Shades of Saddam in Iraq Terror Laws
Crackdown on crime and insurgents
Eavesdropping, detentions allowed
by Mitch Potter
The Toronto Star
An Iraqi woman cries as U.S. soldiers with the 1st Cavalry Division raid her home in Baghdad yesterday looking for insurgents. Gun battles broke out between insurgents and patrolling Iraqi and U.S. forces in her Sunni neighbourhood on the day that the Iraqi government announced sweeping new security laws.
BAGHDAD -- Iraqis welcomed a sweeping new security law eerily reminiscent of the Saddam-era police state, saying that only by restoring law and order can their new government lay a foundation for the freedom and democracy they hope will follow.
The six-page national security law announced yesterday outlines a crackdown on crime and insurgents replete with the powers to eavesdrop, intercept mail, impose curfews and closures and to search and detain suspects — practices not seen since the fall of dictator Saddam Hussein 15 months ago.
The announcement was underscored by a surge in violence in Baghdad, where a four-volley series of mortar strikes landed in a residential area near the home of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi. Pitched gun battles involving insurgents, fledgling Iraqi police and national guard troops followed.
"We will soon reach a day when you can be safe inside your homes, in your streets, your employment situation will drastically improve and you will all be united without separation according to regions or religions," Allawi told reporters in the wake of the apparent assassination attempt.
"However, for now we have a very important task ahead of us and that is to rid our country of these criminals and terrorists. Together we will succeed and we will prevail."
Allawi's interim government had twice postponed the announcement of the new law in order to accommodate U.S. and Iraqi concerns that the appointed prime minister could use its powers to circumvent elections scheduled for January and remain in office indefinitely.
As written, the emergency law includes several safeguards, including a requirement that Allawi must win the unanimous approval of his three-member Presidency Council — a group that represents the interests of Iraq's dominant Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish populations — before declaring a state of emergency in any given area.
Baghdadis yesterday welcomed the announcement as the most dramatic sign yet that their government has a strategy for ending the rash of kidnappings, carjackings, murder, theft and assault that has plagued the capital since the fall of the former regime.
But many stressed that while they welcome the crackdown, they demand it be fair — and temporary.
"All we want is to feel safe," Saleh Manshed, 54, an unemployed veteran of the Iran-Iraq war, said yesterday in the predominately Shiite ghetto known as Sadr City.
"We want the government to be strong, to frighten the criminals and terrorists.
"And if they come and arrest me, let them. I have nothing to worry about because I am innocent."
Manshed's comments were echoed by half a dozen men gathered amid a squalid strip of automotive machine shops. Across the street, fruit seller Suhil Ali, 42, was more cautious, wondering aloud how long such laws might be in effect.
"If it is temporary, okay. But these laws don't serve people in the long term," said Ali.
"It would be like we went through all of this for nothing. Things would be the same as under Saddam."
In theory, the new national security law will remain nothing more than a piece of paper until such time as the Iraqi government declares a state of emergency within a defined geographical area.
But during a drive through Baghdad yesterday, a carload of journalists, including this reporter, was detained for several minutes at an Iraqi police checkpoint in a manner significantly more aggressive than that seen in recent weeks.
A policeman swinging a blackjack seized the driver's identity papers and threatened to arrest him on the grounds that a rear-window sun screen was hindering his attempts to look inside the car. Only after pleading with the officer, and insisting that the driver was ordered to raise the screen to conceal the car's non-Iraqi passengers, did he relent.
Across town, workers in the upscale neighbourhood of Zeiyouna, known in Saddam's day as City of the Officers, offered mixed reactions.
"Of course this is the right thing to do. Nobody will accept going back to the ways of Saddam, but as an Arab control, we also need strong laws to control the street," said Ivan Hermes Hanna, 23.
"We are not like the Western world. We don't have the training to deal with democracy and personal freedom," said the ice cream parlour operator.
"When the pressure of Saddam was lifted, some people thought freedom meant they could do whatever they wanted, including crime.
"Instead, we need to make the transition step by step toward the goal of freedom."
But a far more bleak assessment came from Saad Rashid, 27, co-owner of an Internet service company, who dismissed yesterday's announcement as "a piece of drama made for television."
"I don't believe it will have any effect because our police are not independent, they are under the Americans. And all the Americans care about is fighting terrorists, not helping Iraqis," Rashid said.
"I have very little information about the American system, but I believe it is better for them to take this war against terrorists to Iraq.
"They created this battleground only for that reason.
"And the Iraqi people are caught in the middle of it all."
Crackdown on crime and insurgents
Eavesdropping, detentions allowed
by Mitch Potter
The Toronto Star
An Iraqi woman cries as U.S. soldiers with the 1st Cavalry Division raid her home in Baghdad yesterday looking for insurgents. Gun battles broke out between insurgents and patrolling Iraqi and U.S. forces in her Sunni neighbourhood on the day that the Iraqi government announced sweeping new security laws.
BAGHDAD -- Iraqis welcomed a sweeping new security law eerily reminiscent of the Saddam-era police state, saying that only by restoring law and order can their new government lay a foundation for the freedom and democracy they hope will follow.
The six-page national security law announced yesterday outlines a crackdown on crime and insurgents replete with the powers to eavesdrop, intercept mail, impose curfews and closures and to search and detain suspects — practices not seen since the fall of dictator Saddam Hussein 15 months ago.
The announcement was underscored by a surge in violence in Baghdad, where a four-volley series of mortar strikes landed in a residential area near the home of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi. Pitched gun battles involving insurgents, fledgling Iraqi police and national guard troops followed.
"We will soon reach a day when you can be safe inside your homes, in your streets, your employment situation will drastically improve and you will all be united without separation according to regions or religions," Allawi told reporters in the wake of the apparent assassination attempt.
"However, for now we have a very important task ahead of us and that is to rid our country of these criminals and terrorists. Together we will succeed and we will prevail."
Allawi's interim government had twice postponed the announcement of the new law in order to accommodate U.S. and Iraqi concerns that the appointed prime minister could use its powers to circumvent elections scheduled for January and remain in office indefinitely.
As written, the emergency law includes several safeguards, including a requirement that Allawi must win the unanimous approval of his three-member Presidency Council — a group that represents the interests of Iraq's dominant Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish populations — before declaring a state of emergency in any given area.
Baghdadis yesterday welcomed the announcement as the most dramatic sign yet that their government has a strategy for ending the rash of kidnappings, carjackings, murder, theft and assault that has plagued the capital since the fall of the former regime.
But many stressed that while they welcome the crackdown, they demand it be fair — and temporary.
"All we want is to feel safe," Saleh Manshed, 54, an unemployed veteran of the Iran-Iraq war, said yesterday in the predominately Shiite ghetto known as Sadr City.
"We want the government to be strong, to frighten the criminals and terrorists.
"And if they come and arrest me, let them. I have nothing to worry about because I am innocent."
Manshed's comments were echoed by half a dozen men gathered amid a squalid strip of automotive machine shops. Across the street, fruit seller Suhil Ali, 42, was more cautious, wondering aloud how long such laws might be in effect.
"If it is temporary, okay. But these laws don't serve people in the long term," said Ali.
"It would be like we went through all of this for nothing. Things would be the same as under Saddam."
In theory, the new national security law will remain nothing more than a piece of paper until such time as the Iraqi government declares a state of emergency within a defined geographical area.
But during a drive through Baghdad yesterday, a carload of journalists, including this reporter, was detained for several minutes at an Iraqi police checkpoint in a manner significantly more aggressive than that seen in recent weeks.
A policeman swinging a blackjack seized the driver's identity papers and threatened to arrest him on the grounds that a rear-window sun screen was hindering his attempts to look inside the car. Only after pleading with the officer, and insisting that the driver was ordered to raise the screen to conceal the car's non-Iraqi passengers, did he relent.
Across town, workers in the upscale neighbourhood of Zeiyouna, known in Saddam's day as City of the Officers, offered mixed reactions.
"Of course this is the right thing to do. Nobody will accept going back to the ways of Saddam, but as an Arab control, we also need strong laws to control the street," said Ivan Hermes Hanna, 23.
"We are not like the Western world. We don't have the training to deal with democracy and personal freedom," said the ice cream parlour operator.
"When the pressure of Saddam was lifted, some people thought freedom meant they could do whatever they wanted, including crime.
"Instead, we need to make the transition step by step toward the goal of freedom."
But a far more bleak assessment came from Saad Rashid, 27, co-owner of an Internet service company, who dismissed yesterday's announcement as "a piece of drama made for television."
"I don't believe it will have any effect because our police are not independent, they are under the Americans. And all the Americans care about is fighting terrorists, not helping Iraqis," Rashid said.
"I have very little information about the American system, but I believe it is better for them to take this war against terrorists to Iraq.
"They created this battleground only for that reason.
"And the Iraqi people are caught in the middle of it all."
