Community | December 02, 2009 | 35 comments

Iraq: Women forced into sex slavery

source: http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1259243063998

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TravG73
Rising numbers of Iraqi women are being sold into sexual slavery every year because of the waning economy and dire security situation.

Human rights organizations are highlighting the plight of Iraqi women and young girls, sometimes as young as twelve, exploited by criminal gangs for profit.

"The women trafficking trade is at its height," Houzan Mahmoud, representative abroad of the Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq said. "There has never been a situation as extreme, and it's frightening. Many of them have been trafficked to neighboring countries like Syria or the Gulf states or trafficked internally inside Iraq from one city to another."

The Baghdad Women's Organization estimates that at least 200 Iraqi women are sold into slavery every year, although the US-based Human Rights Watch estimates that the numbers are in the thousands. The organization warns that the figures may be higher if Iraqi refugee women in neighboring countries such as Syria and Lebanon are also counted.

The situation has become much worse since 2003, after the US led invasion of Iraq," Nadya Khalife, a women's rights researcher for the Middle East and North Africa region at Human Rights Watch told The Media Line.

"More women have become widows and orphans and have turned to prostitution to simply make ends meet," she said. "There are simply no other alternatives for women who head households to locate other sources of income. In Syria and Lebanon, for instance, Iraqi families have simply exhausted their financial savings and some of these families have forced their own wives and daughters into prostitution."

Mahmoud said that since 2003 more than 70% of Iraqis have lost their jobs, a situation compounded by a lack of welfare provisions.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull&cid=1259243063998
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35 comments // Iraq: Women forced into sex slavery

  • echoz
  • myfriendmarcus
  • echoz
    • 0
      echoz  
    • Image

    • BAGHDAD // With her family mired in deepening poverty, Sajida Mohammad was happy enough that her father accepted the proposal of marriage when it came. The man who would become her husband was a stranger to them all, but he promised financial help and there seemed to be no other options.

      It was, however, a decision the 28-year-old Iraqi woman came to bitterly regret because, within a month, her hopes had collapsed and the newlywed found herself being sold as a prostitute by her spouse.

      “For a short time he was nice to me, and did give my family some money and that was good,” she said. “Then we moved house, to a small apartment and one day he invited some friends over and told me I must do anything they wanted, even if it was something that should only be between a man and his wife.

      “I rejected the idea, but my husband was drunk and he beat me.”

      According to Ms Mohammad, the attack was so severe that she lost consciousness. After recovering, she said, her husband laid down the law: she would work for him and have sex with whomever he brought back to their flat in Karrada, in central Baghdad. If she complained, he would stop giving money to her parents or even kill her.

      “I didn’t have any choice and so I did what he told me,” Ms Mohammad explained. “I lived that kind of life for a year. I slept with any man he brought to me. I didn’t see any way to escape from it, and I couldn’t tell anyone what was happening.”...[there's more at the link]

      http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20091129/FOREIGN/711289906/1135/editorials

    • 2 years ago
  • echoz
    • 0
      echoz  
    • Image

    • I generally refrain from speculative Wiki but even they report in "human trafficking' that:

      Many of the Iraqi women fleeing the Iraq War are turning to prostitution, while others are trafficked abroad, to countries like Syria, Jordan, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Turkey[citation needed]. In Syria alone an estimated 50,000 Iraqi refugee girls and women, many of them widows, had been forced into prostitution as of 2007.[44] Cheap Iraqi prostitutes have helped to make Syria a popular destination for sex tourists. The clients come from wealthier countries in the Middle East.[45] High prices are offered for virgins.[46]

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_trafficking

    • 2 years ago
  • echoz
    • 0
      echoz  
    • Image

    • "According to the story by Rania Abouzeid, poor and underprivileged Iraqi mothers are selling their preteen and teenage daughters into a "sex market," with prices ranging from $2,000 all the way up to $30,000, where they are driven into prostitution. While much of it takes place within local borders, there are many occurrences on an international level as well, particularly to Syria and Jordan....

      "The saddest and most repulsive aspect, though, is that it largely remains a "hidden crime." Abouzeid goes on to cite a report from the State Department saying the Iraqi government is basically ignoring everything, claiming that Baghdad "offers no protection services to victims of trafficking, reported no efforts to prevent trafficking in persons and does not acknowledge trafficking to be a problem in the country."

      http://www.nowpublic.com/world/voice-reason-sex-trafficking-iraq-tragedy

    • 2 years ago
  • shanklinmike
  • jef_jef
  • tommytripper
    • 0
      tommytripper  

    • wonderful the "spreading" of freedom, and democracy... good results here... bravo... and people still believe the crap the white house and its corporate masters spout...

    • 2 years ago
  • marioee
  • AsperGirl
    • 0
      AsperGirl  

    • Perhaps one could exaggerate and claim that some male Shiite Iraqis enjoy more rights since Iraq was "freed" from Saddam Hussein's rule, but only if one completely ignores the existence of all Iraqi women (Shiite and Sunni).

      It has always been obvious that regardless of the marginal "freedoms" for political speech Iraqi Shiite males have enjoyed since being "liberated" from Saddam Hussein's rule, the U.S. invasion has been a human rights disaster for Iraqi females. Being forced back into the veil and out of professional lives is just the beginning of the loss of civiil rights, violence, domestic abuse and human rights violations that comprise Iraqi womens' lives today.

      Since women were (even before the U.S. invasion) more than 60% of the population of Iraq, I find it delusional and dishonest whenever Americans claim that Iraqis were "freed" from Saddam Hussein's rule or that they enjoy more rights now. Iraqi women have gone from having the most rights in the Arab world under Saddam Hussein, to losing rights under religious traditionalists, and into some of the worst conditions for women of the Arab world.

    • 2 years ago
  • Jackstowne
    • 0
      Jackstowne  

    • It's not "sex," it's *rape.* Sex is defined as consensual, but even for those who insist on confusing it with the clinical term, "intercourse" or "penetration," they still must recognize the potency of association. Sexy is universally and strongly associated with: consensual, good, natural, and erotic. Hence the phrase "Sex sells." It is a highly charged word.

      "Slavery" obviously means a violation of will so why attach it to a word that is implicitly associated with and defined as consensual? It defeats the purpose of trying to raise the alarm since it only serves to blur the line between consent and violation, to make the idea seems sexy or kinky (e.g." sex slave"). If they are indeed slaves, then they are *rape slaves.*

      The commercialization of rape, whether it be women or girls, has always been confused with "consensual" prostitution, which is rather rare. And phrasing such as "sex slavery" is why.

      Rape is not sex and vice-versa.

    • 2 years ago
  • puella
  • sirpaulmcdarkney
  • echoz
  • ozoneocean
  • zeropiate
  • JonRaymond
  • cairo926
  • cairo926
    • 0
      cairo926  

    • It drives me crazy that so many women around the world are victims of these horrible crimes when all that needs to happen to end this is to educate men on these topics and to say - KEEP IT IN YOUR PANTS MEN - (obviously, I know this is only one of the many many things that need to change, but come on...)

    • 2 years ago
  • TheOuroborus
  • echoz
  • echoz
  • akassan
    • 0
      akassan  

    • I don't understand, if they cover their women up and disown them for having sex I just assumed there wouldn't be a market for prostitution.

    • 2 years ago
  • BigJoeSixPack
  • JonRaymond
  • rufescens
    • 0
      rufescens  

    • This is frightening. It sounds like the fate of Iraqis is much like that of Palestinians--Other Arab countries offer them refuge, but no one takes care of them. They end up exhausting their savings and are left poor, without work, without school, and without voting rights. Completely helpless refugees. It's unfair. And it's devastating.

    • 2 years ago
  • aquamammal
  • keithponder
  • echoz
  • eLearnDev
  • echoz
  • calm_incense
  • echoz
    • 0
      echoz  

    • sounds like corporate imperialistic america is still making themselves at home in Iraq. i wonder how many women actually "head" households in Iraq...I'd bet that's a new phenomenon of "free" market forces at work optomisticlly benefitting the surrounding communities in their global village...

    • 2 years ago
  • StaleCookie
    • 0
      StaleCookie  
    • echoz:

      This has absolutely nothing to do with how the people of Iraq treat women? These women would be living most excellent lives if it wasn't for corporate imperialistic America... Am I right here?

    • 2 years ago
  • echoz
    • 0
      echoz  
    • echoz:

      Stale', well maybe you may care to be right, but the country of iraq is a commodity on the world super power stage. Iraqis have one of the richest oil reserves in the world, yet "...since 2003 more than 70% of Iraqis have lost their jobs, a situation compounded by a lack of welfare provisions." How can that so completely be, when we've come to "free" them as the pinnacle of a beacon of hope for Western influence and good will in the Islamic world? And if under your own house pooled millions in oil reserves, would you really think to sell your daughter, wife, or neice as a piece of ass, just to put bread in your mouth, (or perhaps as some may be tempted to allege) just so you can live another day just to spite your neighbor??? Hmmm...

      "Rising numbers of Iraqi women are being sold into sexual slavery every year because of the waning economy and dire security situation." Waning economies? u mean, like ours??? where even big wigs and fat cats steal taxpayer money right in front of our eyes, and yet, in Iraq, somehow, you imagine, it would be different, even perhaps to living "excellently" as you've presumptively alleged? Why, if we started in such "humanitarian" efforts as the war was sold to us, "for" the people of Iraq, are we even as americans, unapologetically so familiar with BlackWater and Halliburton than visions of the Red Cross and other such dis "united" ways? I think it's a fatter chance that was the real reason American government took notice of Iraq. The American government even thinks to put it's own citizens under constant continuing NEEDLESS surveillance defeating probable cause for probable guilt. Why would anyone question American involvement even indirectly in any of this when our own society is so rife with such counter-productive greed? (Today's "progressive" morality is actually more effectively..."if you can get away with it...")

      "The women trafficking trade is at its height...There has never been a situation as extreme..." There has never been a situation as extreme... I'm guessing that means...well, extreme, as in, "never been more 'extreme'"...never. I guess it could be Iraqis are getting just as demogoguish and sex-crazed as american liberal media to do these kinds of things, but somehow I think it's more involved than if we "just weren't even there" as you also assert... Meanwhile, I'm sure American good will is making sure simple welfare provisions are good enough "for the people" to actually keep them from selling their asses on the damn street in a Muslim world! But I am supremely confident American "corporate" interests have and still do generously help Iraqi's considerably misaccount for their oil profits in squandered "misappropriations."

      And while in part as possibly you may also be suggesting...yes, you aren't so completely right as you are not so completely wrong. I'm sure you are right in that Iraqi's have a part to play in their own social evils...but conditions can be instigated and propogated to keep them that way as well. We are not without precedent or excuse. Witness much of latin america. That should ring a big bell sister. Even New Orleans, of more recent memory and much closer to home.

      Or you could insist on being totally right, but does it matter? I wish I wasn't, but I know the rich and the greedy are not innocent in such (for them) temptations...

      'Power corrupts' the old adage goes...thanks for giving me occasion to think a little about it. see ya...

    • 2 years ago
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