An overview of
CPT Iraqi
Kurdistan
activities during
spring 2013.

Pray that the women of Iraqi Kurdistan may find freedom from domestic violence, discrimination in legal and medical systems, honor killings and other forms of oppression. Give strength and courage to those who advance women's rights and well-being.

CPT Iraqi Kurdistan has published a new a report summarizing views of fellow activists in the field of Women’s Rights in Iraqi Kurdistan.

The people of Halabja and these young protesters
ask the world not to forget the dead, but also not
to forget the living.

The CPT Iraqi Kurdistan team is growing increasingly concerned by the situation surrounding imprisoned journalist Karzan Karim. Karim, who has been imprisoned since late 2011, was found guilty in October 2012 of violating a law criminalizing any act that "harms state institutions" and "undermines the security and stability of the region," after he published a series of articles calling out corruption he observed in the Erbil International Airport.

Lord, renew among your war-weary people the gifts of lamentation
in the face of wrong, sharing in suffering, partnering with all who
stand in and for peace and good, and offering oneself to protect
from harm anyone branded as "enemy".

Ten years after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, CPT,
together with uncounted Iraqi families, laments
the ongoing carnage that continues to echo from
that moment.

Give thanks for God’s gift to young Iraqi Kurds of openness and honesty in both naming violence in all its forms and imagining alternatives. Ask for humility and reawakened hope of older, "wiser" ones to listen, believe and act in new, redemptive ways.

The classroom was cold and crowded with old and squeaky benches. We began moving them aside a bit, to make room for the exercises. A group of girls came in and eagerly sat in the front benches. "Oh, there's no electricity! We can't show them the film clips that we've prepared!"

CPT Iraqi Kurdistan met with two shepherds who had spent nearly three weeks in Iranian detention last fall. The shepherds said they were grazing their flocks in Iraqi Kurdistan territory when they were kidnapped by Iranian border guards.