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Death of a professor
There is now a systematic campaign to assassinate Iraqis who speak
out against the occupation
By Haifa Zangana
02/28/06 "The
Guardian" -- -- In a letter to a friend in Europe,
Abdul Razaq al-Na'as, a Baghdad university professor in his 50s,
grieved for his killed friends and colleagues. His letter concluded:
"I wonder who is next!" He was. On January 28 al-Na'as drove from
his office at Baghdad University. Two cars blocked his, and gunmen
opened fire, killing him instantly.
Al-Na'as is not the first academic to be killed in the mayhem of the
"new Iraq". Hundreds of academics and scientists have met this fate
since the March 2003 invasion. Baghdad universities alone have
mourned the killing of over 80 members of staff. The minister of
education stated recently that during 2005, 296 members of education
staff were killed and 133 wounded.
Not one of these crimes has been investigated by the occupation
forces or the interim governments. They leave that to international
humanitarian groups and anti-war organisations. Among them is the
Brussels Tribunal on Iraq, which has compiled a list to persuade the
UN special rapporteur on summary executions to investigate the
issue; they do so with the help of Iraqi academics, who risk their
lives in the process. Their research shows that the victims have
been men and women from all over Iraq, from different ethnic,
religious and political backgrounds. Most were vocally opposed to
the occupation. For the most part, they were killed in a fashion
that suggests cold-blooded assassination. No one has claimed
responsibility.
Like many Iraqis, I believe these killings are politically motivated
and connected to the occupying forces' failure to gain any
significant social support in the country. For the occupation's aims
to be fulfilled, independent minds have to be eradicated. We feel
that we are witnessing a deliberate attempt to destroy intellectual
life in Iraq.
Dr al-Na'as was a familiar face on al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya TV. He
had often condemned the continued presence of US-led troops in Iraq,
and criticised the sectarian interim governments and their militias.
His case echoes the assassination of the academic Dr Abdullateef al-Mayah.
A prominent human rights campaigner and critic of the occupation,
Mayah was killed only 12 hours after he had appeared on al-Jazeera
denouncing the corruption of the US-appointed Iraqi Governing
Council.
Militias have replaced the disbanded Iraqi army, applying their own
rule of law. Some units operate under a semblance of "legality" -
the "wolf brigade", attached to the interior ministry, is infamous
for its terror raids on mosques and the torture of civilians.
Last month the journalist Abdul Hadi al-Zaidi accused the
government's militias of targeting intellectuals. He is one of a
group of Iraqi journalists who, in the aftermath of al-Na'as's
assassination, went on strike, demanding an immediate investigation
into the "systematic assassination campaign" against intellectuals
opposed to the occupation.
After the July London bombings, Tony Blair promised the British
people to "bring those responsible to justice". In Iraq, the British
government does exactly the opposite. The law of occupation states
that: "All foreign soldiers, diplomats or contractors implicated in
the killing of Iraqi civilians are immune from arrest or trial in
Iraq." Both the British and US governments turn a blind eye to the
systematic violations of human rights and murders committed by their
clients in Iraq.
It has become obvious that the occupation forces, with their elite
troops and $6bn-a-month budget, cannot hold Iraq. The only honorable
and realistic way out is genuine dialogue with the Iraqi resistance
over a complete withdrawal of foreign troops and adequate
reparations and debt-cancellation to rebuild the country.
· Haifa Zangana is an Iraqi-born novelist and former prisoner of
Saddam's regime; a longer version of this article will appear in Not
One More Death, published next month by Verso
Email - haifa_zangana@yahoo.co.uk
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