December 19, 2005


The White House seemed very upset with what happened in the Green zone, when US soldiers "found" the jail of Jadriya while they were looking for a 15 years old kidnapped child. The images of torture and execution disturbed the US government, who now claims to be the champion of human rights and democracy. Even Condolencia Rice proclaimed that "the US does not torture". They pretended that the Jafaari government had let them down with such abuses. How hypocrite can you get? They trained these men, spent 3,3 billion $ out of the 2004 Pentagon’s 87 billion $ budget to create and fund militia’s like the Badr militia’s and the Wolf brigade. They don’t fool no Iraqis, even when they hire people like Christian Bailey to plant false stories in Iraqi newspapers. We Iraqis know what’s happening. The US bears prime responsibility for the torture and killing of Iraqi civilians. They transferred their dirty methods used in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala to Iraq. And they kill without remorse, using their militia’s to carry out the torture for them. They must be very desperate. On the one hand they want to invade Iran, on the other hand they fund and train Iranian militia’s, and support Iranian fundamentalist currents. But when they decide to invade Iran, every single Shia in Iraq will join the resistance. And they will be as ruthless against US forces as they are now against the Iraqi resistance. How can the US ever get out of this quagmire? A good advice: the sooner they leave, the better for them

My story is about those jails far away from the Green Zone, near to the Iranian zone. Who feels the pain of the prisoners under the whips of the Iranian investigators in Medain, Kut, Baladiyat, and Hilla ? And what is the role of the UN as independent international organization in Iraq, when "investigators" in Iranian jails in Iraq shoot people down without reason, and the UN is looking the other way

My friend Majed Hadi al-jubourie, 27 years old, was arrested in October 2005 by Al Rafidain forces, with the support of US troops, and he and his 3 brothers and 55 years old uncle were taken to the Al-Rafidain forces headquarters in Baladiyat, south east of Baghdad near to the formal Security building

"From the first moment when we were arrested, I felt that those soldiers who arrested us were not Iraqis, I mean they were really very close with Iranians, that was clear through their accents, and through the sayings and the singing that are typical for the Badr forces and the dead Hakim", Majed said

Majed thought that he and his brothers would be executed, because incidents of arrests by the police, who execute people before throwing their bodies in isolated areas, is a common practice these days in Iraq.

"They blindfolded us, handcuffed us and put us in an American van without windows, to the Al-Rafidain forces camp, then they put us in a cell and started their investigation which consisted only of beatings. They did not ask us a specific question, they did not know why we were there, all they knew was that 'we are Sunni’s and we are men’", Majed said angrily. "They used sticks and pipes to hit us, every night. We were trying to cover my uncle because he is sick and older than us. We thought that he might die under these severe beatings"

Majed considered himself lucky at that time, as he was hearing the sounds of torture in investigations rooms and solitary rooms, he was hearing the shouting of the prisoners, and he saw them after the investigation: half dead. They brought them with blankets as they were not able to walk

"They were torturing people from the Dora district. They were so savage with them, so brutal. They were torturing them many times a day. One day they were torturing us after dinner, and they decided to put us with them in the same cell. We were forty people, squeezed in a tiny cell. These were the most difficult days. I thought that I would die. They broke my bones, they tortured me and everyone in that cell, to force us to confess that we killed policemen, and tried to make us confess in front of a camera to show us on Al-Iraqia tv"

"They ordered my brother Hamed to carry dead bodies from people tortured to death. They choose him because he was big and strong. I thought that they would kill him later on as he saw a lot of their crimes "

Hamed is still afraid of the horrors he witnessed. He asked me not to mention anything that would reveal his identity, and he decided not to stay at home after that horrible experience

"They were killing people as if they were killing flies. They were not afraid of anything. It was apparently very easy for them to kill anyone. I carried many bodies which were covered with blood and filled with holes of drilling devices, and some of those bodies were shot. They gave me this job for one reason: they did not want their uniform to be covered with blood. We were putting the bodies in ambulances, and then they would take them away. I think they were thrown into rivers or in deserted areas"

Hamed told me: "the ground was covered with blood, all red. They used everything to torture people. Making holes in heads seems to be very easy for them, as they were trained to do that. They do a dirty duty and follow orders from superiors"

Majed told me about someone's horrible painful story inside the jail. This story is a good example of how terrible and inhuman the people are that were in charge of the jail. "They took someone for investigation and we were hearing him shouting during the torture. They were telling him to confess what he did. He was saying that he did nothing, then they shot in his leg with a pistol, then brought him back into the cell. He was bleeding a lot, because there was a hole in his leg. We treated him with a rag and we asked the guards to take him to hospital, but they refused, they said: 'you Sunni’s deserve this, you are Saddam's people’. The man was dying and no one could help, they kept him for more than a week until there was a bad smell coming from his leg, we all were smelling. The place was incredibly dirty with urine and human excrements. I still feel the smell coming from that man's leg. It was like he was rotting. He remained there when we were released. He asked us to inform his family in case he would die, and said: "pray for me. I want to die, because I can’t stand the pain anymore"

Majed said: "if you get out of that jail you feel a desire to join Zarqawi’s people to fight against the Shia and Americans, and you believe what Zarqawi says, if he exists. Those militia men were hanging Hakim’s picture everywhere in the jail and tortured us continuously. I hate that picture now. I hate their black hats and their dirty beards. They are a shame for Islam. They are not Muslims"

Majed said that some Shiite religious men were mediating between the prison officers and the prisoners families. Their families had to pay something like $3000 to release a person, sometimes more, depending on the financial situation of the prisoners families

This is now happening in Iraq, to my friends and family, on a daily basis, while you Americans are buying Christmas presents and preparing Turkey. Every Iraqi has a similar story to tell. We never had sectarian violence before, but Bremer and Bush are successfully heading for a catastrophe when they remain in Iraq. And I’ll tell you why. Let the occupation troops leave and the equilibrium will be restored. Now people can kill without impunity, because they feel protected by the occupation forces. They are pushed into a sectarian corner by every law that has been issued by Bremer and the TAL. But if the troops leave and one Iraqi kills another Iraqi, he’s certain that there will be revenge. Remember that this is a tribal society, and if one member of the tribe gets killed, the other members of the tribe have the obligation to revenge this killing. Everyone in Iraq knows this, and they will think twice before committing atrocities as they are doing now, with the help of US tax money and protected by Bremer’s laws and US occupation forces. I hope you understand by now that there is only one way to solve this conflict before it really escalates: bring your troops home before my people kicks them out. With every new prisoner, every new civilian killed by your airplanes and Apache helicopters, ten new people will join the popular resistance