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UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs

IRAQ: Families of detainees want greater access

BAGHDAD, 3 November 2003 (IRIN) - After months of waiting, spouses and friends of Iraqis detained by coalition forces after being suspected of being involved with weapons of mass destruction are getting impatient. "No one has told me when my husband, a biological scientist, may be let go," Banu Mahmud al-Awbasani, a Baghdad resident told IRIN.

US soldiers had gone to Sinan al-Awbasani’s laboratory in June and promised to question him for just two hours, she said. But it has now been almost five months. "Sadness is inside my heart. My husband is not a criminal," Banu Mahmud maintained. "My children and I haven’t seen my husband since June."

Any questioning or investigation into al-Awbasani’s work helping UN weapons inspectors before the war must certainly be over, she asserted. Al-Awbasani was in charge of a national biological research facility that had "dual-use" autoclave machines permitted under the UN's Oil-for-Food programme. Moreover, any research into biological weapons being conducted by US officials had stopped in 1991 with UN sanctions, Banu Mahmud observed.

"They may consider my husband as helping the regime, but my husband never worked with the regime," she said. "He did his duty according to the rules of the former government. I’m not going to defend the previous regime, but after 1991, they stopped working on everything anyway."

It is a sore issue for other spouses as well, including a woman who declined to give her name, but whose husband is considered a top chemical weapons researcher. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is vigilant in ensuring that people being detained are having their cases heard. "Anyone classified as a prisoner of war [POW] should be released when hostilities end," a spokeswoman for the ICRC in Baghdad, Nada Doumani, told IRIN.

US President George Bush declared major combat operations over on 1 May, but has not announced an end to the war in Iraq.

Security detainees, who reportedly include scientists and researchers in the former regime, should have the right to a trial, Doumani said. "Cases of civilian internees - another classification created by coalition forces - must be reviewed every six months," she noted.

Banu Mahmud has received letters from her husband indicating that he has POW status, although he did not hold any rank in the military of the former regime (a prerequisite to being classified as a POW). "It’s not clear even for the families what the status is of their relatives," Doumani said.

Whereas the ICRC did not advocate for the release of the detainees, it would push to ensure that legal issues were addressed, which could lead to a release. "They cannot keep a prisoner indefinitely," she observed.

Meanwhile, Banu Mahmud said, spouses of the people being held were confused as to what to do. They wanted to speak out against what they saw as unfair detention, but many were also afraid that doing so might lead to ill-treatment. She said she did not believe that husband had received any ill-treatment at the hands of coalition forces. "We always see in American movies that you have the right to a lawyer, that everything is with the law. Is this what democracy is supposed to be like?" she wanted to know.

Banu Mahmud said that for at least two months she had not known where her husband was being held, even though she had tried hard to track him down through various US military channels and the infamous Abu Ghurayb Prison, where many detainees are currently confined. After weeks of frustration, she said a driver had brought her a satellite telephone, saying that her husband would call her. He called and said he was being held at the airport, where many other scientists are thought to be. People who have been captured on Iraq’s "hit list of 55", which includes Saddam Hussein, are also thought to be at the airport.

Since then, there had been no further calls, and letters delivered by the ICRC often arrived a month or more after they are written, Banu Mahmud noted. "That’s because coalition forces are translating all mail and reading it, a process that takes several weeks," Doumani explained.

"No one allowed us to meet them, because they are on a black list," Banu Mahmud said, close to tears. "I’m just afraid he needs more warm clothes for winter."

Under the Geneva Convention of 1949, POWs must be fed and clothed and must not be tortured. Issues such as due process are not as clear. Family visits are a right for all civilian detainees, according to Doumani. The coalition declined to comment on this issue.

Theme(s): (IRIN) Conflict, (IRIN) Human Rights

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This material comes to you via IRIN, a UN humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations or its agencies. If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post this item, please retain this credit and disclaimer. Quotations or extracts should include attribution to the original sources. All materials copyright © UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs 2003