Press Release

Don't leave the boys of Mesopotamia alone.
Let's stop the death squads in Iraq.

Un Ponte Per expresses condolences and concern for the repeated repressions on Iraqi protesters: yesterday again two people were killed and dozens more wounded by gunshots. After months of murders and disappearances of dozens of activists, what future for the country with elections ever closer?

Rome 26 May 2021 - After many months in which the pandemic had forced a reduction in mobilisations, the boys and girls of the 'October uprising' returned to the streets, hundreds of thousands across Iraq, to once again demand an end to corruption, the sectarian quota system, and above all to demand justice for the more than 700 of their brothers and sisters killed by police repression and armed militias. But once again, yesterday, a peaceful demonstration was suppressed in blood. Two demonstrators were killed, dozens were wounded by gunfire.

'Who killed me?' was the slogan chanted by many, referring to the campaign launched by the family of the activist Al-Wazni, a member of the coordination of the demonstrations, who was killed by pro-Iranian militias in Kerbala on 8 May. In the last few months alone, 35 activists had been killed or disappeared in Iraq at the hands of death squads.

Iraq is heading towards early elections in October, demanded and obtained by mass mobilisations, but in the climate of intimidation and violence to which activists are subjected - and until their killers, even when known, are brought to justice - the protesters do not believe there will be the conditions for fair and transparent elections that will bring about the necessary change.

Un Ponte Per hopes that our Foreign Minister and European chancelleries will demand respect for the legitimate dissent of millions of young Iraqis, who are systematically excluded from any prospect of a decent life.

We also hope that there will be a genuine will to get to the truth and bring to justice those responsible for the repression.

The system of sectarian partitioning of the country has swallowed up tens of billions in aid and oil revenues, spread corruption and impunity, with the consequence that even today, 16 years after the war, the Iraqi state is not even able to provide drinking water and electricity to the entire population of the capital.

Today the boys and girls of Baghdad have returned to the streets to remember this and to demand a different future. They just want a normal country, without foreign troops and armed militias on the ground, where all Iraqis are equal without sectarian divisions. In the Iranian-US condominium that has become Iraq, they risk being a crock pot in the geopolitical confrontation. They need all our support.

The Pope's recent visit to Iraq has turned the world's spotlight on that country, let us not turn it off again in the indifference of the international community, which would have a duty to monitor respect for human rights at a delicate time for the country, with elections ever closer.

Countries like Italy - which participated with its army in the war and the proliferation of armaments in Iraq - owe a debt to these boys and girls. We ask our government to honour it.

The National Committee of Un Ponte Per