Fact Sheet 
 
 Office of International Women's Issues 
 
 Washington, DC 
 
 March 20, 2003 
 
 
 
 Iraqi Women Under Saddam's Regime: A Population Silenced Situation for Women in Saddam's Iraq 
 
 In 1979, immediately upon coming to power, Saddam Hussein silenced all political opposition in Iraq and converted his one-party state into a cult of personality. Since then, his regime has systematically executed, tortured, imprisoned, raped, terrorized, and repressed the Iraqi people. Iraq is a nation rich in culture, with a long history of intellectual and scientific achievement, especially among its women. However, Saddam Hussein's brutal regime has silenced the voices of Iraq's women, along with its men, through violence and intimidation. In Iraq under Saddam, if you are a woman, you could face: Beheading. Under the pretext of fighting prostitution, units of "Fedayeen Saddam," the paramilitary organization led by Uday Hussein, Saddam's eldest son, have beheaded in public more than 200 women throughout the country, dumping their severed heads at their families' doorsteps. Many families have been required to display the victim's head on their outside fences for several days. These barbaric acts were carried out in the total absence of any proper judicial procedures and many of the victims were not engaged in prostitution, but were targeted for political reasons. For example, Najat Mohammad Haydar, an obstetrician in Baghdad, was beheaded after criticizing the corruption within health services. (Amnesty International Report, Iraq: Systematic Torture of Political Prisoners, August 2001; Iraqi Women's League in Damascus, Syria) Rape. The Iraqi Government uses rape and sexual assault of women to achieve the following goals: to extract information and forced confessions from detained family members; to intimidate Iraqi oppositionists by sending videotapes showing the rape of female family members; and to blackmail Iraqi men into future cooperation with the regime. Some Iraqi authorities even carry personnel cards identifying their official "activity" as the "violation of women's honor." (U.S. Department of State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices-2001, March 2002; Iraq Research and Documentation Project, Harvard University) Torture. The Iraqi Government routinely tortures and kills female dissidents and the female relatives of Iraqi oppositionists and defectors. Victims include Safiyah Hassan, the mother of two Iraqi defectors, who was killed after publicly criticizing the Iraqi Government for killing her sons after their return to Iraq. Women in Saddam's jails are subjected to the following forms of torture: brutal beatings, systematic rape, electrical shocks, and branding. (U.S. Department of State, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices-2001, March 2002; U.S. Department of State, Iraq: A Population Silenced, December 2002) Murder. In 1990, Saddam Hussein introduced Article 111 into the Iraqi Penal Code in a calculated effort to strengthen tribal support for his regime. This law exempts men who kill their female relatives in defense of their family's honor from prosecution and punishment. The UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women reported that more than 4,000 women have been victims of so-called "honor killings" since Article 111 went into effect. (UN Commission on Human Rights, Report of the Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, January 2002) U.S. Support for Iraqi Women 
 
 All people deserve to live in freedom, including the men and women of Iraq. On March 6, 2003, a group of free Iraqi women met with Vice President Dick Cheney, National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky, and Ambassador at Large for a Free Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad. The women shared their experiences under Saddam's reign of terror. As this group made clear, Iraqi women are eager to participate in the process of building a peaceful, democratic post-Saddam society. They want their society to once again be based on progressive Iraqi traditions and values. They believe in the universal principles of human rights. As in Afghanistan, the United States Government is prepared to help Iraqis with the priorities and projects that they identify as the best way to achieve their goals. We will continue to meet with Iraqi women and exchange ideas about their path forward. As Under Secretary of State for Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky stated after her recent meeting with a group of free Iraqi women: "It is clear that the women of Iraq have a critical role to play in the future revival of their society. They bring skills and knowledge that will be vital to restoring Iraq to its rightful place in the region and in the world." 
 
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 Men speak to a prostitute in Tikrit, Iraq, in 2004. (Andrea Bruce/The Washington Post) 
 
 It was late Saturday when several four-wheel drive vehicles rolled to a stop before a sun-battered, taupe apartment building in the eastern Baghdad neighborhood of Zayounah. The cars deposited militants who filed inside the widely known house of prostitution. In the militants’ hands were reportedly silenced guns. 
 
 Later, after the killing was done, Agence France-Presse said a single warning clung to a door: “This is the fate of any prostitution.” 
 
 The images gathered of that fate are snapshots of terrible carnage, each more chilling than the last. One shows the bloody bodies of eight young women amid discarded furniture. Another reveals five women who died in one another’s arms inside a bathroom. Three more bodies were splayed along the floor, their hair wild and matted. 
 
 In all, anywhere from 20 to 29 alleged prostitutes were killed in a massacre that also claimed the lives of several men. No one appears to know what happened: who the killers were, why they did this, who ordered it. In a city besieged by an encroaching Sunni army that has proclaimed a modern Caliphate, it looked on Monday as though those questions wouldn’t be answered. Residents told AFP that every few months prostitutes are found murdered in those apartments. And nothing is ever done. 
 
 “If a person got shot right next to a policeman, they wouldn’t say anything,” one shopkeeper who requested anonymity explained to the news agency. “They’re afraid. It’s the rule of the strong over the weak.” 
 
 However rough life is for sex workers elsewhere in the world, it’s rougher in Iraq. According to a review of journalistic, academic and aid agency accounts, theirs is a precarious economic existence made worse by perpetual warfare, regime change and the threat of summary executions and beheadings. In 2003, the U.S. State Department reported Iraqi militants, under the auspices of fighting prostitution, “beheaded in public more than 200 women throughout the country, dumping their severed heads at the families’ doorsteps. Many families have been required to display the victim’s head on their outside fences for several days.” 
 
 Analysts agree refugees are among the most susceptible to human trafficking, and Iraq has loosed hundreds of thousands of refugees in decades of unrest. The Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq reported that “an estimated 4,000 Iraqi women, one-fifth of whom are under 18, have disappeared [in broad daylight] since the 2003 invasion; many are believed to have been trafficked.” Some estimates said an additional 50,000 Iraqi women and girls were then forced into Syria’s sex trade. 
 
 But it wasn’t always that way. After the nation was founded in the late 1950s, the Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq said it was home to something similar to a regulated sex “trade. … There was a strong women’s movement on the ground.” When the Baathist regime swept into power in 1963, however, it ushered in laws that made prostitution illegal. Then came the implementation of economic sanctions on Saddam Hussein’s Iraq — and scores of desperate women were pushed into the industry. 
 
 “A starvation-style economy translated into exploitation of women in the workplaces,” the report said. “Although women were a big part of the public work force, their monthly salary became equivalent to a few dollars. A huge population of widowed single mothers started to practice individual and hidden prostitution in workplace or in neighborhoods for survival.” 
 
 That survival became even harder in the subsequent crackdowns and honor killings that claimed at least 9,000 Kurdish women within nine years — and that was still before the U.S.-led invasion shattered the country. In the years after, “families keep their girls inside, not only to keep them from being assaulted or killed, but to prevent them from being kidnapped by organized prostitution rings,” wrote analyst Debra McNutt in Common Dreams. “Gangs are also forcing some families to sell their children into sex slavery.” 
 
 That happened to a 15-year-old girl Human Rights Watch calls “Muna B.” She said men abducted her on May 11, 2003, along with her two sisters, age 11 and 16. “They did bad things to my sister,” she told the aid agency. “She told me that they had slept with her; she was crying. She only told me about that one night, and she said that all [four men] did it.” 
 
 The killings did not stop after Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki came to power. In some ways, they got worse as religious fanaticism crept into certain ministries. The Ministry of Interior “openly managed mass killings of prostitutes in Al Battaween in central Baghdad,” according to Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq. In July 2006, six alleged prostitutes and one man were executed in Baghdad by armed militants. More mass killings of women accused of prostitution also reportedly occurred in the southern cities of Basra and Umara between 2006 and 2008. 
 
 Today, the sex trade continues to thrive in Baghdad, Al-Monitor said, a precarious system hinging on older prostitutes called “sheikha” who look after younger ones. Business is done in nightclubs or in individual residences. “This is how things are for prostitutes in Baghdad,” wrote journalist Ali al-Saray. “Aliases are part of the precautions they take in a society that chases them down but derives pleasure from them at the same time.” 
 
 The journalist then asked one worker named Wardah, who has a 4-year-old son and said she “pleasures anyone who pays,” whether anything can dismantle the trade. “This,” she replied, “is just a dream.”
– "This is the fate of any prostitution" read a sign plastered on the front of a building in Baghdad late Saturday—a building where up to 29 alleged prostitutes were killed in a raid by gunmen that same day, reports the Washington Post. At least six men were also massacred in the attack, which has the Zayounah neighborhood reeling as it tries to figure out who carried out the slaughter and why. AFP reporters were able to slip past police and into the neighborhood, where they spotted the ominous sign and talked to residents, who claim prostitutes are murdered there every few months and that police do nothing to stop it from happening. "If a person got shot right next to a policeman, they wouldn't say anything," a shopkeeper told one reporter. "They're afraid. It's the rule of the strong over the weak." The Post doesn't mince words: "However rough life is for sex workers elsewhere in the world, it’s rougher in Iraq." The US State Department in 2003 reported that Iraqi militants who claimed to be fighting prostitution publicly beheaded more than 200 women—many of whom weren’t even sex workers—and left their heads on their families’ doorsteps. Mass "honor" killings of alleged prostitutes have reportedly continued even after Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki entered office; one report says the Ministry of Interior "openly managed mass killings of prostitutes in Al Battaween in central Baghdad." Further, the Post points out that refugees are particularly at risk of being trafficked, and Iraq has produced hundreds of thousands of refugees in recent decades. According to one report, an estimated 4,000 Iraqi women have disappeared since the 2003 US invasion, and many are suspected to have been sold as sex slaves. Click to read the full Washington Post story here.