CPTnet
1 September 2005

IRAQ: Waleed's* quest
by Peggy Gish

After two years of searching, Waleed is still trying to find his nephew, Yasser, last seen in U.S. military custody in spring 2003. The nephew has been part of CPT's Adopt-a-Detainee Campaign, and Waleed has come to our apartment often to share information. While trying to find Yasser, he has also helped other families with their searches. When CPT held vigils in Tahrir Square in spring of 2004, he joined us a few times, holding Yasser's photo.

At one point he told CPTers, "Even though you were unable to find concrete results, you are here with us in our suffering." However, as he became more discouraged about the lack of progress CPT made in finding the disappeared, he came less often.

We suspect that in most of these cases, the disappeared person is actually dead. Friends and family have said this to Waleed, but he, like many others, has not had any evidence to give him closure, and has not given up his search. A man came to him claiming to have Yasser's prison identification number from a prison in Qatar.  True or false, it has given him new hope. A week ago he came with information about many men who had disappeared and said he hopes to get help from a U.S. military official in charge of the detainee system.

Waleed told us about his own four-hour detention last week. U.S. soldiers stopped him at a checkpoint near Fallujah, handcuffed and blindfolded him after they found papers with him referring to Yasser's capture by the U.S. military as "a criminal act." While searching him, they found a CPT Iraq card and he said he was associated with our team.  He thought that may have helped him convince the soldiers to release him.

He said that recently U.S. soldiers took two women from their homes near Fallujah as hostages, in order to force their husbands to turn themselves in. They later released the women, but that did not remove the shame for them and their families. "In our society," he said, "it is more difficult for us to have a woman detained than for a whole village to be bombed."

I asked how his family and home fared since the November 2004 U.S. assault on Fallujah. He said his family, living outside the city limits, was not harmed, but his milk factory, inside the city, has remained closed since then. "But," he said, "it's not just about me. It's about Iraq. It's horrible. People are suffering so much."

Today, he looked discouraged when he visited briefly. The U.S. military official he had hoped to meet had just left for a three-week vacation. We said, "We are sorry."  He knows we care, but we are also among the many in the past two years who have been unable to help him find the truth that can help him move on with his life.

*Not his real name


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Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) seeks to enlist the whole church in organized, nonviolent alternatives to war and places teams of trained, peacemakers in regions of lethal conflict.  Originally a violence-reduction initiative of the historic peace churches (Mennonite, Church of the Brethren and Quaker), CPT now enjoys support and membership from a wide range of Christian denominations.

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