Graves of nearly 1000 Iraqi political prisoners found

Sydney Morning Herald ^ | April 22 2003

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Nearly 1000 political prisoners lie buried in secret graves at a cemetery on the western outskirts of Baghdad, the cemetery's manager and a gravedigger told AFP, while displaying remains of the corpses.

"The Ba'ath regime has gone and now we can talk freely with you," the manager, Mohymeed Aswad, told AFP.

"They are all political. Ten to 15 bodies would arrive at a time from the Abu Ghraib prison and we would bury them here," he said, adding that the last corpse interred was number 993.

Mohammad Moshan Mohammad, gravedigger at the cemetery located about 30 kilometres from central Baghdad and about two kilometres from the prison, said much of his work involved political prisoners.

He said all the dead that arrived from the feared prison during the last three years he worked at the cemetery were aged between 15 and 30, men and women who had been shot or hanged.

"The civilians were hanged. Sometimes a soldier would come through and they were all shot. I could distinguish them by their uniforms," he said through an interpreter.

There are no names at the grave sites which occupy land fenced off by a two-metre high wall. Instead each grave is marked with a number.

"This grave belongs to a woman. She was hanged," Mr Mohammad said, pointing to number 952.

"There are another five cemeteries in Baghdad with secret grave sites so in this city alone there are about 6000 (political) corpses."

AFP

[dead]

Hundreds found alive in prison pits
April 22 2003

United States soldiers in Iraq have discovered three underground prisons containing hundreds of political prisoners.

General Jawdat al-Obeidi, the proclaimed deputy head of the Baghdad provisional government, said that about 150 political prisoners were found by US troops in a secret prison in Salman Pak, 35 kilometres south of Baghdad, and another 200 were rescued at a spot he refused to name.

In Kadhimiya, a primarily Shiite neighbourhood in Baghdad, 25 people were discovered in an underground prison, he said.

"Before Baghdad fell, the guards let water flow into the cells to kill the prisoners before they themselves fled. But the prisoners were smart and built ramps to climb on top of. That's why they didn't drown.

"We and the Americans are working at a fever pitch to find other secret prisons. But it is very difficult, because they are hidden under the earth and have doors that only open with a number code."

The underground jails were discovered following tip-offs from people who lived nearby, and from Iraqis who had been part of the old regime and hoped their co-operation would assuage their guilt, he said.

General Obeidi, an Iraqi Shiite who emigrated to the US in 1999, returned to Baghdad with US troops. He was sentenced to two years' jail for taking part in the uprising against Saddam Hussein in 1991.

Deutsche Presse-Agentur

[OpusatFR]

Looks like the charge of genocide is going to be very large against Saddam and his minions.

It is absolutely frightening to realize that as we look and as the Iraqi people are less afraid, more and more of these mass graves will appear. These poor people.

I live free no matter who is in office as long as our Constitution is obeyed and we have an army of officers who swear allegience to it. These people have lived in terror. I can't imagine why these hideous socialist communist ~peace activists~ can back Saddam's regime.

[Jeff Head]

But, but ... where are the WMD's? [/sarcasm]

Couple this with what they already found outside of Kirkuk and what they will surely find in the south and it amounts to him (one again) using WMD's on his own people.

The Iraqi regime killed more Muslims and other Mid Eastern peoples than any other country on earth ... but that isn't the headline from the liberal/lefitst/marxist useful idiot rags is it, or from the state controlled Arab press either?

Hmmm ... I wonder why?

Winning Iraqi Freedom

[facedown]

bump

[dead]

People like Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon would rather see thousands more innocents poured into these graves, than see a Republican president get reelected.

That's where their priorities lie.

[Freedom'sWorthIt]

Truth bump.

[UCANSEE2]

If you want to know why the Hollywood libs mindlessly follow that path, you must follow the (1)money and (2) path to success (or failure).

His name is Jack Valenti.

[Blood of Tyrants]

[The cells] have doors that only open with a number code."

Try C-4 (just a little bit), the code that works with all of them.

[Jeff Head]

You nailed that.

It wouldn't matter to them who the dead were.

[mass55th]

Hopefully they will eventually find a list somewhere with the names that relate to those grave numbers. The only other way they'd be able to match them up would be through DNA testing with family members who lost someone, but that would take ages and cost mucho bucks.

[MizSterious]

You know, people scoff at me when I say this, but I'll say it again anyway. Hussein is going to rival Hitler in the atrocities department. People keep saying that can't be, but start adding up the numbers from all these individual sites. It's horrific.

[MizSterious]

FYI

[Charlie OK]

that was how I convinced my anti-war stepmother to support the war effort. I told her that I truly believed that Saddam would eventually be revealed as being worse than Hitler. Her dad fought in WWII.

[knighthawk]

Nearly 1000 political prisoners lie buried in secret graves at a cemetery on the western outskirts of Baghdad, the cemetery's manager and a gravedigger told AFP, while displaying remains of the corpses.

Middle East list

If people want on or off this list, please let me know.

[warchild9]

Not to diminish this atrocity, but were their organs removed for later sale, such as those of the tens of thousands of victims of our President's buddies, the Chinese?

[Delta 21]

Hey, O Sahma, need a new set of kidneys?

[Dog]

Dead any word on Scott Speicher???

[FreedomPoster]

Ping; more dungeon doors opening.

[dead]

I haven't heard anything. I find the idea that we would find him alive after all these years pretty absurd.

I hope I'm wrong, but I doubt it.