Crowds and Clerics

Today has probably been the most productive so far. Met with the President of the Iraqi Association of Economists, who is also part of the INA party, and who was very clear in rejecting Saddam’s debts. Next I had a meeting with the deputy British consul in the Al-Rasheed complex. There was a dreadful traffic jam (with the paucity of traffic lights and police, plus so many cars on the verge of breakdown after 13 years of sanctions, jams are frustratingly common) so I hopped out in order to walk the kilometre to the complex where the British consulate is. It quickly became obvious that there had been some disturbances, and I found that the road was blocked by soldiers. I pieced together later that there had been a demonstration by ex-military members demanding pay which had turned nasty (an unconfirmed story I was told is that a soldier kicked an old man and was then lynched by the crowds, here's the latest from the BBC). In fact this must have started about 10.30 when we were driving to the INA and were overtaken by tanks (see below) driving over the pavements to get somewhere in a hurry.



I showed my passport to a soldier, and was allowed to walk along the pavement in the direction of the hotel. There was quite a big crowd of Iraqis, mainly young men, being funnelled out of the area, and as I walked I was chatting with some of them. It was all very good natured but quickly, as can happen with frightened crowds, the situation got a bit more boisterous. People were trying to grab my backpack, were pinching my bottom (?!?) and someone even put a lit cigarette in my pocket (ouch). People were swarming around, it was getting noisier, and the Iraqis I’d been talking with decided to take the situation in hand. They took my arm, formed a ring around me, told the shabab (young men) that I wasn’t a solider and demanded that they to back off. Then they guided me out of the crowd and deposited me with some Iraqi policemen who drove me to the hotel. I think it would have been a dangerous situation for someone without any Arabic, but it was typical of Iraqi good nature that, knowing that I was a friend – and more importantly a guest - they looked after me even in the face of angry countrymen. There can’t be many places in the world where, in a tense and chaotic crowd situation, people protect an apparent enemy in such a way.

So I got to the Rasheed complex, though half an hour late, and managed to meet up with the deputy British Consul, who I’d talked with a few days previously. He was a sound chap, supportive of Jubilee Iraq, and offered to help put me in contact with some key people. The next stop was the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan where we met with a friendly member of their leadership who took as trong a line on debt as the INA had done this morning. The final stop of the day, after a gorgeous Kishmisha fruit smoothy (the Iraqi versions outclass the expensive English versions one-hundredfold), was the Abu Khanifa shrine. This is the most important Sunni mosque in Iraq, and I’d arranged to meet with it’s cleric Sheikh Moyaad. You might remember the mosque from the news back on 10 April, since it was attacked by the US following a rumour that Saddam was praying there. The Sheikh was a lovely warm guy, and I was amazed that he gave me about an hour of his time after evening prayers. He explained that the longest verse in the Koran is actually on the subject of debt, and gave some very interesting responses to my questions in an area in which he had no experience. Afterwards finishing the interview on debt, he was keen to tell me about Islam. It was a real privilege – like hearing the Gospel from the Pope or something I guess. When I got up this morning I couldn’t have guessed that in a few hours I’d be debating predestination in broken Arabic with one of Iraq’s leading clerics. He invited me to come back and talk some more with him, which I hope will be possible. As I'm typing the power has just gone out, but the hotel seems to have just installed a backup for the computers, so i'm typing awaying in the dark under the glow of the monitor! I better press "post" quick before the backup power fails...