Iraq's Latest Problem

This is a story that has been seriously under reported in the media. Gay men across Iraq are being rounded up, tortured, and killed by the country's militias, including the Mahdi Army, and the government is doing nothing about it. A report produced by Human Rights Watch was released last week and details some of the atrocities that are happening. The report includes some testimony from survivors of the violence as well as some startling statistics.

The main offenders seem to be Shia militia, some with alleged links to al Qaeda, seem to be conducting a type of cleansing to rid areas of the gay population. The men who are being targeted include openly gay males, but also men who dress with a more feminine flair or who wear their hair longer. Some targets have been found to be heterosexuals that were rumored to be bisexual as well.

Here is some testimony that appears in the report:

Haytham -
A car pulled us over. About six men carrying weapons stepped out and asked for our IDs. They were dressed in black, which is usually the sign of the Mahdi Army. I demanded, “Who are you to ask for our cards?” So they opened the door and pulled us out, humiliating us, calling us “puppies,” saying, “We see you in pervert places all the time.” I tried to argue we were just friends, tried to convince them there was nothing between us. Then they pulled out a list and they started asking us about these names. Most were women’s names, the nicknames of gay men. They weren’t names that either of us knew. At that point, a U.S. [Army] patrol car came by. The men hissed at us: “Your turn is coming next.” They threw us against a wall, jumped in the car, and drove off.

Bilal -
He was very public, everybody knew he was gay. His family said his killers made a CD of how he was killed—they filmed it. They slaughtered him; they cut his throat. His family did not want to talk about it. And now they are killing people right and left in Shaab and al-Thawra. We heard 11 men were burned alive in al-Thawra. Everyone is talking about the numbers of people killed. And they just keep rising.

It is easy for the militias to score points in this region for targeting a group that is already outcast. Like most cultures in the region, men pride themselves on their manliness. This makes the antithesis of the idea an easy target. There have been a few American GLBT activists that have stepped forward to say that Americans need to stand up and support these men, but this has been kept rather quiet in the media this far. Part of the problem is that the militias see the homosexuality as result of increased western influence.

This story needs to garner more media coverage and the world community needs to stand up and speak out against these hate crimes.