Iraqi women

The woman on the left is Fatima who is the General Secretary of Iraqi Women Rising at one of the public meetings in Toronto. I am now in Montreal after two meetings in Toronto and one in Ottawa. This week end we will do a panel at the Alternatives Journee d'etudes just outside of Montreal.

Its been a great trip for Fatima and Shameron and Massar their translator. For Massar it is the first time out of the Middle East and for the two women it's the first time since the 1970's so it is as Massar says, the trip of a life time.

For me it's been an amazing experience. In many ways Iraq is the opposite of Bolivia. It's a place that was very progressive in the 1950's and as Fatima says it has been under occupation for decades first by Saddam Hussein who according to them, militarized the entire society and created a dictatorship where you could not achieve anything in the society unless you were a member of the Baath Party. Both women were tortured by what they call the X regime and lost loved ones, Fatima, her husband. Now they are occupied by the Americans who have destroyed or allowed to be destroyed everything that had been built in the society.

To illustrate what the Americans are up to in Iraq Shamerin tells the story that the Americans have allowed everything to be destroyed and looted including museums and important antiquities and the only thing they have protected is the Ministry of Oil