CPTnet
19 December 2005
IRAQ: Waiting is the hardest part
by Greg Rollins
As this kidnapping draws out I am reminded of the Tom Petty and the Heart
Breakers song that says "the waiting is the hardest part." We fill our days
with work--important work--but work that helps us avoid the waiting. If we
stop and wait we grow restless, even edgy.
What we are currently experiencing here in Iraq is nothing new. Iraqis
civilians are kidnapped often. Almost every Iraqi knows someone who has been
kidnapped. In the past few weeks we have taken a lot of cues from our Iraqi
friends. They have told us how to word letters or statements, how to talk
to the local press and how to find the ear of people of influence.
The day before the abduction of our colleagues, Jim, Harmeet, Norman and I
visited a Chaldean church where we met a seventeen-year- old who was
kidnapped a year ago. His kidnappers held him for several weeks. They didn't
know him; they only wanted money from his family. He told us they treated
him well.
Recently, I was in a police station. While I sat there, a man walked in and
asked how many kidnappings the police were familiar with in 2005. "I
couldn't tell you the real number," the police officer said. "There are too
many. It is too high." After some questions and guess work the officer
behind the desk concluded he was familiar with around three hundred cases.
And these are just the ones that people reported to the police in his
designated area of Baghdad. Many families do not say anything when one of
their kin is abducted. They choose to deal with it as quickly and quietly as
they can.
How often do those of us outside Iraq hear about kidnapped Iraqis? Very
rarely. In the news, we hear about the bombs and ambushes. We hear about
the assassinations of political and religious leaders and the fighting in
Anbar province, but we rarely hear anything about the many Iraqis held
hostage.
And what about the innocent Iraqis arrested in sweeps by Multinational
Forces or Iraqi Security Forces? If they are innocent they still have to sit
in jail. Isn't that similar to a kidnapping? Just because governments do it
with a "legal" force while others do it as criminals, doesn't change the
circumstance for the people that are taken. Witnesses have told us that
prisoners in the custody of the Multinational Forces and Iraqi security
forces can be tortured and killed. How is that different than what criminal
kidnappers are capable of doing?
If we in CPT have received a lot of press over our kidnapped colleagues, it
is only because we are foreigners. I am disturbed that CPT's personal
tragedy outshines the more frequent abductions of Iraqi civilians, but in
the end, it doesn't matter if you are Iraqi or a foreigner, the waiting is
still the hardest part.
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