SWEET LIBERTY
by Amir Taheri
New York Post
March 19, 2004

March 19, 2004 -- THERE was no ceremony the other day when a policeman locked the gate of the Ashrafi Camp before driving away. Located 150 kilometers north of Ahvaz in southwest Iran, it was the largest camp set up by the United Nations for Iraqi refugees. Its last "guests" having returned home, the camp was no longer needed.

Ashrafi received its first "guests" in the winter of 1974, when Saddam Hussein's terror gangs rounded up hundreds of thousands of Shiites and Kurds and drove them into Iran, often on foot and in freezing temperatures. Thousands died on the way; an estimated 600,000 others became stateless people in Iran.

In October 1980, the camp's population swelled to 80,000 after Saddam's armies, having invaded Iran, drove many Iraqis out of towns and villages close to the border. The war over Kuwait and Saddam's subsequent massacre of Shiites in 1991 produced another wave of refugees.

For two decades, Iraq was one of the top five sources of refugees in the world. Under Saddam, an estimated 4 million Iraqis were forced out of their homeland or fled into exile to save their lives.

When the war to liberate Iraq started a year ago today, few hoped to be able to return home soon. In fact, the United Nations' High Commission for Refugees had prepared plans to receive 1.8 million new refugees from Iraq.

HISTORY, however, was written in a different way: Saddam's regime collapsed in 20 days (two weeks shorter that this writer predicted at the time). No new refugees poured out. Instead, refuges in neighboring countries began to return, first by the dozen, then in thousands - even before major combat had ceased.

No one quite knows how many Iraqis have returned home. But some estimates put the number at 1.2 million. In most cases, they simply walked back or hired buses to take them home, ignoring U.N.-imposed procedures.

It is unlikely that all Iraqi exiles will return home. Many have built new lives in more than 70 countries spread across the globe. Some are too old to relocate while others are too young to have keen memories of a distant homeland. What is important, however, is that they all know that they can return home now, if they so wish: "Home" no longer means the risk of execution and/or imprisonment, and the certain loss of basic human rights.

REFUGEES are not alone in regarding the war of liberation as the event that gave them a new life.

Liberation has also given a new life to an estimated 1.2 million Marsh Arabs, whose villages Saddam wiped out in the 1980s and 1990s. Saddam built a canal to drain the marshes, which were recognized as one of the wonders of nature, so that his tanks could reach the villages unhindered. That criminal scheme is now being scrapped, allowing the marshes to regain at least part of their pristine beauty. Tens of thousands of marshlanders have returned to rebuild their homes, thus helping repair one of the worst environmental disasters of the last century.

It is not surprising that one key word in Iraq today is awadah (return).

Its magic is also felt by hundreds of thousands of Kurds whose villages were razed by Saddam in the murderous campaign known as Al-Anfal. It is unlikely that all the 4,000 destroyed villages will be rebuilt anytime soon. But work on hundreds of them is under way.

It is also "return" time for many aspects of Iraqi life.

Soccer, the Iraqis' favorite sport, is back with the national squad fielded in international games for the first time in years. Cinemas and theatres have reopened, and the spectators are no longer required to stand at attention as a hymn in praise of Saddam is played out before and after each performance.

Poetry recitals have become the rage, with many previously banned poets reading their work to enthusiastic audiences. Weddings are reaching "epidemic" numbers as more and more Iraqis regain confidence in the future.

THE Iraqis are also ending a generation of silence, double-talk and dissimulation. With fear of the terrorist regime lifted, they are once again learning to discuss and debate all issues of interest and concern in freedom.

That freedom is also reflected in Iraq's new media - which, despite problems inevitable in the immediate aftermath of every war, are the most outspoken in the region.

The concept of "return" also helps explain the economic recovery under way. The new Iraqi currency, the dinar, is now 22 times more valuable, against a basket of currencies, than its predecessor that bore Saddam's portrait.

With "return" to some measure of sanity, the Iraqi economy is trying to rebuild its derelict structures, eliminate the Saddam-controlled black market and generate hundreds of thousands of new jobs. Thousands of Iraqi and other Arab investors have poured in, mostly from the Persian Gulf states, to set up small and medium enterprises that create the bulk of the new jobs.

For some victims of Saddam, however, there will be no return.

The remains of at least 300,000 people have been found in over 1,000 mass graves in almost all parts of the country, including the "Sunni Triangle" where Saddam is supposed to have had some support. A special committee, meanwhile, is trying to find out what happened to thousands of Iraqis who are listed as "disappeared" after being arrested by Saddam's henchmen.

A thought for those who shall not return can lead to only one question: Why did the world wait so long before freeing the Iraqi people from an oppressor who, at the same time, had defied the international community for more than a decade?

THE awdah of which Iraqis talk with the greatest passion is a speedy return to self-rule.

Many in the outside world like to see Iraq as an "artificial country" created by the British in the 1920s and thus devoid of a national consciousness. Some so-called experts have even argued that Iraq, being home to separate communities with "tribal backgrounds," should be divided into three to five mini-states.

Such claims are either malevolent or based on ignorance. Iraq is one of the founders of the League of Nations and its successor, the United Nations. As a nation-state it is older than two-thirds of the U.N. membership.

Anyone with some knowledge of the region would know that Iraq is one of the most authentic nation-states of the Middle East. Ethnic and religious differences among the Iraqis do not diminish their sense of Uruqa (Iraqiness). The Kurds, the Shiites, the Sunnis, the Turcomans, the Chaldaeans and the Yazidis are like streams flowing into a single river rather than flowing away from it.

Iraqis have also retained what could be called an atavistic memory of the rule of law and a constitutional system. In the experience of this writer, Iraqis are among the best prepared peoples of the regions for a genuine attempt at democratic nation-building. This has been borne out by the fact that Iraqis across the political spectrum were able to agree on a constitutional text that could transform their country into a modern democratic state, the first of its kind in the Muslim world.

Thus, the sooner that sovereignty is fully restored to the Iraqi people, the better for all concerned.

SOME, especially in the West, are unhappy about the liberation of Iraq - not because they were fond of Saddam but because they dislike the United States and/or George W. Bush.

This has led to the emergence of two Iraqs.

One Iraq is that of the reality on the ground - a newly liberated nation is rebuilding its shattered life more quickly than postwar Germany or Japan.

There is still a great deal of violence and insecurity fomented by foreign terrorist groups allied to the remnants of the fallen tyranny. But all in all, this Iraq looks good - better than this writer expected a year ago.

The other Iraq is an issue of the domestic politics of several Western countries, notably the United States and Britain. This Iraq must look bad, real bad, so as to undermine the re-election chances of both President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair. (It may have contributed to last weekend's electoral defeat of the Spanish People's Party - whose Premier Jose-Maria Aznar was a staunch supporter of liberating Iraq.)

IT is a pity, not to say a shame, that, for reasons of domestic Western political rivalries, what has been a spectacular success in liberating a martyred nation from one of the worst tyrannies of recent history is portrayed as a failure.

History will eventually forget Saddam without forgiving him. But Iraqis will never forget those who helped them regain their liberty, dignity and home.

On March 25, Amir Taheri will speak in New York on Iraq, a year after liberation.

E-mail:

amirtaheri@ benadorassociates.com

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