Human rights in post-invasion Iraq

Human rights in post-invasion Iraq have been the subject of concerns and controversies since the 2003 U.S. invasion. Concerns have been expressed about conduct by insurgents, the U.S.-led coalition forces and the Iraqi government. The U.S. is investigating several allegations of violations of international and internal standards of conduct in isolated incidents by its own forces and contractors. The UK is also conducting investigations of alleged human rights abuses by its forces. War crime tribunals and criminal prosecution of the numerous crimes by insurgents are likely years away. In late February 2009, the U.S. State Department released a report on the human rights situation in Iraq, looking back on the prior year (2008).

Human rights abuses by insurgents

Abuses of Human Rights conducted by, or alleged to have been conducted by, Iraq-based insurgents and/or terrorists include:

August 2003

Bombing of the U.N. headquarters in Baghdad in August 2003 which killed the top U.N. representative in Iraq, 55-year-old Vieira de Mello, a Brazilian, who was also the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. 22 UN staff members were killed and more than 100 injured in the explosion. The dead also included Nadia Younes, former Executive Director at World Health Organization (WHO) in charge of External Relations and Governing Bodies. The terrorist attack was condemned by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and denounced by the UN security council.

June 2004

South Korean translator Kim Sun-il beheaded by followers of al-Zarqawi.

July 2004

Tawhid and Jihad behead Bulgarian truck drivers Ivaylo Kepov and Georgi Lazov. Al-Jazeera broadcast the videotape containing the killing, but said the portion with the actual killing was too graphic to broadcast.

December 2004

Italian photographer, 52-year-old Salvatore Santoro, beheaded in a video. Islamic Movement of Iraqi Mujahedeen claimed responsibility.

February 2005

Al-Iraqiya TV (Iraq) aired transcripts of confessions by Syrian intelligence officer Anas Ahmad Al-Issa and Iraqi terrorist Shihab Al-Sab'awi concerning their booby-trap operations, explosions, kidnappings, assassinations, and details of beheading training in Syria.

July 2005

Egyptian and Algerian envoys.

*Two Algerian Diplomats were reported to have been killed by Al-Qaida in Iraq. Al-Qaeda in Iraq issued an Internet statement saying it killed two kidnapped Algerian diplomats, Ali Belaroussi and Azzedine Belkadi. “The court of al-Qaeda in Iraq has decided to carry out God’s verdict against the two diplomats from the apostate Algerian government ... and ordered to kill them,” said the statement, which was signed by Abu Maysara al-Iraqi, the al-Qaeda spokesman.
*Egyptian Diplomat by Al-Qaida was reported to have been killed. Al-Qaida in Iraq posted on a web forum a statement that it killed Egyptian diplomat al-Sherif. Top Sunni cleric Mohamed Sayed Tantawi condemned the killing as a "crime against religion, morality and humanity and a crime that goes against honour and chivalry".

February 2006

The Al Askari Mosque bombing occurred on February 22, 2006 at approximately 6:55am local time (0355 UTC) at the Al Askari Mosque — one of the holiest sites in Shi'a Islam — in the Iraqi city of Samarra, some northwest of Baghdad. Although no injuries occurred in the blast, the bombing resulted in violence over the following days. Over 100 dead bodies with bullet holes were found on February 23, and at least 165 people are thought to have been killed.

June 2006

Video of the killing of four Russian diplomats kidnapped in Iraq appear on the Internet. A group called the Mujahideen Shura Council released the hostage video.

July 2006

Anba' Al Iraq News agency, Writers without Borders Organisation condemn the imprisonment of its staff member, Husain E. Khadir who was in charge of covering documentaries about the type of threats Kurdistan Federal region imposes to its Neighboring countries. Delegation of Human Rights Watch (HRW) released reports about torture in Iraq and repression of human rights and freedom of expression. HRW interviewed several detained writers and journalists to document such violation. 718] Mr. Khadir was detained in Karkuk then moved to Arbil where Human Rights Watch (HRW) visited him in one of the detention places.
Last year in Baghdad, the same writer suffered even worse when he escaped from Shiia militia, who seized his house and threw his family in the streets, which was considered as a serious threat directed against his life. The move is widely exercised in Iraq in a retaliation against human rights activists, journalists and writers who express critics to the Iraqi government and Shiia coalition party. Several press and media agencies criticized loudly the Iraqi Shiia Coalition during the constitution-writing process. Khadir led a campaign to amend the constitution and urged for a constitution to be as peace building tool which brings all parties and opponents to a national consensus and social cohesion rather than a state building as the ruling party is regularly saying. UNAMI commented that most of these civil society activities were and are supported by the UN agencies, International donors or the US and British governments.
IRIN/UN news agency revealed that journalists and writers are the most vulnerable victims to killing, deaths, threats, kidnapping, torture and detention are commonly exercised by uncontrolled Iraqi forces, paramilitary organisations and Shiia or Suni militias. Similarity to this specific case is occurring and spreading in the south, centre and the north of Ira


The number of killed journalists and writers in Iraq has exceeded 220 this year. The Iraqi organisation for Supporting Journalists victims reported to IRI


US National Guard Sergeant Frank "Greg" Ford claims that he witnessed human rights violations in Samarra, Iraq. A subsequent Army investigation found Ford's allegations to be unfounded. Ford was also found to have displayed unauthorized "US Navy SEAL" insignia on his Army uniform; Ford had in fact never been a Navy SEAL as he had claimed for many years while serving in the Army National Guard.

*Kuwaiti News Agency reports that a high ranking Iraqi security source in the Interior Ministry said that the final death toll of the 13 August bombings in the Al-Zafaraniyah district in southern Baghdad is 57 killed and 145 injured, most of them women and children. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki laid the blame with Sunni extremists seeking to escalate the conflict.

Human rights abuses by coalition forces

Prison and interrogation abuses by coalition forces

April 2003

An Iraqi man, Ather Karen al-Mowafakia, was shot and killed by a British soldier at a roadside checkpoint on 29 April 2003. Witnesses have alleged he was shot in the abdomen after the door of his car struck a soldier on the leg when he was getting out of his car, and that he was then dragged from the vehicle and beaten by the soldier's comrades, dying later in hospital. In seven attempts made by ''The Guardian'' to raise the issue, the MOD has refused to "explain why the individuals were detained, or say where, how or why they died."

May 2003

In May 2003, Saeed Shabram and his cousin, Menem Akaili, were thrown into the river near Basra after being detained by British troops. Akaili survived but Shabram did not as he drowned in the river. Akaili said that he and Shabram were approached by a British patrol and led at gunpoint down to a jetty before being forced into the river. The punishment was known as "wetting" and said to have been inflicted on local youths suspected of looting. "Wetting was supposed to humiliate those suspected of being petty criminals," said Sapna Malik, the family's lawyer at Leigh Day and Co. "Although the MoD denies that there was a policy of wetting to deal with suspected looters around the time of this incident, evidence we have seen suggests otherwise. "The tactics employed by the MoD appeared to include throwing or placing suspected looters into either of Basra's two main waterways." Iraqi bystanders dragged Akaili out of the water but his cousin disappeared. Shabram's body was later recovered by a diver hired by his father, Radhi Shabram. Shabram's mother waited on the river bank for four hours while a diver searched the river for Saeed. "When Saeed's corpse was finally pulled from the river, Radhi describes how it was bloated and covered with marks and bruises," said Leigh Day. Though the MOD paid compensation to Saeed Shabram's family, none of the soldiers involved were charged for his death.

Ahmed Jabbar Kareem Ali, aged 15, was on his way to work with his brother on May 8, 2003, when a group of British soldiers assaulted him. The four soldiers beat him then forced him into a canal at gunpoint to "teach him a lesson" for suspected looting. Weakened from the beating Ali received from the soldiers, he floundered. He was dead when he was pulled from the river. Four British soldiers who were involved in a separate incident with the death of an Iraqi teenager were acquitted of manslaughter.

August 2003

Hanan Saleh Matrud, an eight-year-old Iraqi girl, was killed on 21 August 2003 by a soldier of the King's Regiment, when a Warrior armoured vehicle stopped near an alley that led to her home. Three or four soldiers exited the vehicle, and group of children including Hanan gathered, attracted by the soldiers. Stories differ about what happened next. The troops claimed they came under attack from stone-throwing mobs, and the shot was fired was a "warning shot". The local crowd, on the other hand, alleged that the crowd consisted of only children, who had been "coaxed into the open by the soldiers' offers of chocolate". Hanan was shot and killed by a soldier of the King's Regiment and was hit in her lower torso, and she was rushed by the soldiers to a Czech-run hospital. Hanan died the following day after an unsuccessful operation. According to the MOD, "in the absence of impartial witness evidence or forensic evidence to suggest a soldier had acted outside the rules of engagement, no crime was established." In May 2004, after an intervention from Amnesty International, her family submitted a formal claim for proper compensation, which as of 2004 is being assessed by the MOD.

September 2003

On 14 September, Baha Mousa, a 26-year-old hotel receptionist, was arrested along with six other men and taken to a British base. While in detention, Mousa and the other captives were hooded, severely beaten, and assaulted by a number of soldiers on base. Two days later, Mousa was found dead. A post-mortem examination found that Mousa suffered multiple injuries (at least 93), including fractured ribs and a broken nose, which were "in part" the cause of his death.

Seven members of the Queen's Lancashire Regiment were tried on charges relating to the ill treatment of detainees, including those of war crimes under the International Criminal Court Act 2001. On 19 September 2006, Corporal Donald Payne pleaded guilty to a charge of inhumane treatment to persons, making him the first member of the British Armed Forces to plead guilty to a war crime. He was subsequently jailed for one year and expelled from the army. The BBC
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