21 November 2003
Iraqi Women Say Life in Iraq Has Improved since Saddam's Ouster
Speak to journalists at Washington's Foreign Press Center Nov 19
Representatives from a delegation of Iraqi women leaders said their country's politics and infrastructure were much improved since Saddam Hussein's regime was ousted by Coalition forces in April.
The women, some of whom serve on the Iraqi Governing Council or the Baghdad City Advisory Council, spoke to journalists at Washington's Foreign Press Center November 19.
Raja Khuzai, a Governing Council representative, said that due to the oppression of the Ba'thists, "every honest Iraqi was happy with the war and welcome[d] the war."
"You don't know a dictatorship unless you live in it," she said.
Lina Abood, a gynecologist and obstetrician, reminded the audience of the thousands of unknown Iraqis buried in mass graves after being killed by Saddam's regime, while Siham Hamdan, a university lecturer and member of Baghdad's Advisory Council, said she appreciated the new freedom the Iraqi people had to criticize or demonstrate against their government.
Another Governing Council member, Songul Chapouk, said that many welcomed the coalition invasion due to a strong desire to be released from the former regime. "We couldn't release ourselves because we don't have the power," she said.
The four women said the economic and security situation has also improved for women since the fall of Saddam Hussein.
Khuzai said there was some media exaggeration about the security problems in the country, including the situation of women. "[E]verything is back to normal," she said, with colleges and schools open, and hospitals running 24 hours a day.
Hamdan added that many of her female colleagues had returned to their jobs "because of the improvement in the economical situations, increasing their salaries."
"It's enough for us, war and killing," said council member Chapouk. "We need safety. We need peace. ... We have to move and to ask for help from all countries, because Saddam left us without anything. He damaged everything, and we need now to rebuild Iraq again."
Khuzai said that besides improving security, job creation was also an immediate concern. She suggested creating a program similar to U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt's Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) that employed hundreds of thousands of Americans during the depression period of the 1930's.
She also called for microcredit and microlending programs for small Iraqi businesses.
The State Department's Senior Coordinator for International Women's Issues, Charlotte Ponticelli, hosted the briefing. She said it was important for Iraqi women to be "planners, implementers and beneficiaries of all reconstruction efforts in Iraq."
"[T]he Iraqi women have clearly expressed their strong desire to be at the table at the highest of decision-making levels," she said.
Siham Hamdan also said outsiders should not doubt the ability of the Iraqi people to lead themselves. "We need every help now to encourage us, to push us forward, and not to bring us backwards to Saddam's regime, to Saddam's dictatorship," she said.
"So let us give the chance for Iraqis, for the first time, after 35 years ... [to] rule themselves," said Hamdan. "We have trust in our people. We have to have this trust. We don't have a lot of alternative; otherwise, we cannot accept a foreigner to rule us, even for one day."
Following is a transcript of the Iraqi women's delegation at the Foreign Press Center:
(begin transcript)
FOREIGN PRESS CENTER BRIEFING WITH CHARLOTTE PONTICELLI, SENIOR COORDINATOR FOR INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S ISSUES, DEPARTMENT OF STATE, AND A DELEGATION OF IRAQI WOMEN FROM THE GOVERNING COUNCIL AND THE BAGHDAD CITY ADVISORY COUNCIL WHO MET WITH PRESIDENT BUSH ON MONDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2003
TOPIC: THE U.S. COMMITMENT TO WOMEN IN IRAQ
THE WASHINGTON FOREIGN PRESS CENTER, WASHINGTON, D.C.
2:05 P.M. EST, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 2003
MR. DENIG: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Washington Foreign Press Center. Welcome also to journalists at our New York Foreign Press Center. We're very pleased today to have a delegation of Iraqi women from the Governing Council and the Baghdad City Advisory Council with us today. And I'd like to introduce our guests, if I may, before we start.
To your far left is Charlotte Ponticelli from the Department of State. She is the Senior Coordinator for International Women's Issues at the Department. Next to her is Songul Chapouk, a member of the Iraqi Governing Council. Next to her, in the middle, is Raja Khuzai, also from the Governing Council. Next to her is Siham Hamdan from the Baghdad City Advisory Council. And next to me is Dr. Lina Abood who was a candidate for the Iraqi Governing Council.
We'll have a few opening statements to make, and after that, we'll be delighted to take your questions.
Charlotte.
MS. PONTICELLI: Thank you so much, Paul. It really is a great pleasure to be here today at the Foreign Press Center, and to meet again with these truly distinguished Iraqi women leaders, some of whom I met, actually, for the first time during a recent trip to Baghdad. All of these women are dedicated to a better future for their families and their communities, and they are determined to make that future work for all Iraqis, men and women.
As President Bush mentioned to these women who are here today, when he met with them earlier this week at the White House, the stories of the courageous leaders are "stories of human tragedy on the one hand and human hope on the other." Our discussions with this delegation over the past week are really a continuation of our ongoing dialogue with the women of Iraq. It's a dialogue that's already spawned great cooperation and ideas.
In our discussions with these brave women, both here and in Baghdad, several key issues have emerged. In addition to concerns about the security situation, the Iraqi women have clearly expressed their strong desire to be at the table at the highest of decision-making levels.
Songul and Raja on the Governing Council, and Siham on the Baghdad City Advisory Council, I think are great examples of the political leadership role that women can and should be playing in Iraq. They and the rest of the group have made it clear that it is also important that women be involved in the constitutional drafting process, and we support their aspirations.
Iraqi women must be planners, implementers and beneficiaries of all reconstruction efforts in Iraq. All Iraqis must be involved in running their country, women and men. There are plenty of willing and able women, as we can see today, women like Dr. Lina Abood, who runs a clinic in Baghdad. She's a general practitioner of obstetrics and gynecology and sees about 200 patients a week. She's an example of the contributions that women are making now, today, in Iraq.
As President Bush has said, the Iraqi people are plenty capable of governing themselves. We recognize that and we're here to support them any way we can. We know that training, including leadership, organization and networking programs, is something that we can do, and will continue to do to assist them. We are also working with many interested Americans who are stepping forward and volunteering their time and their talents to assist the women of Iraq, and will be helping to make those connections.
I'll end now, because I want you very much to hear from these pioneering women themselves, and I'd like turn to my friend first, Songul Chapouk, who would like to say a few words. Thank you.
MS. CHAPOUK: Thank you. I think it's a pleasure for me to be here again. I was here before, a month and half. I joined a conference in Washington Institute, and I went to foreign affairs and State Department. And again, now I am here with my group of women, and we are enjoying it here, to be here, and it's a pleasure for us to serve our country, because we know that Iraqi people need help, especially the women. They need help, because the war affected on women more than men.
And if you saw the women in the war, they are all without men, without their husbands. I was without my husband, because he had to go to work, and to save, to protect the company he worked in. And I was alone with my children, in home. I suffered, from the bombs, from killings. I saw people killing. For three wars we saw it.
It's enough for us, war and killing. We need safety. We need peace. How we can reach it if we not move? We have to move and to ask for help from all countries, because Saddam left us without anything. He damaged everything, and we need now to rebuild Iraq again. And women can do this. And we will win in this job, inshallah.
MR. DENIG: Thank you very much. I'd like to ask Raja Khuzai to make a statement.
MS. KHUZAI: Thank you. This is my first visit to U.S., and I am very pleased, and I have learned a lot. I'm the head of the delegation, 17 women, leaders, and different ethnic and religious groups. This -- really this is an example of the Iraq, the one-nation Iraq, the new Iraq. I am proud with this group.
We have met top officials here and we have discussed the role of women, especially in the constitution, the drafting process, and the legislation as well. Also, I have raised the point of security and the role of creating jobs for the unemployed. I think creation of jobs is very important, and security. And I raised the example of President Roosevelt and the Depression period, which is the CCC. If we create a massive civil works, it will work, it will help our community.
The other thing is the small businesses and microcredits and microlending. This will help the Iraqis. They have suffered. We need to help them. The other thing that now, in this time, we are ready for local elections only. And then after that, we may do the national elections.
Thank you.
MR. DENIG: Good. Thank you very much. We'd now like to take your questions. As usual, we ask you use the microphone, identify yourself and your news organization.
Let's start up in front here with Said.
QUESTION: Thank you. My name is Said Arikat from Al Quds Newspaper, the Jerusalem-based Al Quds Newspaper. You know, Nick Kristof, a columnist in The New York Times, wrote an article today. I'd like to read you what he said about the women's situation. He said that one UN official told him Iraqi women were once raped by Qusay and Uday, Saddam's sons, and now they are raped by everybody else. Fewer women are in the labor force than under Saddam because now they don't dare to leave their homes.
And a report by the UN Population Fund offers a devastating portrait of the plight of Iraqi women since the war. Contraceptive use has fallen because of supply breakdown. You know, maybe you can tell us about that. Unsafe abortions are increasing, sexual abductions are on the rise, and a combination of poor security and hospital looting has left many women without access to medical care. Treatment of problems such as sexually transmitted infections, breast or cervical cancer, is now is now impossible to afford.
Could you please elaborate on that?
MS. KHUZAI: Just the last point, the cervical cancer --
QUESTION: Well, saying that, you know, contraceptives are not available. You know, people are afraid to --
MS. KHUZAI: Now? Nowadays?
QUESTION: Now. Now that -- things are a lot worse for women today than they were under Saddam, especially in the labor force.
MS. KHUZAI: We can say there is no big difference before the war and after it. We can see the contraceptives and the intrauterine contraceptive device in the primary health care centers, and that's, in some areas, maybe diminished, okay? And for Baghdad, that the place I'm working in, you can see all of these things are available.
But we need this time, and also, continuously with the time before the war under Saddam's regime, we need an extra care, especially for screening for cervical cancer and for breast cancer, and we need an increased facilities and equipment to, you know, for the early diagnosis of these diseases. This is what is available from before.
QUESTION: If I could follow up very quickly. If you were to draw a curve on, you know, the situation for women in Iraq, let's say, from four weeks ago, until today, how would it go? It is worse, better, is it the same?
MS. KHUZAI: Four weeks ago?
QUESTION: Yeah, I mean, you know -- just over four weeks.
MS. KHUZAI: It's better.
QUESTION: Well, over the past, let's say, month, two and half months.
MS. KHUZAI: It's increasing now to improvement. There is an improvement.
DR. ABOOD: May I comment?
MR. DENIG: Yes, please. Absolutely.
DR. ABOOD: Well, my profession is I'm a Ph.D. in obstetrics and gynecology, and I was running a maternity hospital, so I think I'll comment on this subject. There is a vast difference from now since before the war. We are much better, and health-wise, especially the women. The family planning clinics are running, you know, better than six months ago, or let us say, eight months ago. Even during the war, I was running the family planning clinic. I didn't leave it.
MR. DENIG: Would any of you care to comment on the labor situation for women?
MS. CHAPOUK: Yes. I think women's condition is good now, because if you see in the schools, teachers are coming to school and students also. That's good. That's every day. I saw people that were leaving from home to school, and nothing happened. Even you saw if something happened. That wasn't happened to every day. It was just for a day. It wasn't for -- it was for a day, not all the days. And people leaving their home safely and go to work. I saw many people. And my sisters. They are doctors. They are engineers and teachers, and I didn't heard from them any day that they left their job. They are working. Since the war, it is better.
MS. HAMDAN: I want to add to that that so many of my colleagues, doctors, especially female, they just returned back to their jobs because of the improvement in the economical situations, increasing their salaries, and that's good.
MR. DENIG: Okay. Thank you. Let's go to Hiro in the middle, please.
QUESTION: My question is maybe to --
MR. DENIG: Hiro, do you want to give you full name?
QUESTION: I'm Hiro Aida with Japan's Kyodo News. My question might be to, maybe, Ms. Chapouk.
You just emphasized a need for peace and safety, security in your country, and about, I think, the recent announcement of this accelerated transfer of power from so-called CPA to the Iraqi people may mean -- well, despite of the President's denial, may mean accelerated also transfer of U.S. troops. You know, that might be a perception of people like me outside of Iraq and also maybe inside of Iraq.
And if I quote today's newspaper columnist, as my colleague did, where one of the leading neo-conservative world, think of who have been advocating the strong position vis-à-vis, you know, this, the Iraqi insecurity -- security situation, he also said that just, you know, talking about a transfer of power may give a wrong signal to a Saddam loyalist or other terrorist kind of people inside your country. And don't you feel any uneasiness about this kind of accelerated process of transfer?
MS. CHAPOUK: I can answer you about Saddam and his followers. They are ended. There is no more of them. The persons now in Iraq, we saw them. They are al-Qaida and people coming from outside of Iraq from -- because we have open borders. So how we can protect our country? Everyone can reach Iraq easily. And now, Iraq becomes a good place for their work and they will start to do these things.
Why? And because they don't like Iraq to be in a peaceful condition. They don't want us to lead. They are against the humans. If they see that the humans can live in peace, they will stop their fighting, their killing, their bombing, because women and children also [are] killed in this bombing. What they want? Saddam has guns, and we are now in the Governing Council. Iraqi people, now the political people whom they tell they suffered from Saddam, now they are ruling Iraq.
What Iraqi people need more than this? We need a government now. We have a government. And it will be election for them. They will choose their leaders. But we need the time. What we can do? It's just six months. How we can build Iraq with this time? We need that time. We need that time. This is the problem. There is no problem for us. We need to take the right decision. Governing Council, when we are taking decisions, when we are late, people ask us why we are late. We say we need to be right -- not wrong, like what happened in the past. We need to rebuild a new Iraq, a democratic Iraq.
Thank you.
MS. KHUZAI: About the transfer of power or authority, all the Iraqis welcome this decision and the Governing Council has announced that. This will make the Iraqis -- will increase the trust between the Iraqis and the Governing Council because Iraqis know that -- they knew about the Governing Council decision wasn't -- you know, it was the CPA's decision. So now, the trust will be built between the Governing Council and the Iraqis. And the other thing [is] that they will trust the Americans as well because the Americans said "we are not occupiers."
MS. HAMDAN: Okay. Can I?
MR. DENIG: Yes, please.
MS. HAMDAN: One comment. In fact, I wonder why [there is] this kind of mistrust in Iraqi people. Iraqi people have great intellectuality, have great men, and have great minds. Saddam was not all of Iraq, he was not representing Iraqi people. So why this kind of mistrust in the intellectuality, in the leadership, in the ability of Iraqi people to rule and to lead their people?
I just wonder why this kind of mistrust. We need every help now to encourage us, to push us forward, and not to bring us backwards to Saddam's regime, to Saddam's dictatorship. I just question those people who mistrust this kind of transference to a national Iraqi government, a government that will lead the Iraqi people, and that might have good mentalities, good quality people, and they can lead the country.
So, in my opinion, we have to give those people the chance to lead the country. We cannot bring again the dark experience of 35 years of dictatorship. Now there is no dictatorship. There will be no dictatorship any more. It is not the one-man decision anymore.
People, Iraqi people, can -- now at least they have the right to demonstrate if they didn't agree, if they do not agree with anything. They have the right to demonstrate. They have the right to demand that this man, or that person, or that personality is disqualified -- disqualified and he can be out of the way.
So what I ask you, just to clear this kind of -- to reflect Iraqis' vision, we demand that Iraqis must be ruled by Iraqis. We cannot make a foreigner to rule us. It is not the quality of Iraqi people. We reject it and we cannot accept it. And if you can go to read history, you will find that Iraqis have never agreed to be ruled by foreigners.
So let us give the chance for Iraqis, for the first time, after 35 years, they can, they can rule themselves. We have trust in our people. We have to have this trust. We don't have a lot of alternative; otherwise, we cannot accept a foreigner to rule us, even for one day.
Thank you.
MR. DENIG: All right. Let's go up to the front here.
QUESTION: Thank you. This is Tulin Daloglu from Turkey's Star TV. I am just wondering whether you can bring the lives of women in Iraq much closer to us. Still the security is a serious threat. Immediately after the war, we read stories that women were scared to leave their houses because they were scared to be raped, but then there was the issue, the cultural issue, the religious issue that they are so ashamed to talk about this.
Now the security seems still a serious concern. I wonder how it is like in Baghdad. You're all coming from Baghdad, I assume. What is -- how do you spend a day -- not you, but maybe the women around you? Are they still afraid to leave their homes? Is rape still an issue? Do you have patients coming up, and are they now talking about it, or is it still, within this traditional and religious trend, a sacred issue that they do not talk? Can you directly refer to the issues of women that how they are doing in this difficult time?
MS. KHUZAI: Well, there is a lot of exaggeration about the security problem, and the women -- about women, especially. I don't know why they concentrate and focus on women can't leave houses. This is an exaggeration. Well, my daughter is 21, and she is going to College of Pharmacy every day. I never worried about her. Okay?
Colleges are open, schools are open, hospitals running 24 hours a day; everything is back to normal. It's just the media. They focus on these negative things. They never focus on the positive things. Okay? And I, as an obstetrician, I never seen a case of rape -- okay -- till I was appointed as a Governing Council member in 13th of July. Okay? So really it's exaggeration. I don't know. It's the media.
MR. DENIG: Dr. Abood.
DR. ABOOD: I want to answer this. Yeah. We can say some cases, I mean, shortly after the war, but now the conditions, there is a great improvement for myself and going to my clinic is, you know, easily, and I can stay there, and but for a limited time, but it's getting more and more improvement in Baghdad, especially. And these numbers of raped women and killing, it has been exaggerated after the war because, all of us, we are working in the hospitals and not seeing this large number of these cases.
MR. DENIG: Okay. I guess we have to wonder what The New York Times reporter was drinking.
Let's go to Reha back here.
QUESTION: Yeah. My name is Reha Atasagan with the Turkish Television. And my question is to members of the Governing Council, Mrs. Chapouk and Khuzai.
When you took over as the members of the Governing Council, did you believe that you represent Iraqi people, and how could you make decision on behalf of the Iraqi people when you are not elected? You said, you know, it took time for us to get the right decisions. So you were not representing the Iraqi people.
And, secondly, I mean, I don't believe when you say there is no security problem. I mean, the whole world is talking about this security. UN withdraw itself from Baghdad, and there is this great operation going on with the American forces. I mean, how can you -- I mean, it's a kind of a denying that the security -- we all wish there is security there, but, I mean, we don't see any security.
Thank you.
MS. CHAPOUK: Can I answer you?
QUESTION: Sure.
MS. CHAPOUK: Yeah. About the American forces, I have American escort with me, and I didn't see any Iraqi people hurt them or hate them. When they saw them, they are very proud of them, and they shake hand with them, and they give them flowers, honestly. This is what I am there. And the security problem, I called my husband the last night. He said there is nothing.
And also, I called Kirkuk, where is my family, and I asked my sister whether my children going to school. Do you know I have a daughter, 13 years old? She go to school alone and by walk. Nobody ask her "why you are going?" Even her friends also. They are coming from far away, and they are coming by walk. Nobody against women. This is wrong.
And these people [who] are doing these things, they are not Iraqi. They are not Iraqi. They are doing something here, and here, and here, and to show the media that Iraqi security is bad. Why it is bad? I saw Iraqi policemen, they're working at night. They are very brave. And American forces, also they are protecting people, they're helping Iraqi people.
What they have done, the media, let our media to be? Where is our media? We don't have media. Foreign media told you all, al-Jazeera and Arabiya told you these things. We don't have our media. And if you go and everything, everything happened that there is a media zoo there.
I don't know. They make a deal with them? They meet in secret with them? I don't know. They pay for them to do all these things? There is many people trying to make all of these things for Iraqi people, and I think Iraqi people are strong.
And you said we are not elected. How you can make election in Iraq now? There is no -- nothing. We don't have anything. How we can make election? We have to choose people to rule, and then if we find, if we make a counting of population, then it will be election for Iraqi people. We will not stay forever. We are ruling Iraq for just for the time [being], not all the time. And when they want us, elected us, we will stay. And if they not want us, we will leave. But our aim [is] to serve Iraq. If I don't go to serve Iraq, and she don't, who will serve Iraq, who will protect Iraq, who will govern Iraq? We need Iraqi people to go out, and to not be afraid.
DR. ABOOD: Yeah. I want to answer. I can say that the security in Iraq now is affecting both men and women equally because we are suffering from only the terrorism attacks, not from other cases like robbery operations or killing or kidnapping or something else. So that's the critical situation here.
MS. KHUZAI: Well, I, myself, and all my colleagues in the Governing Council, we represent most of the Iraqis. And this is the thing, you know, it is a transitional period. How can you do it, you know? This is the only way. This is the only way. We can't do elections straightaway after the war. We need time.
QUESTION: A follow-up?
MR. DENIG: Let me, if I may, try somebody else, first. We'll go to the gentleman in the white shirt.
QUESTION: L.K. Sharma, Deccan Herald. This is addressed to the first speaker, who made a really moving reference about impact of war on women and children, so on, so forth. So what were your thoughts on the eve of the war, before the war? Were you afraid of the coming war, and did you protest about it?
MS. CHAPOUK: When the war happened, I was happy, and every Iraqi was happy because we want to [be] release[d]. It's enough for us. If American people must come to release us, and these forces, coalition forces, if they not came, who can release us from Saddam? We couldn't release ourselves because we don't have the power.
Then they came and the war start. Everybody in Iraq was happy because we will be free and we can -- and every bomb come on the building of Saddam, we prayed for God to kill these people, to remove these people, and we didn't protect ourselves. We have been in our homes. Iraqi people not afraid of war because the war was the right thing. It happened in Iraq, this war, because it was for freedom, for Iraqi freedom. And did you see the children when the forces came? Everybody was happy.
MS. KHUZAI: You don't know a dictatorship unless you live in it, so nobody here knows what dictatorship means. Dictatorship, we lived in it: Well, you can't talk, you just can't criticize the government. You can't criticize Saddam or his sons. If you do so, and somebody hear you, the least punishment is cutting of the tongue; otherwise, you will be executed. So every Iraqi, every honest Iraqi, was happy with the war and welcomes the war.
DR. ABOOD: I think all of you saw the mass graves, and there are a number of thousands of people that are not -- they are, until now, missed, and we don't know their fate. They are just dissolved by an acidic materials or just cutted into pieces into the river of the Tigris. I want you to know this information.
MR. DENIG: Okay. One last quick question here from India.
QUESTION: Parasuram, the Press Trust of India. Will the new Iraqi state be a secular state, and what will be the role of religion in it? Will it be a multi-ethnic, multi-religious state, with equal rights for all?
MS. KHUZAI: Well, Islam is the religion of Iraq, because most of the Iraqis are Muslims. But -- okay? Can I comment?
MR. DENIG: Yes, please.
MS. KHUZAI: We respect all other religions, and this is what we're going to try [to reflect] in the constitution. All the ethnic groups, all the religious groups, have got their own rights.
MR. DENIG: I think we need to close this formal session now. I want to thank the ladies in the delegation very much, to wish them and their country all the best, and thank you, ladies and gentlemen. There are some opportunities for one-on-one interviews now. If you'd like to come up, we'll make arrangements for you.
(end transcript)
(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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