Mohammed Hussein - Iraq

November 07

This month’s spotlight features the case of a British family man, Mohammed Hussein, currently imprisoned in Iraq on an unsafe conviction.

Mohammed Hussein, a barber from Birmingham, fled Iraq in the early 1990s when he was a teenager, escaping the anti-Shia political tensions in that country. Now in his late 20s, he has lived in the UK since, becoming a British citizen and has a British wife and a two-year-old son. Prior to his visit to Iraq earlier this year, he had only been back to that country once since his departure, to introduce his new wife to his family in 2003.

Other members of his family remained in Iraq, living in the Baghdad area, though they have suffered as a consequence of continuing violence and tensions.

Following the death of Mohammed’s older brother, who had been a policeman, the remaining family fled to a rural location close to Najaf in Southern Iraq. However, Mohammed was still concerned for their safety, and in January 2007 he purchased return tickets for his family to visit and attempt to persuade his elderly mother to return to the UK to live with them. He had been particularly concerned that she was not able to receive adequate treatment for her chronic diabetes.

Not long after their arrival in his family’s village, Mohammed became alarmed at the number of other new arrivals in the area, many of them armed. He called the local police emergency number and was assured that the people were there for an annual religious march and that the armed men would protect the participants, as they did every year.

On 27 January the family was woken by heavy gun fire and was forced to stay indoors for their own protection. Despite this, a missile hit their building and Mohammed’s mother and sister were was killed. Mohammed and his wife rang their family in London and asked them to immediately inform the British Embassy in Baghdad that their lives were in danger.

The next morning the village had been sealed off. Mohammed and his family, including several young children walked towards the approaching American soldiers with a white towel to show their peaceful intentions. He told the soldier he was a British citizen who had been caught up in the violence and trapped in the area.

The soldiers replied they had been advised of his telephone calls to the police and British embassy, and knew of him. The Iraqi army assumed responsibility shortly thereafter and were informed by their American counterparts that a British family was among those being apprehended.

Despite this, Mohammed was rounded up and detained with the other men found in the village and was charged with being a member of an Iraqi Shia cult, accused of being involved in fighting against Iraqi and American forces on 27 January 2007. Mohammed’s wife and two-year-old son were also arrested and imprisoned for two months, though have since been freed and allowed to return to the UK.

According to our information, while on remand, Mohammed suffered torture and mistreatment at the hands of Iraqi authorities and was forced to sign a ‘confession’ on two occasions after he was severely beaten. His hands were tied behind his back and hung him from the ceiling for two hours. They attempted to pull his fingernails out. They beat the soles of his feet with tree branches. Then they threw cold water on his feet to exacerbate the pain of the beating and beat his feet again. He was verbally abused and told his wife and sister would be raped. They called him a son of a bastard. They said that he would meet be damned because of what he had done.

Mohammed was subjected to a sham trial process and sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment. His health is failing and he has received no visits in prison from either the British embassy or aid organization Red Crescent.

Our concerns

• The charge was extremely vague; that he was “found in a place, where a terrorist group was present”;
• During the trial Mohammed was questioned for just 10 minutes in which he confirmed his name. The judge asked why he had been in Najaf, which he answered truthfully. Accusations were made which he denied. No transcript was taken;
• The only evidence presented on behalf of the prosecution was that Mohammed had been in the area at the time of the attacks;
• Mohammed’s lawyer did not get a chance to speak on his behalf;
• Several co-defendants spoke out for Mohammed and said that he had nothing to do with their group and had been in the area for the first time, visiting his family. This was not only ignored but also not recorded;
• All 400 defendants who had been arrested in the area following the attacks, were found guilty, none was acquitted. All were sentenced to death, 20 years or 15 years respectively. Mohammed received 15 years;
• Despite the serious charges, the vast majority of the defendants were not represented by a lawyer;
• The judge gave one judgment for all, stating that he would find each of them guilty ‘as they had confessed to their crime in the court room’, despite no record of confessions having been made;
•  Mohammed’s right to know the reasons for the judgment, (essential to the right of the accused to appeal), has been violated. Neither he nor his lawyer have received a copy of the written judgement and the sole basis for his conviction presented by the judge was his presence in the area where the violence took place.

What next

An appeal was entered on the day after his conviction at the end of August and by (Iraqi) law should be decided within 30 days, yet no decision has been taken

The case has a certain political dimension as the fateful events around the battle of Najaf lead to political controversy within Iraq, as critics have accused the Government of a massacre and cover–up. Precise numbers of those who perished are not available but it appears that the number of women and children killed are in their hundreds. Thus the Iraqi Government is under considerable pressure to show that they are in control and that their arrests at the time were justified.