FyneUK: Death Squads Systematically Executing Gays In Iraq Like Saddam Never Did

[Hissyspit]

http://www.fyne.co.uk/index.php?item=472

The new butchers of Baghdad

... But Islamist death squads are systematically executing gays in Iraq, like he never did – perversely, with the apparent blessing of the new, West-backed Iraqi Government. Fyne’s Adrian Gillan probes Ali Hili, leader of the Iraqi LGBT group - himself under ‘fatwa’, exiled in London.

- snip -

“One known civilian LGBT was killed under Saddam, in 1995,” says Ali Hili, head of Iraqi LGBT, the UK-based global support group for Iraqi queers, since its inception in September 2005 - himself now living in exile in London, having left his troubled homeland in 2000. “Since Saddam fell in 2003, eighty five known LGBT deaths have been reported to us. But I believe the actual number to be far higher. Hussein’s removal has made all LGBT people’s position far worse than anyone expected. Initially - with all the talk of democracy - I never thought LGBTs would become death targets, shot like dogs in the street; or that ‘sexual cleansing’ would be allowed. But so it is.”

“I didn’t face any discrimination under Saddam’s regime,” he continues, corroborating other reports that homosexuality was generally tolerated under the dictator, as long as discreet. “Yet, I know if I go back to Iraq now, I will face certain death - especially heading this organisation, as I now do. I stay in close contact with LGBTs there, reporting their situation to the outside world. Gay life in Iraq is hell. The community is completely underground. People find it necessary to modify their behaviour and appearance – just to survive. Shia death squads roam, hunt and kill, unchecked.”

Kidnapping, abduction, torture, black mail, execution and all manner of abuse occur on an almost daily basis, says Hili – not least in southern cities like Najaf, Karbala, Nasriya, Ammara, Basra, and Baghdad. Highly visible, effeminate and publicly-recognised homosexuals, including prostitutes, are the main targets. Iraqi LGBT helps organise an underground network of safe houses or havens to harbor queers in many Iraqi cities. It also gathers information in order to publicise the atrocities via media, and by writing letters to human rights organizations and government officials worldwide – in the, hitherto largely unfulfilled, hope of generating international pressure.

Much of the recent post-Saddam surge in anti-gay violence seems to be related to the highly influential Shia leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani’s, death-to-gays fatwa issued in October 2005. He called for the execution of gay people in the “most severe possible way”. After an international outcry, he removed the fatwa from his website, but the fatwa itself has not been rescinded. It remains in force and is the spiritual sanction for the death squads which openly murder LGBTs. Indeed, a fresh fatwa has just been issued against Ali Hili himself - over two and a half thousand miles away in England - singling him out for execution because of his activities.

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[Behind the Aegis]

1. Gays, guns, and G-d...

Seems to be a common theme the world over. :puke:

[Erika]

2. As religious fundamentalists take over power

tolerance disappears, as seen in this country.