Surveys by doctors from the Physicians for Human Rights group in Boston have revealed the scale of human rights abuses in Iraq between 1988 and 2003.
A team led by Lynn Amowitz questioned 2000 men and women in cities in southern Iraq. Almost half reported that groups affiliated with Saddam Hussein鈥檚 Baath party had abused at least one member of their household. The abuses included mutilation, murder, torture, kidnapping and forced military service.
A second survey of 100 Iraqi doctors by Chen Reis found that Saddam鈥檚 government had threatened doctors with beatings, torture, kidnap or dismissal from their jobs to force them to maim citizens or forge medical documents. Half the doctors questioned said their peers were 鈥渆xtremely or quite a bit involved鈥� in the amputation of ears as a form of punishment. The results appear in The Journal of the American Medical Association (vol 291, p 1471 and p 1480).
Advertisement