Some everyday stories from Iraq

Iraq’s southern province – an environmental nightmare

Azzaman reports (September 23^rd): The southern Iraqi Province of Missan sits on five million landmines and remnants of unspecified quantities of depleted uranium, the head of the province’s Health Department Dr. Maythan Lafta said.

In an interview with the newspaper, Lafta said the province was facing “an environmental catastrophe.”

http://www.azzaman.com/english/index.asp?fname=news\2011-09-23\kurd.htm

In postwar Iraq, housing is scarce and pricey

 

Washington Post reports (September 23^rd): As Iraq’s economy rattles awake after years of war, the country is experiencing a real-estate boom, with choice properties in Baghdad or in towns such as Karbala or Irbil selling for $500,000 to more than $1 million.

Years of violence, sectarian tensions and international sanctions have left the country with an acute housing shortage that is driving up prices, experts say. The growing country of 30 million needs about 2 million housing units, according to a United Nations estimate.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle-east/in-postwar-iraq-housing-still-scarce/2011/09/19/gIQAu9H0pK_story.html

Iraqi Christians find safety in north, but no jobs

Reuters report (September 21^st):  Menas Saad Youssef no longer fears being blown up while praying in a church. But she and many other traumatised Christians who fled Iraq's capital for safer areas have a new crisis -- no jobs.

Almost a year since a deadly church siege in Baghdad that killed dozens of people and prompted her family to seek refuge in the prosperous northern Kurdish region, Youssef sits at home, frustrated about her future.

The 28-year-old academic, who is still haunted by images of her friends lying in pools of blood at the cathedral where she prayed every Sunday, misses her job as an architecture professor in Baghdad.

http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/feature-iraqi-christians-find-safety-in-north-but-no-jobs/

As an Iraqi, I am very pessimistic

Peter Kandela writes for The Guardian (September 18^th): For the Iraqi people, life has deteriorated dreadfully. Security remains a major problem. Kidnapping, corruption, suicide bombing and general lawlessness all continue, major religious groupings mainly live in closed neighbourhood and minorities like the Christians have largely been forced out of the country. Reluctantly, all my close relatives, except one sister, have fled abroad in fear of their lives.

Then there is the more insidious form of fear, which accompanies poverty and lawlessness. A recent feature on the Iraqi website Aljeeranshowed the very large numbers of women and children forced to beg on the streets, and highlighted their sexual vulnerability. This is an entirely new phenomenon in Iraq.

The right to security is paramount, but what about the right to clean water and power? Most people have given up on the expectation of a regular electricity supply. 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/sep/18/arab-spring-human-rights-iraq

Study: 59 Percent of Iraqi Widows Lost Husbands Under US Occupation

Antiwar.com reports (September 18^th): It is common sense that the massive death toll over the eight years of occupation in Iraq would create more widows. But a new study by the humanitarian aid organization Relief International has found the problem far greater than anyone likely imagined.

The study found that some 10 percent of the women in Iraq are widows, about 1.5 million of them. Of these, 59 percent lost their husbands during the period since the US occupation began in 2003.

http://news.antiwar.com/2011/09/18/study-59-percent-of-iraqi-widows-lost-husbands-under-us-occupation/