CPTnet
23 May 2005
IRAQ UPDATE: 11-16 May 2005
Wednesday 11 May
Multiple car bombs killed seventy-one people throughout Iraq.
Joe Carr and Sheila Provencher visited Women's Will, an Iraqi Women's
organization that advocates for women's issues in Iraq. The founder stated
her passion to unite Iraqi and American mothers in a common nonviolent
struggle against the occupation and war. "It will be better for Iraqis and
better for the American soldiers if [the soldiers] go home," she said.
Thursday 12 May
Provencher went to a wedding. She noted that the Baghdad neighborhood she
was in during the wedding was filled with the noise of helicopters, tanks
and gunfire. Her hosts told her that "the Americans" had target practice at
a nearby military base. The family, who used to support the presence of
American troops, no longer wanted them to be in Iraq and complained about
the increase in violence.
While grocery shopping, Tom Fox came upon four Multinational Forces (MNF)
Hummers and around eight foot soldiers (two squads.) The soldiers told Fox
that they were doing house-to-house checks. When Fox asked why the soldiers
were checking houses, the soldiers told him they received a list of streets
to check, and they check houses on those streets. Some of the soldiers
entered a nearby orphanage, which entertained the children.
Friday 13 May
Provencher visited a 27-year-old Iraqi friend who runs her own business. One
of the employees at the shop said a rocket-propelled grenade seriously
injured his father the previous day. His father's home is next to a police
station. When the resistance targeted the police station, the grenade
missed, flew into the home and took off the father's right leg. The employee
broke down, saying, "As an Iraqi citizen I can no longer bear this
situation. I have so many plans for my life . . . I want to go to graduate
school, for instance. But I am afraid to even travel across the city because
I might lose my hand, my leg, or my life. I cannot bear this anymore."
Sunday 15 May
En route to the U.S.A., Provencher left Iraq and arrived safely in Amman,
Jordan. She told the team that the ten mile trip to the Baghdad airport took
two hours because of all the U.S.-manned check points on the road.
16 May 2005
Rollins and Carr went to the office of an Iraqi nongovernmental organization
(NGO) that has offered CPT meeting space and other assistance. They
interviewed the brother of a man detained at Abu Ghraib by U.S. forces since
November 2004. The detainee was working at a restaurant late one night when
a car bomb exploded across the street. U.S. forces entered the restaurant
and detained all five of the men working there. Since his incarceration in
Abu Ghraib, the Iraqi man has come before a judge twice but both times the
U.S. forces that detained him did not appear to testify against him.
Carr and one of the team's translators went to the residency office to fill
out the necessary forms for his one-month stay in Iraq. Carr had to fulfill
a completely different set of requirements than CPTer Kathleen O'Malley had
to one month earlier.
When they returned from the residency office, the translator stayed to visit
with the team. He mentioned that one of his relatives is a member of the
Provisional Iraqi Assembly. The relative is so concerned for his own safety
that he sleeps in a different relative's house each night and never sleeps
in his own.
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