Wives and daughters targeted by Security Forces in Iraq
22 Feb Daily Telegraph
Iraqi police accused of stirring sectarian tensions by targeting
insurgent suspects’ wives Iraqi security forces are helping to push the
country back towards civil war by arresting and torturing the wives of
suspected insurgents, human rights campaigners claim on Thursday.
A report compiled by Human Rights Watch details appalling allegations
of violence and sexual abuse against women and girls by the Iraqi
police, army, and special forces.Women detainees claim to have suffered
weeks of beatings, rape and electrocutions from interrogators, who
sometimes threatened to arrest their daughters as well and do the same
to them.The culture of sexual violence was commonplace that one employee
at a women’s jail told Human Rights Watch: “We expect that they’ve been
raped by police on the way to the prison.”
The inspector general of Iraq’s interior ministry, Aqil Tarahy, told
the report that such abuse was the work of a few “monsters” from the
regime of the late Saddam Hussein, who had not yet been weeded out from
the security services.
But Human Rights Watch claims to have detected a deliberate policy by
Iraq’s Shia-led government to target female family members of terrorism
suspects, most of whom are drawn from Iraq’s Sunni minority.
The arrest of one such group of women during a security service sweep
in a Sunni farming town 14 months ago was one of the sparks for the
massive Sunni civil rights protests that have now lurched the country
back towards sectarianism.
In the past year the protests have in turn been infiltrated by Sunni
extremists from al-Qaeda, who have regrouped in strength and last month
attempted to seize the Sunni cities of Fallujah and Ramadi.”
The government frequently targets women family members of men wanted
on suspicion of terrorism, often with no evidence,” said Erin Evers, the
Iraq researcher for Human Rights Watch, who said Baghdad had failed to
honour promises made a year ago to address complaints.She added: “The
failure to keep those promises helped fuel the protests that led to the
current fighting in Falluja and Ramadi.”In preparing the report, Human
Rights Watch interviewed 27 female detainees, along with employees from
Iraq’s prison service, interior and human rights ministries, as well
diplomats, United Nations officials, defence lawyers and
judges.Together, they painted a picture of near-impunity for the
security services, who are under huge pressure to curb terrorism ahead
of April’s parliamentary elections.
One judge spoke of four “infamous” fellow judges who gave legal cover
for human rights abuses by the security forces.
All apparently had close links to the office of the prime minister,
Nouri al-Maliki, who has taken personal control of Iraq’s security
apparatus since assuming office in 2006. A number of human rights
ministry inspectors who had led investigations into malpractice by
security units close to Mr Maliki had fled the country for fear of
reprisals, the report said.
|
