basra University. They are reported to be still detained at the General Intelligence prison in Basra.
During and following these events hundreds of followers of Ayatollah al-Sadr were arrested and were subjected to torture. Dozens were later summarily tried and executed. Among them were Al-Shaikh Salim Jassem Sadkhan al-'Abboudi and al-Shaikh 'Ala' Hussain al-Shuwaili who were reportedly arrested in around June 1999 and were sentenced to death in May 2000 and executed a month later. Both were from Saddam City and their family homes were demolished by the security forces. Others executed during the same period after they had been tortured included al-Sayyid Sa'ad Mohammad 'Ali al-Nouri, Qassim Ghazi al-Shuwaili and al-Sayyid 'Amr al-Mussawi. Al-Shaikh Nazzar Kadhim al-Bahadli, a 29-year-old theology student from Saddam City, was arrested in June 1999 and was tortured for long periods in the building of Saddam Security Directorate. His wife, father and mother were reportedly brought to the building in August 1999 and were tortured in front of him to force him to confess to being one of those responsible for the disturbances in Saddam City. He was said to have confessed in order to spare his parents and his wife any further torture. They were released following his confession but he was sentenced to death later and was executed at the beginning of 2001.
Al-Shaikh Yahya Muhsin Ja'far al-Zeini, from Saddam City, is a 29-year-old former theology student in al-Hawza al-'Ilmiya in al-Najaf. On 2 July 1999 he was arrested in his parents' house following his arrival from al-Najaf. His father and two brothers had been detained as substitute prisoners until his arrest. Security men blindfolded him and took him to the building of Saddam Security Directorate. Once there, he was taken to a room and his blindfold was removed. He told Amnesty International:
' ... I saw a friend of mine, al-Shaikh Nasser Taresh al-Sa'idi, naked. He was handcuffed and a piece of wood was placed between his elbows and his knees. The two ends of the wood were placed on two high chairs and al-Shaikh Nasser was being suspended like a chicken. This method of torture is known as al-Khaygania (a reference to a former security director known as al-Khaygani). An electric wire was attached to al-Shaikh Nasser's penis and another one attached to one of his toes. He was asked if he could identify me and he said 'this is al-Shaikh Yahya'. They took me to another room and then after about 10 minutes they stripped me of my clothes and a security officer said 'the person you saw has confessed against you'. He said to me 'You followers of [Ayatollah] al-Sadr have carried out acts harmful to the security of the country and have been distributing anti-government statements coming from abroad. He asked if I have any contact with an Iraqi religious scholar based in Iran who has been signing these statements. I said 'I do not have any contacts with him'... I was then left suspended in the same manner as al-Shaikh al-Sa'idi. My face was looking upward. They attached an electric wire on my penis and the other end of the wire is attached to an electric motor. One security man was hitting my feet with a cable. Electric shocks were applied every few minutes and were increased. I must have been suspended for more than an hour. I lost consciousness. They took me to another room and made me walk even though my feet were swollen from beating.... They repeated this method a few times'.
Al-Shaikh Yahya was regularly subjected to electric shocks followed by beating on the feet. For two months he had to sleep on the floor with his hands tied behind his back and his face on the floor. He stated that this was more unbearable than being subjected to electric shocks. On one occasion Shaikh Yahya was suspended from a window for three days. Another method of torture that he described was that while suspended a heavy weight was attached to his genitals and was left hanging for some time. After five months of detention in the building of the Saddam Security Directorate al-Shaikh Yahya and 21 other detainees arrested at the same time were transferred to the Security Directorate of al-Rassafa district, also in Baghdad. He remained held without charge or trial until 14 April 2000 when he was released.
Al-Shaikh Mohammad 'Aziz Rahif al-'Aqqabi, a 27-year-old man married with children, was arrested in the early hours of 14 May 2000 in his house in Saddam City. He was accused of involvement in the murder of the head of Saddam Security Directorate which took place during the disturbances. He was held in Saddam Security Directorate during which he was tortured. In the first 15 days he was held in solitary confinement blindfolded and his hands tied behind his back. The blindfold was removed only during prayers. He stated to Amnesty International:
'...on the second day of my arrival I was taken to a room for interrogation. The blindfold was removed. The interrogator asked me a lot of questions about people I knew but I said I did not know them. Then he asked the guard to take me to al-Gannara [butcher's] room. Once inside the room the blindfold was removed again and the room was empty. I then had my hands tied with a telephone cable behind my back. I was made to stand on a barrel and then the guards encircled each of my upper arms with a tight belt. The belts had a knob. The knobs were tied to a rope and onto a horizontal rod. The guards then pushed the barrel I was standing on and I was left suspended. One guard then held me from the waist and started to pull me down. This was very painful. The interrogator asked the guard to tie my penis and one of my toes to an electric wire and onto an electric motor. He would then turn the electricity on and would increase it. The interrogator was also beating me with a stick on my back...'.
Al-Shaikh al-'Aqqabi was regularly tortured during the first 15 days of detention. He was made to confront one of his friends who under torture had told the interrogators that Shaikh al-'Aqqabi was involved in the killing of the head of Saddam Security Directorate. Al-Shaikh al-'Aqqabi 'confessed' to the killing under torture. However the details he gave about the circumstances surrounding the killing convinced the security officers interrogating him that he was not involved. Nevertheless he was kept detained without trial and was tortured further in order to extract from him information about activities of other followers of Ayatollah al-Sadr. He was released on 7 November 2000.
Iyyad Taresh Sajet al-Sa'idi, a 25-year-old former student at Baghdad's Institute of Fine Arts, was arrested together with three of his brothers, Salem, Hamid, Fahd, on 26 June 1999. They were arrested and held in Saddam Security Directorate as substitute prisoners because another brother, al-Shaikh Nasser Taresh Sajet al-Sa'idi was sought by the security authorities. When al-Shaikh Nasser, aged 31 and married with two children, was arrested on 30 June 1999 in al-Najaf where he had been studying theology, and was transferred to Saddam Security Directorate the brothers were not released. They were interrogated in connection with the activities of al-Shaikh Nasser who was a follower of Ayatollah al-Sadr. Each one of them was made to attend the torture of al-Shaikh Nasser. They themselves were tortured separately in front of their brother. Methods of torture included being left suspended and electric shocks being applied on their bodies including their genitals. They were tortured every two or three days during the first three weeks. The three brothers stayed in Saddam Security Directorate until 7 August 1999 when they were transferred to al-Rassafa Security Directorate. On 15 November 1999 they were taken back to Saddam Security Directorate and were released five days later. Following his release Iyyad al-Sa'idi discovered that he had been dismissed from the Institute of Fine Arts. His brother al-Shaikh Nasser was sentenced to death on 13 May 2000. At the beginning of 2001 he was transferred to al-Radhwaniya detention centre where he is reported to be still on death row. No information relating to the exact charges against him or his trial is available to Amnesty International.
3.2 Other suspected political opponents
B (name withheld), a Kurdish businessman from Baghdad, married with children, was arrested in December 1996 outside his house by plainclothes security men. Initially his family did not know his whereabouts and went from one police station to another enquiring about him. Then through friends they found out that he was being held in the headquarters of the General Security Directorate in Baghdad. The family was not allowed to visit him. Eleven months later in November 1997 the family was told by the authorities that he had been executed and that they should go and collect his body. His body reportedly bore evident signs of torture. His eyes were gouged out and the empty eye sockets were filled with paper. His right wrist and left leg were broken. The family was not given any reason for his arrest and subsequent execution. However, they suspected that he was executed because of his friendship with a retired army general who had links with the Iraqi opposition outside the country and who was arrested just before B.'s arrest and was also executed.
Salah Mahdi, a 35-year-old traffic warden in al-Mansur district in Baghdad, married with three children, was arrested together with scores of people following the attempted assassination of 'Uday Saddam Hussain, the eldest son of the President, in December 1996. He was accused of neglect because he did not notice the car the assailants used. He was held in the Special Security building and was severely tortured. He died, reportedly as a result of torture, in around June 1997. His family was told that he had died but the body was never returned to them for burial despite their repeated requests and to date his burial place reportedly remains unknown to the family.
'Abd al-Wahad al-Rifa'i, a 58-year retired teacher, who was executed by hanging after he had been held in prison without charge or trial for more than two years. On 26 March 2001 his family in Baghdad collected his body from the Baghdad Security Headquarters. The body reportedly bore clear marks of torture including the pulling out of toe-nails and swelling on his right eye. 'Abd Wahad al-Rifa'i, married with nine children, was arrested on 8 March 1999. Initially he was held in the headquarters of the General Security Directorate in Baghdad then transferred to the Baghdad Security Headquarters. He was believed to have been arrested because the authorities suspected that he was in contact with the Iraqi opposition abroad through his brother, 'Abd al-Rahim al-Rifa'i, an active anti-government opponent living in Europe. 'Abd al-Wahad al-Rifa'i's wife and children have reportedly had their food ration card withdrawn from them as a punishment and the authorities also stopped pension payments which 'Abd al-Wahad was receiving before his execution.
Hundreds of army and security officers have been arrested in recent years and many have been executed. Charges against them have included plotting to overthrow the government or having contacts with the opposition abroad. Many were subjected to torture. A former Iraqi General Intelligence officer C (name withheld) told Amnesty International that he was arrested in mid-1990s on suspicion of having contacts with the opposition. He was held in solitary confinement for two years at the headquarters of the General Intelligence in al-Hakimiya in Baghdad. During the two years of detention he endured prolonged and repeated torture in the interrogation room. He was left suspended for long hours from a horizontal rod. His hands and feet were tied behind his back and was suspended from the upper arms. He was also beaten with a cable on different parts of the body, especially on the back of his head. Electric shocks were applied to various parts of the body and a wooden stick was inserted into his anus. He was held in solitary confinement all this time. The cell he was held in was painted entirely in red, including the ceiling, the floor and the doors. The light was red too. It is often referred to as the 'red room' by former torture victims. He was released at the end of 1997. However he was rearrested again two years later also on suspicion of establishing contacts with the opposition and was held in the same detention centre. He was subjected to the same forms of torture as described above. C has now been left with permanent physical damage.
A number of former Iraqi political detainees were forced to undergo surgery to have a leg or arm amputated because they had been tortured for long periods of time and had developed gangrene for which they did not receive medical treatment. They had no choice but to sign statements in hospitals to the effect that it was solely their decision to have the amputation carried out.
4 TORTURE, ILL-TREATMENT AND EXTRAJUDICIAL EXECUTION OF WOMEN
Women too have been tortured, ill-treated and in some cases extrajudicially executed in Iraq. Su'ad Jihad Shams al-Din, a 61-year-old medical doctor, was arrested at her clinic in Baghdad on 29 June 1999 on suspicion that she had contacts with Shi'a Islamist groups. She was detained without charge or trial and was released on 25 July 1999. She was initially held in Baghdad Security Directorate and then was transferred to al-Ambar Security Directorate (also in Baghdad) on 5 July. Su'ad Jihad Shams al-Din was tortured frequently during interrogation by security men. Methods of torture included mostly beatings on the sole (falaqa) with a cable.
Some women have been raped in custody. They were detained and tortured because they were relatives of well known Iraqi opposition activists living abroad. The security authorities use this method to put pressure on Iraqi nationals abroad to cease their activities. For example, on 7 June 2000 Najib al-Salihi, a former army general who fled Iraq in 1995 and joined the Iraqi opposition, was sent a videotape showing the rape of a female relative. Shortly afterwards he reportedly received a telephone call from the Iraqi intelligence service, asking him whether he had received the 'gift' and informing him that his relative was in their custody.
In October 2000 dozens of women suspected of prostitution were beheaded without any judicial process in Baghdad and other cities after they had been arrested and ill-treated. Men suspected of procurement were also beheaded. The killings were reportedly carried out in the presence of representatives of the Ba'ath Party and the Iraqi Women's General Union. Members of Feda'iyye Saddam, a militia created in 1994 by 'Uday Saddam Hussain, used swords to execute the victims in front of their homes. Some victims were reportedly killed in this manner for political reasons.
Najat Mohammad Haydar, an obstetrician in Baghdad, was beheaded in October 2000 apparently on suspicion of prostitution. However, she was reportedly arrested before the introduction of the policy to behead prostitutes and was said to have been critical of corruption within the health services.
A woman known as 'Um Haydar' was beheaded reportedly without charge or trial at the end of December 2000. She was 25 years' old and married with three children. Her husband was sought by the security authorities reportedly because of his involvement in Islamist armed activities against the state. He managed to flee the country. Men belonging to Feda'iyye Saddam came to the house in al-Karrada district and found his wife, children and his mother. Um Haydar was taken to the street and two men held her by the arms and a third pulled her head from behind and beheaded her in front of the residents. The beheading was also witnessed by members of the Ba'ath Party in the area. The security men took the body and the head in a plastic bag, and took away the children and the mother-in-law. The body of Um Haydar was later buried in al-Najaf. The fate of the children and the mother-in-law remains unknown.
5 JUDICIAL PUNISHMENTS AMOUNTING TO TORTURE
In 1994 Iraq, through a series of decrees issued by the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC), the highest legislative body in the country, introduced judicial punishments amounting to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading punishments for at least 30 criminal offences, including theft in certain circumstances, monopolizing rationed goods, defaulting or deserting from military service and performing plastic surgery on an amputated arm or leg. The punishments consisted of the amputation of the right hand for a first offence, and of the left foot for a second offence, or the severance of one or both ears. People convicted under these decrees were also branded with an 'X' mark on the forehead.(5) The Iraqi Government argued that the introduction of these severe punishments were in response to the rising crime rate resulting from worsening economic conditions as a result of the UN imposed sanctions. The punishment of amputation of the auricle of the ears and the branding of the foreheads were suspended in 1996 by the Iraqi Government, through RCC Decree 81/96.
A number of former soldiers who suffered amputation or had their ears cut off have fled the country and now live with permanent physical damage as a result of such punishments. They include:
Ahmad Dakhel Kadhim, aged 30, from al-Samawa in al-Muthanna governorate in southern Iraq, was arrested on 1 September 1994. He had been serving in the army and then deserted following the invasion of Kuwait. He was in hiding until his arrest. He was taken to al-Samawa prison where he was detained for three days and then he was blindfolded and taken to an unknown location. He later found himself in al-Samawa hospital. He was made to lie on a bed and his hands were tied to each side of the bed. He was given an anaesthetic and when he recovered consciousness his right ear had been cut off as a punishment. He was taken back to the same prison and then transferred to other prisons until 23 December 1994, when he managed to escape from prison, and at the beginning of 1995 he fled the country. Ahmad Dakhel Kadhim has been sentenced to death in absentia.
Majed 'Abd al-Wahed al-Sarraji, aged 30 from Baghdad, was arrested on 15 September 1994 because he failed to join the army when he was called to service. He told Amnesty International:
'I was taken to al-Rashidiya al-Hussainiya Prison in Baghdad. I stayed there for three days without being interrogated. Then on the fourth day they called my name and took me to al-Nu'man Hospital in Baghdad. I was given anaesthetic by injection on my right arm and when I woke up I discovered that they had cut off a small part of my right ear... I was taken back to the same prison where I stayed for 40 days. I found out later that all my family had been forcibly transferred by the security forces to a camp in al-Nahrawan, just outside Baghdad. The camp was surrounded by armed guards. My family was held for three months and were then allowed back to the house. I was transferred to al-Fudhaylia detention centre in Baghdad and six weeks later I was taken to al-Diwaniya Prison, south of Baghdad. I was held in this prison for two years. I was in a room where there were around 50 detainees. All of us in the room had one or both ears cut off partially or completely...'.
Majed 'Abd al-Wahed al-Sarraji managed to escape with a few inmates from al-Diwaniya Prison. He was living in hiding until the beginning of 1999 when he managed to flee the country.
Amputations were very often publicized in Iraqi media, including television and newspapers. However, since the end of 1996, following international condemnation of these punishments, reports of amputations being carried out have rarely been publicized in Iraq. In August 1998 six members of Feda'iyye Saddam reportedly had their hands amputated by order of 'Uday Saddam Hussain. They were said to have been accused of theft and extortion from travellers in the southern city of Basra.
Amputation of the tongue was reportedly approved by the authorities in mid-2000 as a new penalty for slander or abusive remarks about the President or his family. In September 2000 a man reportedly had his tongue amputated by members of Feda'iyye Saddam in Baghdad for slandering the President. He was said to have been driven around after the punishment while information about his alleged offence was broadcast through a loudspeaker.
Amnesty International had publicly called on the Iraqi Government to abolish the penalties of amputation and branding and to provide reparation for all victims, or for families of victims. In November 1997 the UN Human Rights Committee, the international body of experts responsible for supervising the implementation of the ICCPR, examining Iraq's fourth periodic report expressed deep concern that Iraq 'has resorted to the imposition of cruel, inhuman and degrading punishments, such as amputation and branding, which are incompatible with Article 7 of the Covenant [ICCPR]' and urged that such punishments be ceased immediately.(6) The Committee recommended that 'a thorough review of existing temporary laws and decrees be undertaken with a view to ensuring their compliance with the provisions of the Covenant'.(7)
6 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Suspected government opponents and occasionally others are systematically and routinely tortured in Iraq. Some of the victims have died and many have been left with permanent physical and psychological damage. Others have been left with mutilated bodies resulting from the application of certain judicial punishments introduced by the government in the 1990s. Amnesty International's concerns about the systematic use of torture and about other gross human rights violations in the country are shared by the UN Commission on Human Rights which, in its 2001 session, condemned the 'widespread, systematic torture and the maintaining of decrees prescribing cruel and inhuman punishment as a penalty for offences'. The Commission called on the government to 'abrogate all decrees that prescribe cruel and inhuman punishment or treatment, including mutilation, and to ensure that torture and cruel punishment and treatment no longer occur'.(8)
Amnesty International is now urging the Iraqi Government to:
1 Ratify and implement fully in domestic law and practice the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment;
2 Repeal all decrees introduced in the 1990s which amount to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading punishments;
3 Set up an independent body to undertake prompt, thorough and impartial investigations into all allegations of torture and ill-treatment, including cases of death in custody, and ensure that the methods and findings of such investigations are made public;
4 Bring to justice anyone responsible for committing acts of torture and other serious human rights violations;
5 Issue a public declaration that torture, including rape, will not be tolerated under any circumstances;
6 Ensure that women prisoners are kept separately from men and supervised only by female prison officials;
7 Prohibit by law all extrajudicial executions;
8 Condemn publicly the practice of extrajudicial executions, and make clear to all authorities that such killings will not be tolerated;
9 Demonstrate respect for the inherent right to life by putting an immediate end to executions;
10 Pending the abolition of the death penalty in law for all offences, commute all outstanding death sentences and ensure that it is never applied in violation of Article 6(2)(9) of the ICCPR;
11 Declare a moratorium on executions as called for by the United Nations Commission on Human Rights in April 1999;(10)
Appendix
Amnesty International's 12-Point Program for the Prevention of Torture by Agents of the State
Torture is a fundamental violation of human rights, condemned by the international community as an offence to human dignity and prohibited in all circumstances under international law.
Yet torture persists, daily and across the globe. Immediate steps are needed to confront torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment wherever they occur and to eradicate them totally.
Amnesty International calls on all governments to implement the following 12-Point Program for the Prevention of Torture by Agents of the State. It invites concerned individuals and organizations to ensure that they do so. Amnesty International believes that the implementation of these measures is a positive indication of a government's commitment to end torture and to work for its eradication worldwide.
1. Condemn torture
The highest authorities of every country should demonstrate their total opposition to torture. They should condemn torture unreservedly whenever it occurs. They should make clear to all members of the police, military and other security forces that torture will never be tolerated.
2. Ensure access to prisoners
Torture often takes place while prisoners are held incommunicado — unable to contact people outside who could help them or find out what is happening to them. The practice of incommunicado detention should be ended. Governments should ensure that all prisoners are brought before an independent judicial authority without delay after being taken into custody. Prisoners should have access to relatives, lawyers and doctors without delay and regularly thereafter.
3. No secret detention
In some countries torture takes place in secret locations, often after the victims are made to 'disappear'. Governments should ensure that prisoners are held only in officially recognized places of detention and that accurate information about their arrest and whereabouts is made available immediately to relatives, lawyers and the courts. Effective judicial remedies should be available at all times to enable relatives and lawyers to find out immediately where a prisoner is held and under what authority and to ensure the prisoner's safety.
4. Provide safeguards during detention and interrogation
All prisoners should be immediately informed of their rights. These include the right to lodge complaints about their treatment and to have a judge rule without delay on the lawfulness of their detention. Judges should investigate any evidence of torture and order release if the detention is unlawful. A lawyer should be present during interrogations. Governments should ensure that conditions of detention conform to international standards for the treatment of prisoners and take into account the needs of members of particularly vulnerable groups. The authorities responsible for detention should be separate from those in charge of interrogation. There should be regular, independent, unannounced and unrestricted visits of inspection to all places of detention.
5. Prohibit torture in law
Governments should adopt laws for the prohibition and prevention of torture incorporating the main elements of the UN Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (Convention against Torture) and other relevant international standards. All judicial and administrative corporal punishments should be abolished. The prohibition of torture and the essential safeguards for its prevention must not be suspended under any circumstances, including states of war or other public emergency.
6. Investigate
All complaints and reports of torture should be promptly, impartially and effectively investigated by a body independent of the alleged perpetrators. The methods and findings of such investigations should be made public. Officials suspected of committing torture should be suspended from active duty during the investigation. Complainants, witnesses and others at risk should be protected from intimidation and reprisals.
7. Prosecute
Those responsible for torture must be brought to justice. This principle should apply wherever alleged torturers happen to be, whatever their nationality or position, regardless of where the crime was committed and the nationality of the victims, and no matter how much time has elapsed since the commission of the crime. Governments must exercise universal jurisdiction over alleged torturers or extradite them, and cooperate with each other in such criminal proceedings. Trials must be fair. An order from a superior officer must never be accepted as a justification for torture.
8. No use of statements extracted under torture
Governments should ensure that statements and other evidence obtained through torture may not be invoked in any proceedings, except against a person accused of torture.
9. Provide effective training
It should be made clear during the training of all officials involved in the custody, interrogation or medical care of prisoners that torture is a criminal act. Officials should be instructed that they have the right and duty to refuse to obey any order to torture.
10. Provide reparation
Victims of torture and their dependants should be entitled to obtain prompt reparation from the state including restitution, fair and adequate financial compensation and appropriate medical care and rehabilitation.
11. Ratify international treaties
All governments should ratify without reservations international treaties containing safeguards against torture, including the UN Convention against Torture with declarations providing for individual and inter-state complaints. Governments should comply with the recommendations of international bodies and experts on the prevention of torture.
12. Exercise international responsibility
Governments should use all available channels to intercede with the governments of countries where torture is reported. They should ensure that transfers of training and equipment for military, security or police use do not facilitate torture. Governments must not forcibly return a person to a country where he or she risks being tortured.
This 12-Point Program was adopted by Amnesty International in October 2000 as a program of measures to prevent the torture and ill-treatment of people who are in governmental custody or otherwise in the hands of agents of the state. Amnesty International holds governments to their international obligations to prevent and punish torture, whether committed by agents of the state or by other individuals. Amnesty International also opposes torture by armed political groups.
****
(1) In July 1999 Amnesty International issued a public statement explaining the organization's position on sanctions, as well as calling on the UN Security Council to give urgent attention to the humanitarian situation in Iraq and taking all necessary measures to protect the rights of the civilian population. For more information see the public statement entitled Iraq: UN Security Council Considers the Humanitarian Panel's Report on Sanctions, AI Index: MDE 14/06/99, issued on 28 July 1999.
(2) Ayatollah Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr and two of his sons, Hojjatu al-Islam al-Sayyid Mostafa al-Sadr and al-Sayyid Mu'ammal al-Sadr, were shot dead by armed men in al-Najaf. Their family were said to have been denied a funeral ceremony. Iraqi opposition groups blamed the government for their killing. Amnesty International condemned the killings and urged the government to set up an immediate, thorough and independent investigation.
(3) AFP report, 22 February 1999.
(4) Reuters report, 15 May 1999.
(5) For more details on these punishments see Amnesty International's report Iraq: State cruelty - branding, amputation and the death penalty, AI Index: MDE 14/03/96, published in April 1996
(6) UN Doc. CCPR/C/79/Add.84, para 12
(7) Ibid
(8) E/CN.4/RES/2001/14. 18 April 2001. Situation of human rights in Iraq.
(9) Article 6(2) of the ICCPR states that In countries which have not abolished the death penalty, sentence of death may be imposed only for the most serious crimes in accordance with the law in force at the time of the commission of the crime and not contrary to the provisions of the present Covenant and to the Convention on the Prevention and punishment of the Crime of Genocide. This penalty can only be carried out pursuant to a final judgment rendered by a competent court.
(10) In its Resolution 1999/61, adopted on 28 April the Commission called on all states which maintain the death penalty to establish a moratorium on executions, with a view to completely abolishing the death penalty.
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Iraq
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices - 2001
Released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor
March 4, 2002
http://uspolitics.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.state.gov%2Fg%2Fdrl%2Frls%2...
Political power in Iraq1 lies exclusively in a repressive one-party apparatus dominated by Saddam Hussein and members of his extended family. The provisional Constitution of 1968 stipulates that the Arab Ba'th Socialist Party governs Iraq through the Revolutionary Command Council (RCC), which exercises both executive and legislative authority. President Saddam Hussein, who also is Prime Minister, Chairman of the RCC, and Secretary General of the Regional Command of the Ba'th Party, wields decisive power. Hussein and his Government continued to refer to an October 1995 non-democratic "referendum" on his presidency, in which he received 99.96 percent of the vote. This referendum included neither secret ballots nor opposing candidates, and many credible reports indicated that voters feared possible reprisal for a dissenting vote. Ethnically and linguistically the Iraqi population includes Arabs, Kurds, Turkmens, Assyrians, Yazidis, and Armenians. The religious mix likewise is varied and consists of Shi'a and Sunni Muslims (both Arab and Kurdish), Christians (including Chaldeans and Assyrians), and a small number of Jews and Mandaeans. Civil uprisings have occurred in previous years, especially in the north and the south. The Government has reacted with extreme repression against those who oppose or even question it. The judiciary is not independent, and the President may override any court decision.
The Government's security apparatus includes militias attached to the President, the Ba'th Party, and the Interior Ministry. Military and paramilitary forces often fulfill an internal security role. The military and security forces play a central role in maintaining the environment of intimidation and fear on which government power rests. The Government makes no attempt to acknowledge, investigate, or punish officials or members of the military or security forces accused of human rights abuses. Military and security forces committed widespread, serious, and systematic human rights abuses.
The country has a population of approximately 22 million. The Government owns all major industries and controls most of the highly centralized economy, which is based largely on oil production. The Iran-Iraq and Gulf Wars damaged the economy, and the country has been under U.N. sanctions since its 1990 invasion of Kuwait. Sanctions ban all exports, except oil sales, under U.N. Security Council Resolution 986 and subsequent resolutions (the "oil-for-food" program). Under the program, the country also is permitted, under U.N. control, to import food, medicine, supplies for water, sanitation, electricity, agricultural, and educational projects, and spare parts for the oil sector. Reliable economic statistics are unavailable; however, estimates for GDP are approximately $57 billion.
The Government's human rights record remained extremely poor. Citizens do not have the right to change their government. The Government continued to execute summarily alleged political opponents and leaders in the Shi'a religious community. Reports suggest that persons were executed merely because of their association with an opposition group or as part of a continuing effort to reduce prison populations. The Government continued to be responsible for disappearances and to kill and torture persons suspected of--or related to persons suspected of--economic crimes, military desertion, and a variety of other activities. Security forces routinely tortured, beat, raped, and otherwise abused detainees. Prison conditions are extremely poor and at times life threatening. The Government reportedly has conducted "prison cleansing" campaigns to kill inmates in order to relieve overcrowding in the prisons. The authorities routinely used arbitrary arrest and detention, prolonged detention, and incommunicado detention, and continued to deny citizens the basic right to due process. Saddam Hussein and his inner circle of supporters continued to impose arbitrary rule. The Government continued to infringe on citizens' privacy rights.
The Government restricts severely freedoms of speech, the press, assembly, association, religion, and movement. The U.N. Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the country issued a report in January detailing ongoing, grievous violations of human rights by the Government. The U.N. Commission on Human Rights and the U.N. General Assembly passed resolutions in April and November criticizing the Government's suppression of these freedoms. Human rights abuses remain difficult to document because of the Government's efforts to conceal the facts, including its prohibition on the establishment of independent human rights organizations, its persistent refusal to grant visits to human rights monitors, and its continued restrictions designed to prevent dissent. Denied entry to the country, the Special Rapporteur bases his reports on the Government's human rights abuses on interviews with recent emigrants, interviews with opposition groups and others that have contacts inside the country, and on published reports from outside the country. Violence and discrimination against women occur. The Government has enacted laws affording a variety of protections to women; however, it is difficult to determine the practical effects of such protections. The Government neglects the health and nutritional needs of children, and discriminates against religious minorities and ethnic groups. The Government restricts severely trade union rights. Child labor persists, and there were instances of forced labor.
The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) have controlled most areas in the three northern provinces of Erbil, Duhok, and Sulaymaniah since the Government withdrew its military forces and civilian administrative personnel from the area after the 1991 Kurdish uprising. The KDP and the PUK fought one another from 1994 through 1997. In September 1998, they agreed to unify their separate administrations and to hold new elections in July 1999. The cease-fire has held; however, reunification measures have not been implemented. The PUK held municipal elections in February 2000 and the KDP held municipal elections in May, the first elections held in the Kurdish-controlled areas since 1992. Foreign and local election observers reported that the elections generally were fair. The KDP, PUK, and opposition groups committed human rights abuses. However, the PUK and KDP have enacted laws establishing an independent judiciary, providing for freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, the right to form political parties, and women's and workers' rights, and, according to press reporting and independent observers, both groups generally observed such laws in practice. In addition both the PUK and KDP have established human rights ministries to monitor human rights conditions, to submit reports to relevant international bodies, including the ICRC, on worthy cases, and to recommend ways to end abuses.
RESPECT FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
Section 1 Respect for the Integrity of the Person, Including Freedom From:
a. Arbitrary or Unlawful Deprivation of Life
The Government committed numerous political and other extrajudicial killings. The Government has a long record of executing perceived or alleged opponents. In a report released by the U.N. Secretary General on September 13, the U.N. Special Rapporteur criticized the Government for the "sheer number of executions" taking place in the country, the number of "extrajudicial executions on political grounds," and "the absence of a due process of the law." The list of offenses requiring a mandatory death penalty has grown substantially in the past few years and now includes anything that could be characterized as "sabotaging the national economy," including forgery, as well as smuggling cars, spare parts, material, heavy equipment, and machinery. The Special Rapporteur has noted that membership in certain political parties is punishable by death, that there is a pervasive fear of death for any act or expression of dissent, and that there are recurrent reports of the use of the death penalty for such offenses as "insulting" the President or the Ba'th Party. "The mere suggestion that someone is not a supporter of the President carries the prospect of the death penalty," the Special Rapporteur stated. The Government made no attempt to answer allegations of either past or present political or extrajudicial killings, investigate such abuses, nor identify and punish the perpetrators.
In a report released in January, Amnesty International reported that in October 2000 the Government had executed dozens of women accused of prostitution.
In February the Government reportedly executed 37 political detainees for opposition activity. According to press reports, prominent Kurd writer Muhammad Jamil Bandi Rozhbayani was killed in March after a visit to his home by intelligence service personnel investigating his writings regarding the Government's Arabization and ethnic cleansing programs. In May the Government reportedly executed two Shi'a clerics, Abdulsattar Abed-Ibrahim al-Mausawi and Ahmad al-Hashemi, for claiming that the Government was involved in the killing of a Shi'a cleric in 1999 and the killings of four engineers from the Electricity Board for receiving bribes in May (see Section 1.d.). According to credible reporting, in June security forces killed another Shi'a cleric, Hussein Bahar al-Uloom, for refusing to appear on television to congratulate Qusay Saddam Hussein for his election to a Ba'th Party position.
Such killings continue an apparent government policy of eliminating prominent Shi'a clerics who are suspected of disloyalty to the Government. In 1998 and 1999, the Government killed a number of leading Shi'a clerics, prompting the former Special Rapporteur in 1999 to express his concern to the Government that the killings might be part of a systematic attack by government officials on the independent leadership of the Shi'a Muslim community (see Section 2.c.). The Government did not respond to the Special Rapporteur's letter.
In September the Government executed 28 political prisoners in Abu Ghurayb prison as a part of its "prison cleansing" campaign. During 2000 the Special Rapporteur received reports referring to a "prison cleansing" execution campaign taking place in Abu Ghurayb, Radwaniyah, and other prisons. Opposition groups, including the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), the Iraqi Communist Party (ICP), the Iraqi National Congress (INC), and others with a network inside the country, provided detailed accounts of summary executions, including the names of hundreds of persons killed. A former officer from the Mukhabarat (Intelligence Service) reported that he participated in a 1998 mass murder at Abu Ghurayb prison following a Revolutionary Command Council directive to "clean out" the country's prisons. The Government's motive for such high numbers of summary executions--estimated at more than 3,000 since 1997--may be linked to reported intimidation of the population and reduction of prison populations. The Government has made no effort to investigate current or past cases, answer accusations about the executions, or identify and punish the perpetrators.
As in previous years, there were numerous credible reports that the Government continued to execute persons thought to be involved in plotting against Saddam Hussein or the Ba'th Party. These executions included high-ranking civilian, military, and tribal leaders. For example, in March army Major General Tariq Sa'dun was arrested, tortured, and executed for criticizing the Government. Also in March, according to Amnesty International (AI) and press reports, three officers from the Iraqi Air Force: Sa'eed 'Abd al-Majid 'Abd al-Ilah, Fawzi Hamed al-'Ubaidi, and Fares Ahmad al-'Alwan, were executed.
Government agents targeted for killing family members of defectors (see Section 1.f.). For example, in May the Government reportedly tortured to death the mother of three Iraqi defectors for her children's opposition activities. In 2000 government agents reportedly killed Safiyah Hassan, who allegedly criticized publicly the Government for killing her husband and two sons, Hussein and Saddam Kamal. Her husband and sons had been senior government officials; however, the brothers defected to Jordan in 1996. The Government offered the men immunity if they returned to the country; however, upon their return, government agents killed them and their father.
In October 2000, security forces reportedly beheaded a number of women suspected of prostitution and some men suspected of facilitating or covering up such activities (see Section 5). Security agents reportedly decapitated numerous women and men in front of their family members. According to Amnesty International (AI), the victim's heads were displayed in front of their homes for several days. Thirty of the victims' names reportedly were published, which included three doctors and one medical assistant.
Reports of deaths due to poor prison conditions continued (see Section 1.c.).
Many persons who were displaced forcibly still lived in tent camps under harsh conditions, which also resulted in many deaths (see Sections 2.d. and 5).
As in previous years, the Government continued to deny the widespread killings of Kurds in the north of the country during the "Anfal" Campaign of 1988 (see Sections 1.b. and 1.g.). Both the Special Rapporteur and Human Rights Watch (HRW) have concluded that the Government's policies against the Kurds raise questions of crimes against humanity and violations of the 1948 Genocide Convention.
Political killings and terrorist actions continued in the Kurd-controlled north of the country. For example, assailants assassinated the governor of Arbil, Fransu Hariri. PUK and KDP investigators blamed Islamic groups for the killing. In June the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq reported that its members killed Raed Khidir, a Ba'th Party official in southern Iraq. In 2000 unknown persons killed the leader of the Democratic Nationalist Union of Kurdistan, Sirbit Mahmud. In July 2000, unknown assailants killed parliamentary deputy Osman Hassan. Also in July 2000, PUK forces reportedly killed a number of members of the Iraqi Communist Workers Party (IWCP), and KDP forces killed several members of the Iraqi Turkmen Front (ITF). Neither the PUK nor the KDP released information regarding investigations into the killings.
b. Disappearance
There continued to be widespread reports of widespread disappearances. Hundreds still were missing in the aftermath of the brief Iraqi military occupation of Erbil in August 1996. Many of these persons may have been killed surreptitiously late in 1997 and throughout 1998, in the reported "prison-cleansing" campaign (see Section 1.a.). Sources inside the country reported the existence of special prison wards that hold individuals whose whereabouts, status, and fate was not disclosed (see Section 1.c.). The missing were primarily from the Kurd minority but include members of the Assyrian, Turkmen, and Yazidi community. In August AI reported that the Government has the world's worst record for numbers of persons who have disappeared and remain unaccounted for. The whereabouts of Hashem Hasan, a journalist and professor, who was arrested as he attempted to leave the country in 1999, remained unknown at year's end (see Section 2.a.).
The Government continued to ignore the more than 16,000 cases conveyed to it in 1994 and 1995 by the U.N., as well as requests from the Governments of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia to account for the whereabouts of those who had disappeared during Iraq's 1990-91 occupation of Kuwait, and from Iran regarding the whereabouts of prisoners of war that Iraq captured in the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. The majority of the 16,496 cases known to the Special Rapporteur are persons of Kurdish origin who disappeared during the 1988 Anfal Campaign. The Special Rapporteur estimated that the total number of Kurds who disappeared during that period could reach several tens of thousands. Human Rights Watch (HRW) estimated the total at between 70,000 and 150,000, and AI at more than 100,000. The second largest group of cases known to the Special Rapporteur consists of Shi'a Muslims who were reported to have disappeared in the late 1970's and early 1980's as their families were expelled to Iran due to their alleged Persian ancestry.
The Government failed to return, or account for, a large number of Kuwaiti citizens and citizens of other countries who were detained during the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait and continues to refuse to cooperate with the Tripartite Commission to resolve the cases. Of 609 cases of missing Kuwaiti citizens under review by the Tripartite Commission on Gulf War Missing, only 3 have been resolved. The Government denies having any knowledge of the others and claims that any relevant records were lost in the aftermath of the Gulf War. In a December report to the U.N. Security Council, the U.N. Secretary General criticized the Government's refusal to cooperate with the U.N. on the issue of the missing Kuwaiti citizens. Iran reports that the Government still has not accounted for 5,000 Iranian prisoners of war (POW's) missing since the Iran-Iraq War.
In 1997 and 1999, AI documented the repeated failure by the Government to respond to requests for information about persons who have disappeared. The report detailed numerous unresolved cases dating from the early 1980's through the mid-1990's. The report concludes that few victims became targets of the Government because of any crime they had committed; rather, they were arrested and held as hostages in order to force a relative, who may have escaped abroad, to surrender. Others were arrested because of their family's link to a political opponent or simply because of their ethnic origin (see Sections 1.d. and 1.f.).
The Special Rapporteur and several human rights groups continued to request that the Government provide information about the 1991 arrest of the late Grand Ayatollah Abdul Qasim Al-Khoei and 108 of his associates. The Ayatollah died while under house arrest in Al-Najaf. Other individuals who were arrested with him have not been accounted for, and the Government refuses to respond to queries regarding their status. Similarly, AI identified a number of Ayatollah Sadeq Al-Sadr's aides who were arrested in the weeks prior to his killing in February 1999 (see Sections 1.a., 1.d., and 1.g.). Their whereabouts remained unknown. In its November 1999 report, AI identified eight aides of Al-Sadr who disappeared.
In addition to the tens of thousands of reported disappearances, human rights groups reported during the year that the Government continued to hold thousands of other citizens in incommunicado detention (see Sections 1.c., 1.d., and 1.e.).
c. Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
The Constitution prohibits torture; however, the security services routinely and systematically tortured detainees. According to former prisoners, torture techniques included branding, electric shocks administered to the genitals and other areas, beating, pulling out of fingernails, burning with hot irons and blowtorches, suspension from rotating ceiling fans, dripping acid on the skin, rape, breaking of limbs, denial of food and water, extended solitary confinement in dark and extremely small compartments, and threats to rape or otherwise harm family members and relatives. Evidence of such torture often was apparent when security forces returned the mutilated bodies of torture victims to their families. There were persistent reports that the families were made to pay for the cost of executions. Refugees who arrived in Europe often reported instances of torture to receiving governments, and displayed scars and mutilations to substantiate their claims. In August AI released a report entitled "Iraq: Systematic Torture of Political Prisoners," which detailed the systematic and routine use of torture against suspected political opponents and, occasionally, other prisoners.
In May Saad Keis Naoman, an Iraqi soccer player who defected to Europe, reported that he and his teammates were beaten and humiliated at the order of Uday Saddam Hussein for poor performances. He was flogged until his back was bloody, forcing him to sleep on his stomach in the tiny cell in Al-Radwaniya prison in which he was jailed. His account supports allegations made by Sharar Haydar Mohamad Al-Hadithi, a former Iraqi international soccer player, who stated in August 1999 that he and his teammates were tortured on Uday Hussein's orders for not winning matches. In 2000 three soccer players who played for a team that lost an October game in the Asian Cup quarter finals, reportedly were whipped and detained for 3 days. In 1997 members of the national football team reportedly were beaten and tortured on Uday's orders because of poor play in a World Cup qualifying match.
The Special Rapporteur continued to receive reports that arrested persons routinely were subjected to mistreatment, including prolonged interrogations accompanied by torture, beatings, and various deprivations. For some years, the Special Rapporteur has expressed concern about cruel and unusual punishments prescribed by the law, including amputations and brandings. In 2000 the authorities reportedly introduced tongue amputation as a punishment for persons who criticize Saddam Hussein or his family, and on July 17, government authorities reportedly amputated the tongue of a person who allegedly criticized Saddam Hussein. Authorities reportedly performed the amputation in front of a large crowd. Similar tongue amputations also reportedly occurred in the city of Hilla during the year. The Government never has acknowledged such reports, conducted any investigation, nor taken action against those tortured prisoners.
Human rights organizations and opposition groups continued to receive reports of women who suffered from severe psychological trauma after being raped while in custody. Security forces also reportedly sexually assaulted both government officials and opposition members in order to blackmail them into compliance. Former Mukhabarat member Khalid Al-Janabi reported that a Mukhabarat unit, the Technical Operations Directorate, used rape and sexual assault in a systematic and institutionalized manner for political purposes. The unit reportedly also videotaped the rape of female relatives of suspected oppositionists and used the videotapes for blackmail purposes and to ensure their future cooperation (see Section 1.f.).
The security forces allegedly raped women who were captured during the Anfal Campaign and during the occupation of Kuwait. The Government never has acknowledged these reports, conducted any investigation, nor taken action against those who committed the rapes.
Prison conditions are extremely poor and life threatening. There reportedly are numerous official, semiofficial, and private prisons throughout the country. Overcrowding is a serious problem. In May 1998, Labor and Social Affairs Minister Abdul Hamid Aziz Sabah stated in an interview that "the prisons are filled to five times their capacity and the situation is serious." Sabah was dismissed from his post after the interview, and the government-owned daily newspaper Babel reiterated the Government's long-standing claim that it holds virtually no prisoners. It was unclear to what extent the mass executions committed pursuant to the "prison cleansing" campaign have reduced overcrowding (see Section 1.a.).
Certain prisons are infamous for routine mistreatment of detainees and prisoners. Abu Ghurayb, Baladiat, Makasib, Rashidiya, Radwaniyah, and other prisons reportedly have torture chambers. There are numerous mentally ill prisoners at Al-Shamma'iya prison in Baghdad, which reportedly is the site of torture and a number of disappearances. The Al-Radwaniyah detention center is a former POW facility near Baghdad and reportedly the site of torture as well as mass executions (see Section 1.a.).
In 2000 the Special Rapporteur reported receiving information about two detention facilities in which prisoners are locked in metal boxes the size of coffins that reportedly are opened for only 30 minutes each day. A multistory underground detention and torture center reportedly was built under the general military hospital building close to the Al-Rashid military camp on the outskirts of Baghdad. The Center for Human Rights of the Iraqi Communist Party stated that the complex includes torture and execution chambers. A section reportedly is reserved for prisoners in a "frozen" state--that is, those whose status, fate, or whereabouts are not disclosed (see Section 1.b.).
Hundreds of Fayli (Shi'a) Kurds and other citizens of Iranian origin, who had disappeared in the early 1980's during the Iran-Iraq war, reportedly were being held incommunicado at the Abu Ghurayb prison.
In 2000 the Iraqi Communist Party reported that 13 prisoners died at Makaseb detention center in December 1999 and January 2000 as a result of torture and poor prison conditions. The 13 prisoners reportedly were among the Shi'a detained in the aftermath of the protests following the February 1999 assassination of Sheik Al-Sadr (see Section 1.g.). In August 2000, the ICP reported that three political prisoners died from illnesses contracted in Abu Ghurayb prison. The prisoners reportedly were denied medical treatment.
The Government does not permit visits by human rights monitors.
Iraqi Kurdish regional officials reported in 2000 that prisons in the three northern provinces were open to the International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) and other international monitors. According to the ICRC, regular and consistent improvement in conditions was observed on their weekly prison visits to declared prisons. However, both the PUK and the KDP reportedly maintain private, undeclared prisons, and both groups reportedly deny access to ICRC officials. There were reports that authorities of both the PUK and KDP tortured detainees and prisoners.
d. Arbitrary Arrest, Detention, or Exile
The Constitution and the Legal Code explicitly prohibit arbitrary arrest and detention; however, the authorities routinely engaged in these practices. The Special Rapporteur continued to receive reports of widespread arbitrary arrest and detention, often for long periods of time, without access to a lawyer or the courts. As indicated in the November 1999 AI report, "Iraq: Victims of Systematic Repression," many thousands of persons have been arrested arbitrarily in the last few years because of suspected opposition activities or because they were related to persons sought by the authorities. Those arrested often were taken away by plainclothes security agents, who offered no explanation and produced no warrant to the person or family members (see Section 1.f.). The authorities deny detainees legal representation and visits by family members. In most cases, family members do not know the whereabouts of detainees and do not make inquiries due to fear of reprisal. Many persons are taken away in front of family members, who hear nothing further until days, months, or years later, when they are told to retrieve the often-mutilated corpse of their relative. There also were reports of the widespread practice of holding family members and close associates responsible for the alleged actions of others (see Section 1.f.).
In July the Government initiated an arrest and detention campaign involving thousands of individuals who initially had volunteered to serve in the newly formed Al-Quds militia force, but who had not shown up for training.
Mass arbitrary arrests and detentions often occurred in areas in which antigovernment leaflets were distributed. In June the Coalition for Justice in Iraq reported that the Government arrested dozens of lawyers and jurists for distributing antigovernment leaflets. The leaflets reportedly indicated the authors' intent to expose the Government's violations of human rights. Security forces arrested hundreds of persons in al-Najaf, Karbala, and the Shi'a section of Baghdad following an anonymous distribution of antigovernment leaflets in 2000. Other arrests have no apparent basis.
In September the Government arrested and expelled six U.N. humanitarian workers and refused to provide any evidence as a basis for its actions (see Section 1.g.).
According to international human rights groups, numerous foreigners arrested arbitrarily in previous years also remained in detention.
The Government reportedly targeted the Shi'a Muslim community for arbitrary arrest and other abuses. For example, in May the Government reportedly executed two Shi'a clerics, Abdulsattar Abed-Ibrahim al-Mausawi and Ahmad al-Hashemi, for claiming that the Government was involved in the killing of a Shi'a cleric in 1999 and the killings of four engineers from the Electricity Board for receiving bribes. In the weeks preceding the February 1999 killing of Ayatollah Sadeq Al-Sadr and two of his sons, many of Al-Sadr's aides were arrested, and their whereabouts still were unknown at year's end (see Sections 1.a., 1.b., and 1.g.). Hundreds more reportedly were arrested and the houses of many demolished in the weeks following the killing (see Section 1.g.).
Hundreds of Fayli (Shi'a) Kurds and other citizens of Iranian origin, who had disappeared in the early 1980's during the Iran-Iraq war, reportedly were being held incommunicado at the Abu Ghurayb prison. According to a report received by the Special Rapporteur in 1998, such persons have been detained without charge for close to 2 decades in extremely harsh conditions. The report states that many of the detainees were used as subjects in the country's outlawed experimental chemical and biological weapons programs.
Although no statistics were available, observers estimated the number of political detainees to be in the tens of thousands, some of whom have been held for decades.
In May the press reported that the authorities released 3,000 prisoners who paid bribes to prison officials to have their prison terms cut. One former prisoner said his family paid approximately $3,125 (5 million Iraqi Dinars) for him to be released after serving 7 years of his original 15-year sentence.
The Government announced in June 1999 a general amnesty for citizens who had left the country illegally or were exiled officially for a specified period of time but failed to return after the period of exile expired (see Section 2.d.). No citizens are known to have returned to the country based upon this amnesty. An estimated 1 to 2 million self-exiled citizens reportedly remain fearful of returning to the country.
The PUK and the KDP reportedly hold some political prisoners and detainees in the north of the country. The KDP and PUK reached agreement for the mutual release of political prisoners in 1999. In March 2000, the KDP released 10 PUK prisoners and the PUK released 5 KDP prisoners (see Section 1.g.). During the year, PUK and KDP officials reported that all remaining PUK and KDP political prisoners and detainees had been exchanged per the agreement.
e. Denial of Fair Public Trial
The judiciary is not independent, and there is no check on the President's power to override any court decision. In 1999 the Special Rapporteur and international human rights groups observed that the repressive nature of the political and legal systems precludes the rule of law. Numerous laws facilitate continued repression, and the Government uses extrajudicial methods to extract confessions or coerce cooperation.
There are two parallel judicial systems: the regular courts, which try common criminal offenses; and the special security courts, which generally try national security cases but also may try criminal cases. In addition to the Court of Appeal, there is the Court of Cassation, which is the highest court.
Special security courts have jurisdiction in all cases involving espionage and treason, peaceful political dissent, smuggling, currency exchange violations, and drug trafficking. According to the Special Rapporteur and other sources, military officers or civil servants with no legal training head these tribunals, which hear cases in secret. Authorities often hold defendants incommunicado and do not permit contact with lawyers (see Section 1.d.). The courts admit confessions extracted by torture, which often served as the basis for conviction (see Section 1.c.). Many cases appear to end in summary execution, although defendants may appeal to the President for clemency. Saddam Hussein may grant clemency in any case that suits his political goals or personal predilection. There are no Shari'a (Islamic law) courts; however, regular courts are empowered to administer Shari'a in cases involving personal status, such as divorce and inheritance.
Procedures in the regular courts in theory provide for many protections; however, the Government often assigns to the security courts cases that, on their legal merits, would appear to fall under the jurisdiction of the regular courts. Trials in the regular courts are public, and defendants are entitled to counsel, at government expense in the case of indigents. Defense lawyers have the right to review the charges and evidence brought against their clients. There is no jury system; panels of three judges try cases. Defendants have the right to appeal to the Court of Appeal and then to the Court of Cassation.
The Government shields certain groups from prosecution for alleged crimes. For example, a 1990 decree grants immunity to men who commit "honor crimes," a violent assault with intent to commit murder against a women by a relative for her perceived immodest behavior or alleged sexual misconduct (see Section 5). A 1992 decree grants immunity from prosecution to members of the Ba'th Party and security forces who killed anyone while in pursuit of army deserters. Unconfirmed but widespread reports indicate that this decree has been applied to prevent trials or punishment of government officials.
It was difficult to estimate the number of political prisoners, because the Government rarely acknowledges arrests or imprisonments, and families are afraid to talk about arrests. Many of the tens of thousands of persons who disappeared or were killed in the past few years originally were held as political prisoners.
Both the PUK-and the KDP-controlled local administrations maintain separate judicial systems. They use the Iraqi legal code. Both come under a separate Supreme Court of Cassation. During the year, PUK and KDP officials reported that all PUK and KDP political prisoners and detainees had been exchanged in accordance with a 1999 agreement. However, the PUK and the KDP reportedly continued to hold some political prisoners and detainees (see Section 1.d.).
f. Arbitrary Interference With Privacy, Family, Home, or Correspondence
The Government frequently infringed on citizens' constitutional right to privacy, particularly in cases allegedly involving national security. The law defines security offenses so broadly that authorities effectively are exempt from the legal requirement to obtain search warrants, and searches without warrants are commonplace. The Government routinely ignored constitutional provisions designed to protect the confidentiality of mail, telegraphic correspondence, and telephone conversations. The Government periodically jammed news broadcasts from outside the country, including those of opposition groups (see Section 2.a.). The security services and the Ba'th Party maintain pervasive networks of informers to deter dissident activity and instill fear in the public.
The authorities continued systematically to detain, abuse, and kill family members and close associates of alleged government opponents (see Sections 1.a., 1.b., 1.d., and 1.g.). For example, in May the authorities reportedly tortured to death the mother of three defectors because of her children's opposition activities. In June 2000, a former general reportedly received a videotape of security forces raping a female family member. He subsequently received a telephone call from an intelligence agent who stated that another female relative was being held and warned him to stop speaking out against the Government.
In November 1999, the Government expelled more than 4,000 families that had sought refuge in Baghdad after the 1991 Gulf War.
The Government continues its Arabization campaign of ethnic cleansing designed to harass and expel ethnic Kurds and Turkmen from government-controlled areas. According to press reports and opposition sources, the Government has displaced forcibly hundreds of families. As in previous years, the regime periodically sealed off entire districts in Kirkuk and conducted day-long, house-to-house searches (see Sections 2.d. and 5). Government officials also took hostage members of minority groups to intimidate their families into leaving their home regions (see Sections 1.d., 2.d., and 5).
In the past, the authorities demolished the houses and detained and executed family members of Shi'a who protested government actions (see Section 1.g.).
The Special Rapporteur noted that guilt by association is facilitated by administrative requirements imposed on relatives of deserters or other perceived opponents of the Government. For example, relatives who do not report deserters may lose their ration cards for purchasing government-controlled food supplies, be evicted from their residences, or face the arrest of other family members. The Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq reported in October and December 1999 that authorities denied food ration cards to families that failed to send their young sons to the "Lion Cubs of Saddam" compulsory weapons training camps (see Section 5). Conscripts are required to secure a guarantor to sign a document stating that the named conscript would not desert military service and that the guarantor would accept personal responsibility if the conscript deserted.
The Special Security Office reportedly continued efforts to intimidate the relatives of opposition members. Relatives of citizens outside the country who were suspected of sympathizing with the opposition were forced to call the suspected opposition members to warm them against participating in opposition conferences or activities.
g. Use of Excessive Force and Violations of Humanitarian Law In Internal Conflicts
The authorities continued to detain, abuse, and kill family members and close associates of alleged government opponents (see Sections 1.a., 1.b., and 1.f.). The Government has continued a campaign of intimidation directed at U.N. and nongovernmental organization (NGO) relief workers. In February the Foreign Minister threatened to break off official ties to U.N. workers supervising Oil-for-Food Program distribution in northern Iraq, and to revoke their visas and deport them. In September the Government expelled six U.N. humanitarian relief workers without providing any explanation.
The Government continued to "Arabize" certain Kurdish areas, such as the urban centers of Kirkuk and Mosul, through the forced movement of local residents from their homes and villages and their replacement by Arabs from outside the area (see Sections 2.d. and 5).
Landmines in the north, mostly planted by the Government before 1991, continued to kill and maim civilians. Many of the mines were laid during the Iran-Iraq and Gulf Wars; however, the army failed to clear them before it abandoned the area. Landmines also are a problem along the Iraq-Iran border throughout the central and southern areas in the country. There is no information regarding civilian casualties or the Government's efforts, if any, to clear old mine fields in areas under the central Government's control. According to reports by the U.N. Office of Project Services, the Mines Advisory Group, and Norwegian Peoples' Aid, landmines have killed more than 3,000 persons in the three northern governates since the 1991 uprising. The Special Rapporteur repeatedly has reminded the Government of its obligation under the Landmines Protocol to protect civilians from the effects of mines. Various NGO's continued efforts to remove landmines from the area and increase awareness of mines among local residents.
In December 1998, the Government declared that mine-clearing activity was subversive and ordered NGO workers performing such activity to leave the country. In April 1999, a New Zealander working for the U.N. mine-clearing program in the north was shot and killed at close range by an unknown assailant. The KDP arrested a person who claimed to have killed the U.N. worker on behalf of Saddam Hussein's Fedayeen. In April Kurd sources accused the Government of exploding a bomb near an NGO working on mine clearing in the north.
Following the February 1999 killing of Ayatollah Mohammad Sadeq Al-Sadr and his sons (see Section 1.a.), there were widespread reports of military assaults on protesters in areas of Baghdad heavily populated by Shi'a, and in cities with a Shi'a majority such as Karbala, Nasiriyah, Najaf, and Basra, in which hundreds of persons were killed. While a funeral for Al-Sadr was prohibited, spontaneous gatherings of mourners took place in the days after his death. Government security forces used excessive force in breaking up these illegal gatherings, killing hundreds of persons.
In 2000 authorities continued to target alleged supporters of Al-Sadr. In February 2000, security officials reportedly executed 30 religious school students who had been arrested after Al-Sadr's killing. In March 2000, numerous Shi'a who fled the country in 1999 and 2000, told HRW that security forces interrogated, detained, and tortured them. In May 2000, six additional students who were arrested following the killing were sentenced to death.
In 1999 and 2000, as a reprisal for the disturbances following Al-Sadr's killing, the Government expelled approximately 4,000 Shi'a families from Baghdad.
After the 1991 Gulf War, victims and eyewitnesses described war crimes perpetrated by the Government, including deliberate killing, torture, rape, pillage, and hostage-taking. HRW and other organizations have worked with various governments to bring a genocide case at the International Court of Justice against the Government for its conduct of the Anfal campaign against the Kurds in 1988.
No hostilities were reported between the two major Iraqi Kurdish parties in de facto control of northern Iraq. The KDP and the PUK agreed in September 1998 to unify their administrations; however, little progress was made at the time toward implementing the agreement. In October 1999, senior officials from the two parties agreed on a series of measures, including prisoner exchanges, the return of internally displaced persons (IDP's) to their homes, and arrangements for freedom of movement between their respective areas. Most of the measures were not implemented (see Section 1.d.). However, during the year, the two main Kurdish parties reported some progress toward full implementation of the Washington Agreement, including the return of 3,000 IDP's displaced since the 1995-96 fighting, improved movement between the Kurd-controlled areas, and the exchange of all prisoners.
Armed hostilities, which resulted in deaths were reported between the PUK and Islamic Groups, the PUK and the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), and the KDP and the PKK. The heaviest fighting began in September, when a newly created Islamist group, the Jund al-Islam, seized control of some villages near the Iranian border and attempted to institute a strictly Islamic theocratic regime. According to press and opposition reporting, the Jun al-Islam attacked PUK fighters near Halabjah, killing dozens of persons. Intermittent fighting between the PUK, and the Jund al-Islam, and other Islamic groups continued until late November, when an agreement between those involved and the Iranian Government dissolved the Jund al-Islam and imposed a cease-fire.
In July 2000, the PUK reportedly ordered all opposition groups to move their offices out of Sulaymaniah's city center following a number of bombings; the IWCP reportedly refused to move. PUK security forces subsequently killed at least six IWCP members and arrested several others at an IWCP office in Sulaymaniah. PUK forces also killed several IWCP members who were inside a car. In connection with this dispute, the PUK closed the IWCP-affiliated Independent Women's Organization and the Women's Protection Center in July 2000 and detained temporarily 12 women who had been staying at an abused women's shelter within the Center. The PUK announced that it would investigate the security forces' actions; however, no information was available by year's end.
There were no Turkish military invasions into the country during the year.
Section 2 Respect for Civil Liberties, Including:
a. Freedom of Speech and Press
The Constitution provides for freedom of speech and of the press "in compliance with the revolutionary, national, and progressive trend;" however, in practice the Government does not permit freedom of speech or of the press, and does not tolerate political dissent in areas under its control. In November 2000, the U.N. General Assembly criticized the Government's "suppression of freedom of thought, expression, information, association, and assembly." The Special Rapporteur stated in October 1999 that citizens lived "in a climate of fear," in which whatever they said or did, particularly in the area of politics, involved "the risk of arrest and interrogation by the police or military intelligence." He noted that "the mere suggestion that someone is not a supporter of the President carries the prospect of the death penalty." In June the Human Rights Alliance reported that the Government had killed more than 500 journalists and other intellectuals in the past decade.
The Ministry of Culture and Information periodically held meetings at which they issued general guidelines for the press. Foreign journalists must work from offices located within the ministry building and are accompanied everywhere they go by ministry officers, who reportedly restrict their movements and make it impossible for them to interact freely with citizens.
The Government, the Ba'th Party, or persons close to Saddam Hussein own all print and broadcast media, and operate them as propaganda outlets. They generally do not report opposing points of view that are expressed either domestically or abroad. A 1999 Freedom House report rated press freedom in the country at 98 out of a possible 100 points, with 0 being the most free and 100 being the most controlled. Several statutes and decrees suppress freedom of speech and of the press, including: Revolutionary Command Council Decree Number 840 of 1986, which penalizes free expression and stipulates the death penalty for anyone insulting the President or other high government officials; Section 214 of the Penal Code, which prohibits singing a song likely to cause civil strife; and the 1968 Press Act, which prohibits the writing of articles on 12 specific subjects, including those detrimental to the President, the Revolutionary Command Council, and the Ba'th Party. In February opposition press reported that the Government added the penalty of cutting out the tongue of anyone who ridiculed the President. There were several reports during the year that the penalty was imposed on citizens (see Section 1.e.).
Each reporter must inform a security officer regarding the nature of news intended for the foreign media, and intelligence officers screen broadcasts before they are aired. In September the Government threatened to fire any journalist who issued a report detrimental to national security.
In September 1999, Hashem Hasan, a journalist and Baghdad University professor, was arrested after declining an appointment as editor of one of Uday Hussein's publications. The Paris-based Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF) sent a letter of appeal to Uday Hussein; however, Hassan's fate and whereabouts remained unknown at year's end (see Section 1.b.).
According to the Special Rapporteur, journalists are under continuous pressure to join the Ba'th party and must follow the mandates of the Iraqi Union of Journalists, headed by Uday Hussein. According to Iraqi sources, in 1999 Uday Hussein dismissed hundreds of union members who had not praised Saddam Hussein and the Government sufficiently or often enough (see Section 6.a.).
The Government regularly jams foreign news broadcasts (see Section 1.f.). Satellite dishes, modems, and fax machines are banned, although some restrictions reportedly were lifted in 1999. Government-controlled areas have only two terrestrial television channels, the official Iraq Television and Youth TV, owned by Uday Saddam Hussein. The Information Ministry announced a plan to make limited satellite television service available, offering eight channels at a cost of $33 to $38 (10,000 to 12,000 dinars) per month, twice the average wage of a government employee. In September Uday Hussein reportedly had assumed control of the satellite television service.
Books may be published only with the authorization of the Ministry of Culture and Information. The Ministry of Education often sends textbooks with progovernment propaganda to Kurdish regions; however, Kurds routinely remove propaganda items from such textbooks.
The Government does not respect academic freedom and exercises strict control over academic publications and foreign travel by academics. University staff are hired and fired depending on their support for the Government.
In the north, many independent newspapers have appeared over the past 8 years, as have opposition radio and television broadcasts. The absence of central authority permits significant freedom of expression, including criticism of the regional Kurdish authorities; however, most journalists are influenced or controlled by various political organizations. Satellite services and related equipment for telephone, fax, Internet, and television services are available. Although the rival Kurdish parties in the north, the PUK and KDP, state that full press freedom is allowed in areas under their respective control, in practice neither effectively permits distribution of the opposing group's newspapers and other literature.
The Internet was available widely through Internet cafes in major urban centers in Kurdish-controlled areas. In government-operated Internet cafes, users only are permitted to view Web sites provided by the Ministry of Culture and Information. The regional authorities did not try to limit access to preapproved web sites; however, they often monitored web usage by individuals.
b. Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and Association
The Constitution provides for freedom of assembly; however, the Government restricted this right in practice. Citizens may not assemble legally other than to express support for the Government. The Government regularly orchestrated crowds to demonstrate support for the Government and its policies through financial incentives for those who participate and threats of violence against those who do not.
The Constitution provides for freedom of association; however, the Government restricts this right in practice. The Government controls the establishment of political parties, regulates their internal affairs, and monitors their activities. New political parties must be based in Baghdad and are prohibited from having any ethnic or religious character. The political magazine Alef-Be, which is published by the Ministry of Culture and Information, reported in December 1999 that two political groups would not be permitted to form parties because they had an insufficient number of members. The magazine reprinted the conditions necessary to establish political parties, which include the requirement that a political group must have at least 150 members over the age of 25. A 1999 law also stipulates that new parties must "take pride" in the 1958 and 1968 revolutions, which created the republic and brought the Ba'th party to power. Several parties are outlawed specifically, and membership in them is a capital offense (see Section 3). The law prescribes the death penalty for anyone "infiltrating" the Ba'th Party.
In the Kurdish-controlled north, numerous political parties and social and cultural organizations exist. The KDP-and PUK-controlled administrations impose restrictions on some political parties and groups they consider security risks, or that refuse to register as political parties or to participate in local elections. The PUK and KDP have forced political parties that violate these rules to shut down. Neither the KDP nor PUK allow the other group to open party offices in territory under their control; however, they do allow other political parties to operate in those territories and include them in their administrations.
c. Freedom of Religion
The Constitution provides for freedom of religion provided that it does not violate "morality and public order;" however, the Government severely limited freedom of religion in practice. Islam is the official state religion.
The Ministry of Endowments and Religious Affairs monitors places of worship, appoints the clergy, approves the building and repair of all places of worship, and approves the publication of all religious literature.
More than 95 percent of the population are Muslim. The (predominantly Arab) Shi'a Muslims constitute a 60 to 65 percent majority, while Sunni Muslims make up 32 to 37 percent (approximately 18 to 20 percent are Sunni Kurds, 13 to 16 percent are Sunni Arabs, and the rest are Sunni Turkmens). The remaining approximately 5 percent consist of Christians (Assyrians, Chaldeans, Roman Catholics, and Armenian Orthodox), Yazidis, and a small number of Jews and Mandaeans.
The Government does not recognize political organizations that have been formed by Shi'a Muslims or Assyrian Christians. These groups continued to attract support despite their illegal status. There are religious qualifications for government office; candidates for the National Assembly, for example, "must believe in God" (see Section 3).
Although Shi'a Arabs are the largest religious group, Sunni Arabs traditionally have dominated economic and political life. Sunni Arabs are at a distinct advantage in all areas of secular life, including civil, political, military, and economic. Shi'a and Sunni Arabs are not distinct ethnically. Shi'a Arabs have supported an independent country alongside Sunni Arabs since the 1920 Revolt, many joined the Ba'th Party, and Shi'a formed the core of the army in the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War.
The Government has for decades conducted a brutal campaign of murder, summary execution, and protracted arbitrary arrest against the religious leaders and followers of the majority Shi'a Muslim population (See Sections 1.a., 1.d., and 1.g.). Despite nominal legal protection of religious equality, the Government has repressed severely the Shi'a clergy and those who follow the Shi'a faith. Forces from the Mukhabarat, General Security (Amn Al-Amm), the Military Bureau, Saddam's Commandos (Fedayeen Saddam), and the Ba'th Party have killed senior Shi'a clerics, desecrated Shi'a mosques and holy sites, and interfered with Shi'a religious education. Security agents reportedly are stationed at all the major Shi'a mosques and shrines and search, harass, and arbitrarily arrest worshipers.
The following government restrictions on religious rights remained in effect during the year: Restrictions and outright bans on communal Friday prayer by Shi'a Muslims; restrictions on the loaning of books by Shi'a mosque libraries; a ban on the broadcast of Shi'a programs on government-controlled radio or television; a ban on the publication of Shi'a books, including prayer books and guides; a ban on funeral processions other than those organized by the Government; a ban on other Shi'a funeral observances such as gatherings for Koran reading; and the prohibition of certain processions and public meetings that commemorate Shi'a holy days. Shi'a groups report that they captured documents from the security services during the 1991 uprising that listed thousands of forbidden Shi'a religious writings.
In June 1999, several Shi'a opposition groups reported that the Government instituted a program in the predominantly Shi'a districts of Baghdad that used food ration cards to restrict where individuals could pray. The ration cards, part of the U.N. oil-for-food program, reportedly are checked when the bearer enters a mosque and are printed with a notice of severe penalties for those who attempt to pray at an unauthorized location.
Shi'a groups reported numerous instances of religious scholars being subjected to arrest, assault, and harassment in the past several years, particularly in the internationally renowned Shi'a academic center of Najaf. In 2000 AI reported that the Government deported systematically tens of thousands of Shi'a (both Arabs and Kurds) to Iran in the late 1970's and early 1980's, on the basis that they were of Persian descent. According to Shi'a sources, religious scholars and Shi'a merchants who supported the schools financially were the principal targets for deportation. After the 1991 popular uprising, the Government relaxed some restrictions on Shi'a attending the schools. However, the revival of the schools appears to have exceeded greatly the Government's expectations, and led to an increased government crackdown on the Shi'a religious establishment, including the requirement that speeches by imams in mosques be based upon government-provided material that attacked fundamentalist trends.
Authorities continued to target alleged supporters of Grand Ayatollah Al-Sadr during the year (see Sections 1.a. and 1.g.). The Government neither acknowledged nor investigated the reported arrest and execution in February and May 2000 of 36 religious school students.
The Government consistently politicizes and interferes with religious pilgrimages, both of Iraqi Muslims who wish to make the Hajj to Mecca and Medina and of Iraqi and non-Iraqi Muslim pilgrims who travel to holy sites within the country (see Section 2.d.). For example, in 1998 the U.N. Sanctions Committee offered to disburse vouchers for travel and expenses to pilgrims making the Hajj; however, the Government rejected this offer. In 1999 the Sanctions Committee offered to disburse funds to cover Hajj-related expenses via a neutral third party; the Government again rejected the offer. Following the December 1999 passage of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1284, the Sanctions Committee again sought to devise a protocol to facilitate the payment for individuals making the journey. The Sanctions Committee proposed to issue $250 in cash and $1,750 in travelers checks to each individual pilgrim to be distributed at the U.N. office in Baghdad in the presence of both U.N. and Iraqi officials. The Government again declined and, consequently, no Iraqi pilgrims were able to take advantage of the available funds or, in 2000, of the permitted flights. The Government continued to insist that these funds would be accepted only if they were paid in cash to the government-controlled central bank, not to the Hajj pilgrims.
Twice each year--on the 10th day of the Muslim month of Muharram and 40 days later in the month of Safar--Shi'a pilgrims from throughout the country and around the world travel to the Iraqi city of Karbala to commemorate the death there centuries ago of the Imam Hussein. The Government for several decades has interfered with these Ashura commemorations by preventing processions on foot into the city. In 1998 and 1999, violent incidents were reported between Iraqi pilgrims on one side and Ba'th party members and security forces enforcing the ban on the other. In 2000 security forces opened fire on persons who attempted to walk from Al-Najaf to Karbala (see Section 1.g.). During the year, there were no reports of violence during the pilgrimage; however, the Government reportedly imposed travel restrictions.
The Government also has sought to undermine the identity of minority Christian (Assyrian and Chaldean) and Yazidi groups.
The Special Rapporteur and others reported that the Government has engaged in various abuses against the country's 350,000 Assyrian and Chaldean Christians, especially in terms of forced movements from northern areas and repression of political rights (see Section 2.d.). Most Assyrians live in the northern governates, and the Government often has accused them of collaborating with Iraqi Kurds. In the north, Kurdish groups often refer to Assyrians as Kurdish Christians. Military forces destroyed numerous Assyrian churches during the 1988 Anfal Campaign and reportedly tortured and executed many Assyrians. Both major Kurdish political parties have indicated that the Government occasionally targets Assyrians, as well as ethnic Kurds and Turkmens, in expulsions from Kirkuk in order to attempt to Arabize the city (see Section 2.d.).
The Government imposes repressive measures on Yazidis (see Section 5).
d. Freedom of Movement Within the Country, Foreign Travel, Emigration, and Repatriation
The Government restricts movement within the country of citizens and foreigners. Police checkpoints are common on major roads and highways. Persons who enter sensitive border areas and numerous designated security zones are subject to arrest.
The Government requires citizens to obtain specific government authorization and expensive exit visas for foreign travel. Citizens may not make more than two trips abroad annually. Before traveling abroad, citizens are required to post collateral, which is refundable only upon their return. There are restrictions on the amount of currency that may be taken out of the country. Women are not permitted to travel outside the country alone; male relatives must escort them (see Section 5). Prior to December 1999, every student who wished to travel abroad was required to provide a guarantor who would be liable if the student failed to return. In December 1999, authorities banned all travel for students (including those in grade school), canceled spring and summer holidays, and enrolled students in compulsory military training and weapons-use courses.
In an apparent effort to convince citizens living abroad to return to the country, government radio announced in June 1999 an amnesty for teachers who left the country illegally after the Gulf War. Shortly thereafter the Revolutionary Command Council decreed a general amnesty for all citizens who either had left the country illegally or who had failed to return after the period of exile had expired (see Section 1.d.). In October 1999, Justice Minster Shabib Al-Maliki announced that authorities may seize assets belonging to citizens living outside the country who did not return in response to the amnesty decree. A special ministerial committee was formed to track and monitor citizens inside the country who received money from relatives living abroad.
A November 1999 law provides for additional penalties for citizens who attempt to leave the country illegally. Under the law, a prison term of up to 10 years and "confiscation of movable and immovable property" is to be imposed on anyone who attempts to leave illegally. Similar penalties face anyone found to encourage or assist persons banned from travel, including health care professionals, engineers, and university professors. In 2000 the director of the Real Estate Registration Department stated that pursuant to the decree, the Government confiscated the property of a number of persons.
The Government restricts foreign travel by journalists, authors, university professors, doctors, scientists, and all employees of the Ministry of Information. Security authorities interrogate all media employees, journalists, and writers upon their return from foreign travel.
The Government consistently politicizes and interferes with religious pilgrimages, both of Muslim citizens who wish to make the Hajj to Mecca and Medina and of citizen and noncitizen Muslim pilgrims to holy sites in the country (see Section 2.c.).
Foreign spouses of citizens who have resided in the country for 5 years (1 year for spouses of government employees) are required to apply for naturalization as citizens. Many foreigners thus become subject to travel restrictions. The penalties for noncompliance include, but are not limited to, loss of the spouse's job, a substantial financial penalty, and repayment of any governmental educational expenses. The Government prevents many citizens who also hold citizenship in another country, especially the children of Iraqi fathers and foreign-born mothers, from visiting the country of their other nationality.
The U.N. Secretary General estimated that there are more than 500,000 IDP's remaining in the 3 northern provinces (Arbil, Dohuk, and Sulaymaniah), most of whom fled government-controlled areas in early 1991 during the uprising that followed the Gulf War. The Government continued its Arabization policy by discriminating against and forcibly relocating the non-Arab population, including Kurds, Turkmens, and Assyrians living in Kirkuk, Khanaqin, Sinjar, Makhmour, Tuz, Khoramatu, and other districts. Most observers view the policy as an attempt to decrease the proportion of non-Arab citizens in the oil-rich Kirkuk region, and thereby secure Arab demographic control of the area.
Non-Arab citizens are forced to either change their ethnicity on their identity documents and adopt Arabic names or be expelled to the Kurd-controlled northern governates. Persons may avoid expulsion if they relinquish their Kurdish, Turkmen, or Assyrian identity and register as Arabs. Persons who refuse to relinquish their identity may have their assets expropriated and their ration cards withdrawn prior to being deported.
The Revolutionary Command Council has mandated that new housing and employment be created for Arab residents who have been resettled in Kirkuk, while new construction or renovation of Kurd-owned property reportedly is prohibited. Non-Arabs may not sell their homes, except to Arabs, nor register or inherit property. Authorities estimate that since 1991, more than 100,000 persons have been displaced as part of the Arabization program.
According to numerous deportees in the north, the Government generally uses a systematic procedure to evict and deport non-Arab citizens. Frequently, a security force official demands that a family change its ethnicity from Kurdish or Turkmen to Arab. Subsequently, security officials frequently arrest the head of household and inform the other family members that the person will be imprisoned until they agree to settle elsewhere in the country. Such families frequently choose to move to the north; family members must sign a form that states that the departure is voluntary and they are not allowed to take any property or their food ration cards issued under the U.N. oil-for-food program. The Government frequently transfers the families' houses to Arab Ba'th Party members.
Those expelled are not permitted to return. The Special Rapporteur reported in 1999 that citizens who provide employment, food, or shelter to returning or newly arriving Kurds are subject to arrest. The Government denies that it expels non-Arab families.
According to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), hundreds of thousands of Iraqi refugees remained abroad. Apart from those suspected of sympathizing with Iran, most fled after the Government's suppression of the civil uprising of 1991; others are Kurds who fled during the Anfal Campaign of 1988. Of the 1.5 million refugees who fled following the 1991 uprisings, the great majority, particularly Kurds, have repatriated themselves in northern areas outside of government control.
The Government does not cooperate with the UNHCR, does not provide first asylum, and does not respect the rights of refugees.
Approximately 12,000 Turkish Kurds who have fled civil strife in southeastern Turkey remain in northern areas controlled by the central Government. The UNHCR is treating such displaced persons as refugees until it reaches an official determination of their status.
During the year, the KDP and PUK reiterated their September 1998 agreement to begin returning to their rightful homes the many thousands of persons each side had expelled as a result of intra-Kurdish fighting in the three northern provinces. In June the first 70 families were returned. In April 2000, the UNHCR noted that displaced persons still were living in tents or in open, unheated buildings (see Section 1.g.).
In August 1999, the KDP reportedly imposed a blockade on eight Assyrian villages near Aqra. Some sources indicated that KDP forces reportedly reentered one of the villages a couple of days later, rounded up the villagers, and publicly beat two of them. The KDP denied that the blockade or village raids occurred.
Section 3 Respect for Political Rights: The Right of Citizens to Change Their Government
Citizens do not have the right to change their government. The President wields power over all instruments of government. Most important officials either are members of Saddam Hussein's family or are family allies from his hometown of Tikrit. Although the Government has taken steps to increase the perception of democracy, the political process still is controlled firmly by the State. The 1995 so-called referendum on Saddam Hussein's presidency was not free and was dismissed as a sham by most international observers. It included neither voter privacy nor opposing candidates, and many credible reports indicated that voters feared possible reprisal if they cast a dissenting vote. A total of 500 persons reportedly were arrested in Karbala, Baghdad, and Ramadi provinces for casting negative ballots, and a member of the intelligence services reportedly was executed for refusing to vote for the President.
There are strict qualifications for parliamentary candidates; by law the candidates for the National Assembly must be over 25 years old and "believe in God, the principles of the July 17-30 revolution, and socialism." Elections for the National Assembly were held in March 2000; 220 of the 250 parliamentary seats were contested and presidential appointees filled the 30 remaining seats. Out of the 250 seats, members of the Ba'th reportedly won 165 seats, independents won 55, and 30 were appointed by Saddam Hussein to represent the northern provinces. According to the Special Rapporteur, the Ba'th Party allegedly instructed a number of its members to run as nominally independent candidates. Saddam Hussein's son Uday was elected to the National Assembly by receiving 99.9 percent of the vote.
Full political participation at the national level is restricted to members of the Arab Ba'th Socialist Party, who are estimated to constitute approximately 8 percent of the population. The political system is dominated by the Party, which governs through the Revolutionary Command Council. President Saddam Hussein heads the council. However, the RCC exercises both executive and legislative authority. The RCC dominates the National Assembly, which is completely subordinate to it and the executive branch.
Opposition political organizations are illegal and severely suppressed. Membership in certain political parties is punishable by death. In October 2000 security forces reportedly executed eight persons on charges of forming an opposition organization (see Sections 1.a. and 2.b.). In 1991 the RCC adopted a law that theoretically authorized the creation of political parties other than the Ba'th Party. However, in practice the law is used to prohibit parties that do not support the President and the Government. In 1999 various media published articles claiming that Saddam Hussein instructed officials in October 1999 to consider the formation of new political parties, a state council, and a new constitution. However, a Ministry of Culture and Information magazine later reported that the only two groups that attempted to form a party were refused for having an insufficient number of members.
The Government does not recognize the various political groupings and parties that have been formed by Shi'a Muslims, Kurds, Assyrians, Turkmens, or other communities. These political groups continued to attract support despite their illegal status.
The percentages of women and minorities in government and politics does not correspond to their percentages of the population. The law provides for the election of women and minorities to the National Assembly; however, they have only token representation.
In the north, all central government functions have been performed by local administrators, mainly Kurds, since the Government withdrew its military forces and civilian administrative personnel from the area after the 1991 uprising. A regional parliament and local government administrators were elected in 1992. The parliament last met in May 1995. The two major Kurdish parties in de facto control of the north, the KDP and the PUK, battled one another from 1994 through 1997. In September 1998, they agreed to unify their separate administrations and to hold new elections in July 1999. The cease-fire has held; however, reunification measures have not been implemented. The PUK held municipal elections in February 2000 and the KDP held municipal elections in May, the first elections held in the Kurdish-controlled areas since 1992. Foreign and local election observers reported that the elections generally were fair.
The KDP reportedly requires membership lists from ethnic minority political parties. The Government also imposes additional restrictions on some political parties (see Section 2.b.).
Section 4 Governmental Attitude Regarding International and Nongovernmental Investigation of Alleged Violations of Human Rights
The Government does not permit the establishment of independent human rights organizations. Citizens have established several human rights groups abroad and in northern areas not under government control. Monitors from most foreign and international human rights groups are not allowed in the country. However, the Government allows several international humanitarian and aid organizations to operate in the country.
The Government harassed and intimidated relief workers and U.N. personnel throughout the country, continued threatening to arrest or kill relief workers in the north, and staged protests against U.N. offices in the capital (see Sections 1.g. and 2.a.). In September the Government arrested and expelled six U.N. humanitarian workers without providing a basis for its actions.
As in previous years, the Government did not allow the U.N. Special Rapporteur to visit the country, nor did it respond to his requests for information.
In November the U.N. Commission on Human Rights and the U.N. General Assembly issued a report that noted "with dismay" the lack of improvement in the situation of human rights in Iraq. The report strongly criticized the "systematic, widespread, and extremely grave violations of human rights" and of international humanitarian law by the Government, which it stated resulted in "all-pervasive repression and oppression sustained by broad-based discrimination and widespread terror." The report called on the Government to fulfill its obligations under international human rights treaties.
For the ninth consecutive year, the Commission called on the U.N. Secretary General to send human rights monitors to "help in the independent verification of reports on the human rights situation in Iraq." The U.N. Subcommission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities made a similar request. The Government continued to ignore these requests.
The Government operates an official human rights group that routinely denies allegations of abuses.
Section 5 Discrimination Based on Race, Sex, Religion, Disability, Language, or Social Status
The Constitution and the legal system provide for some rights for women, children, and minorities; however, in practice the Government systematically violates these rights.
Women
Domestic violence against women occurs but little is known about its extent. Such abuse customarily is addressed within the tightly knit family structure. There is no public discussion of the subject, and no statistics are published. Spousal violence constitutes grounds for divorce and may be prosecuted; however, suits brought on such charges reportedly are rare. Under a 1990 law, men who committed honor crimes may receive immunity from prosecution (see Section 1.e.).
Rape is prohibited by law; however, security forces rape family members of persons in the opposition a punishment. No information is available regarding the frequency or severity of rape in society.
Prostitution is illegal. During the year, the Government reportedly beheaded women accused of prostitution (see Section 1.a.).
The Government states that it is committed to equality for women, who make up approximately 20 percent of the work force. It has enacted laws to protect women from exploitation in the workplace and from sexual harassment; to permit women to join the regular army, Popular Army, and police forces; and to equalize women's rights in divorce, land ownership, taxation, and suffrage. It is difficult to determine the extent to which these protections are afforded in practice. Women are not allowed to travel outside the country alone (see Section 2.d.).
In April 2000, the PUK declared that immunity would not be given for honor crimes in the area under its control. Several active women's organizations operate in the Kurd-controlled regions in the north. In September the KDP began admitting women into the police academy in preparation for the planned integration of women into the police force.
Children
No information is available regarding whether the Government has enacted specific legislation to promote the welfare of children. However, the Special Rapporteur and several human rights groups have collected a substantial body of evidence indicating the Government's continued disregard for the rights and welfare of children. Education for boys is compulsory through the sixth grade. Children may continue in public schools through grade 12, but children often leave after grade 6 to help in family enterprises. The Government claims that it also has enacted laws to make education for girls compulsory.
The Government's failure to comply with relevant U.N. Security Council resolutions has led to a continuation of economic sanctions. There were widespread reports that food and medicine that could have been made available to the general public, including children, were stockpiled in warehouses or diverted for the personal use of some government officials. The executive director of the U.N. office in charge of the oil-for-food program confirmed the insufficient placement of orders in a January 2000 letter to the Government, in which he expressed concern about the low rate of submission of applications in the health, education, water, sanitation, and oil sectors. He also stated that of the $570 million worth of medicines and medical supplies that had arrived in the country through the oil-for-food program in 1998 and 1999, only 48 percent had been distributed to clinics, hospitals, and pharmacies.
The Government's management of the oil-for-food program did not take into account the special requirements of children between the ages of 1 and 5, despite the U.N. Secretary General's specific injunction that the Government modify its implementation procedures to address the needs of this vulnerable group. In 1999 UNICEF issued the results of the first surveys of child and maternal mortality in the country that have been conducted since 1991. The surveys were conducted between February and May 1999, in cooperation with the Government in the southern and central regions, and in cooperation with the local Kurdish authorities in the north. The surveys revealed that in the south and center parts of the country, home to 85 percent of the population, children under 5 years old were dying at more than twice the rate that they were a decade before. In contrast mortality rates for children under 5 years old in the Kurdish-controlled north dropped in the period between 1994 and 1999. The Special Rapporteur criticized the Government for "letting innocent people suffer while [it] maneuvered to get sanctions lifted." Had the Government not waited 5 years to adopt the oil-for-food program in 1996, he stated in October 1999, "millions of innocent people would have avoided serious and prolonged suffering."
For the 8th, the Government held 3-week training courses in weapons use, hand-to-hand fighting, rappelling from helicopters, and infantry tactics for children between 10 and 15 years of age. Camps for these "Saddam Cubs" operated throughout the country. Senior military officers who supervised the course noted that the children held up under the "physical and psychological strain" of training that lasted for as long as 14 hours each day. Sources in the opposition report that the army found it difficult to recruit enough children to fill all of the vacancies in the program. Families reportedly were threatened with the loss of their food ration cards if they refused to enroll their children in the course. The Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq reported in October 1999 that authorities were denying food ration cards to families that failed to send their young sons to Saddam Cubs compulsory weapons-training camps (see Section 1.f.). Similarly, authorities reportedly withheld school examination results to students unless they registered in the Fedayeen Saddam organization (see Section 1.f.).
Government officials allegedly took children from minority groups in order to intimidate their families to leave cities and regions in which the Government wishes to create a Sunni Arab majority (see Sections 1.d., 1.f., and 2.d.).
Persons with Disabilities
No information was available regarding the Government's policy towards persons with disabilities.
Religious Minorities
The country's cultural, religious, and linguistic diversity is not reflected in its political and economic structure. Various segments of the Sunni Arab community, which itself constitutes a minority of the population, effectively have controlled the Government since independence in 1932. Shi'a Arabs, the religious majority of the population, have long been economically, politically, and socially disadvantaged. Like the Sunni Kurds and other ethnic and religious groups in the north, the Shi'a Arabs of the south have been targeted for particular discrimination and abuse (see Section 2.c.).
Assyrian groups reported several instances of mob violence by Muslims against Christians in the north in the past few years.
Although few Jews remain in the country, government officials frequently make anti-Semitic statements.
National/Racial/Ethnic Minorities
Non-Arabs are denied equal access to employment, education, and physical security. Non-Arabs are not permitted to sell their homes except to Arabs, nor to register or inherit property. The Government continued to relocate forcibly the non-Arab population, including Kurds, Turkmens, and Assyrians living in Kirkuk, Sinjar, and other districts (see Sections 1.f. and 2.d.).
Assyrians and Chaldeans are considered by many to be a distinct ethnic group, as well as the descendants of some of the earliest Christian communities. These communities speak a different language (Syriac), preserve traditions of Christianity, and have a rich cultural and historical heritage that they trace back more than 2,000 years. Although these groups do not define themselves as Arabs, the Government, without any historical basis, defines Assyrians and Chaldeans as such, evidently to encourage them to identify with the Sunni-Arab dominated Government (see Section 2.c.).
The Government does not permit education in languages other than Arabic and Kurdish. Thus, in areas under government control, Assyrian and Chaldean children are not permitted to attend classes in Syriac.
The Constitution does not provide for a Yazidi identity. Many Yazidis consider themselves to be ethnically Kurdish, although some would define themselves as both religiously and ethnically distinct from Muslim Kurds. However, the Government, without any historical basis, has defined the Yazidis as Arabs. There is evidence that the Government has compelled this reidentification to encourage Yazidis to join in domestic military action against Muslim Kurds. Captured government documents included in a 1998 HRW report describe special all-Yazidi military detachments formed during the 1988-89 Anfal campaign to "pursue and attack" Muslim Kurds. The Government imposes the same repressive measures on Yazidis as on other groups (see Section 2.c.).
Citizens considered by the Government to be of Iranian origin must carry special identification and often are precluded from desirable employment. Over the years, the Government has deported hundreds of thousands of citizens of Iranian origin.
Ethnic and religious minorities face some discrimination and harassment by Kurds in the north. In areas of the north under Kurdish control, classes in Syriac and Turkish have been permitted in primary schools run by Assyrian or Turkmen parties, since the 1991 uprising against the Government. However, teaching of Syriac reportedly remains restricted. The Kurdish administrations also require that all school children begin learning Arabic in primary school.
Assyrian groups reported several instances of mob violence by Muslims against Christians in the north in the past few years. Assyrians continue to fear attacks by the PKK, a Turkish-based terrorist organization that operates against indigenous Kurds in northern Iraq. In 2000 Christians reported feeling caught in the middle of intra-Kurdish fighting. Some Assyrian villagers reported in 2000 being pressured to leave the countryside for the cities as part of a campaign by indigenous Kurdish forces to deny the PKK access to possible food supplies. There were no reports during the year of the Kurdistan Regional Government's investigation into a series of bombings in 1998 and 1999 that many Assyrian groups believed were part of a terror campaign designed to intimidate them into leaving the north.
Ethnic Turkmen also claim discrimination by Kurdish groups, including the required use of the Kurdistan flag in Turkmen schools and the assignment of Kurdish teachers to Turkmen schools.
Section 6 Worker Rights
a. The Right of Association
There are no trade unions independent of government control. The Trade Union Organization Law of 1987 established the Iraqi General Federation of Trade Unions (IGFTU), a government controlled trade union structure, as the sole legal trade federation. The IGFTU is linked to the Ba'th Party, which uses it to promote party principles and policies among union members.
Workers in private and mixed enterprises, but not public employees or workers in state enterprises, have the right to join local union committees. The committees are affiliated with individual trade unions, which in turn belong to the IGFTU.
In 1999 Uday Hussein reportedly dismissed hundreds of members of the Iraqi Union of Journalists for not praising Saddam Hussein and the Government sufficiently (see Section 2.a.). Also in 1999, Uday Hussein reportedly jailed at least four leaders of the Iraqi National Students Union for failing to carry out his orders to take action against students known for their criticism of the situation in the country.
The Labor Law restricts the right to strike. According to the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, such restrictions on the right to strike include penal sanctions. No strike has been reported for during the past 2 decades.
The IGFTU is affiliated with the International Confederation of Arab Trade Unions and the formerly Soviet-controlled World Federation of Trade Unions.
In the Kurd-controlled northern region, the law allows persons to form and join trade unions and other organizations, and to use such organizations for political action. Dozens of trade groups have been formed since 1991.
b. The Right to Organize and Bargain Collectively
The right to bargain collectively is not recognized. The Government sets salaries for public sector workers, the majority of employed persons. Wages in the much smaller private sector are set by employers or negotiated individually with workers. Government workers frequently are shifted from one job and work location to another to prevent them from forming close associations with other workers. The Labor Code does not protect workers from antiunion discrimination, an omission that has been criticized repeatedly by the Committee of Experts of the International Labor Organization (ILO).
There are no export processing zones.
c. Prohibition of Forced or Compulsory Labor
Compulsory labor is prohibited by law; however, the Penal Code mandates prison sentences, including compulsory labor, for civil servants and employees of state enterprises for breaches of labor "discipline," including resigning from a job. According to the ILO, foreign workers in the country have been prevented from terminating their employment and returning to their native countries because of government-imposed penal sanctions on persons who do so. There is no information available regarding forced and bonded labor by children.
d. Status of Child Labor Practices and Minimum Age for Employment
The employment of children under the age of 14 is prohibited, except in small-scale family enterprises. However, children reportedly are encouraged increasingly to work in order to help support their families because of the country's harsh economic conditions. The law stipulates that employees between the ages of 14 and 18 work fewer hours per week than adults. Each year the Government enrolls children as young as 10 years of age in a paramilitary training program (see Section 5). There is no information available regarding forced and bonded labor by children (see Section 6.c.).
The Government has not ratified ILO Convention 182 on the worst forms of child labor.
e. Acceptable Conditions of Work
There was no information available regarding minimum wages.
Most workers in urban areas work a 6-day, 48-hour workweek. The head of each ministry sets hours for government employees. Working hours for agricultural workers vary according to individual employer-employee agreements.
Occupational safety programs are in effect in state-run enterprises. Inspectors ostensibly inspect private establishments, but enforcement varies widely. There was no information regarding workers' ability to remove themselves from work situations that endanger their health or safety.
f. Trafficking in Persons
There was no information available regarding whether trafficking in persons is prohibited by law, or whether persons were trafficked to, from, or within the country.
_____________
1 The United States does not have diplomatic representation in Iraq. This report draws to a large extent on non-U.S. Government sources.
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