Iraqi Women Face Increased Violence in Kurdistan

This video is called The Plight of Iraqi Women.

Indeed, ‘Mission Accomplished‘ in George W. Bush’s brave new Iraq. No weapons of mass destruction; no links to 9/11 (the official pretexts for the war). Lots of oil (the real reason for the war).

More deaths than in the worst days of Saddam Hussein. More torture than in the worst days of Saddam Hussein. More unemployment than ever. No hospitals built; no schools; only the gigantic new US colonial administration building embassy; segregation walls; and more prisons than ever.

Gay people worse off than ever. Women losing rights they had had for a long time.

What happens to Iraqi women during George W. Bush’s still UNaccomplished Operation Iraqi Liberation Freedom?

Microsoft News reports:

Marine ordered Iraqi women and kids shot, squad member testifies

CAMP PENDLETON, California — A Marine charged with murdering two girls and killing several other Iraqis gave orders to shoot into a roomful of children and young women, a squad member testified.

Lance Cpl. Stephen Tatum then went into the room himself, followed by loud noise that could have been M-16 gunfire or a grenade, said Lance Cpl. Humberto Manuel Mendoza.

“I told him there’s just womens and kids in the room,” Mendoza said Tuesday. “He replied, ‘Well, shoot them.”‘

But wait, pro Iraq war pundits point out, you might be right for most of Iraq. However, in the far north, in Kurdistan, things are better.

Well, arguably, they were already better there before the 2003 US invasion, which did not happen there, contrary to the rest of Iraq. But are things really so splendid now in Kurdistan? Concerning human rights, and torture?

And now, from IPS:

IRAQ: Women Face Increased Violence in Kurdistan

By Mohammed A. Salih

ERBIL, Jul 18 (IPS) – Shawbo Rauf Ali, 19, clearly did not know that the picnic she was headed for would become a death trap. When she got there, her husband and several other men beat her to death on suspicion of extra-marital relations.

The suspicion arose because of an unknown number that appeared on Shawbo’s cell phone.

The men fled after the murder. Two who had British citizenship left for the UK. Kurdish officials have said the British police will now extradite them to Iraq. The other two have been arrested and are awaiting trial.

The murder of Shawbo is among numerous ‘honour killings’ in the Kurdish region every year. A Kurdistan parliament report has warned of an “increasing rate of violence against women.”

In Sulaimaniya province south of Erbil, 24 women have been killed in the first half of this year, says the parliament report. Arrests have been made in only five of these cases.

In 2005, four women were reported killed in the Kurdish region’s three provinces Erbil, Sulaimaniya and Dohuk. In 2006 that figure rose to 17. Most of the victims were married women, says a report from the human rights ministry.

These figures do not tell all. Many women are reported to have committed suicide under pressure from male members of the family. In 2005, 22 women committed suicide; in 2006 that number rose to 64, according to police records.

Cholera in northern Iraq: here.