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Interview Conducted By Antje Bauer

Translated By Hartmut Lau

July 29, 2005

Germany - Original Article (German)    

Tageszeitung reporter Antje Bauer: Ms. Osseyran, what are the main problems you face today as Minister for Human Rights?

Corpse In One of Iraq's Many Mass Graves

Aida Osseyran: The people don’t know that they have rights because whenever anyone demanded rights during the dictatorship, they were beaten. That’s why we’re teaching human rights in the schools, at the universities and in the ministries - especially in the Ministry of the Interior. We also have teams at the mass graves. There are many mass graves, and people don’t know where their family members are buried. We’re working at setting up a center for the disappeared.

Tageszeitung: What do you consider especially important for women?

Aida Osseyran: We still don’t have new family law; we have no laws for women’s rights. That’s why we have a Women’s Directorate to promote women’s and gender rights and equality and to promote women.

Tageszeitung: The educational level for Iraqi women was relatively high.

Aida Osseyran: Women did have a high education level – 35 years ago.  Since then Iraq has been isolated from the whole world – no satellite television, only pictures of Saddam and his family, no newspapers and no free radio stations. That’s why women in Iraq changed. We have to start over from the beginning.

Tageszeitung: So women’s conditions in Iraq got drastically worse?

Aida Osseyran: We’re now working on new family law and hope that women will accept it. But right now most of the women in the Iraqi Parliament are members of fundamentalist Muslim groupings. These women don’t know anything but the Koran, and they misinterpret it. But there are also many liberal democrats in the Parliament and I am certain we will be able to accomplish something with education and with the world’s support.

Tageszeitung: Normally women’s circumstances get worse in a country in which armed operations are underway – they cannot leave the house.

Aida Osseyran: Every woman can go out. There are kidnappings, but this also impacts men.

Tageszeitung: There are no restrictions keeping young women from leaving the house?

Aida Osseyran: No. They go to university, to school and they go shopping. But many wear veils. They have to. Saddam required it of them. And you cannot take the veil away from them. But you can inform the young generation, you can tell them that it’s not wrong if one doesn’t believe in it and that the Koran itself does not require it.

Tageszeitung: How big a problem is the Americans’ behavior in Iraq?

Americans on Patrol in Iraq

Aida Osseyran: They are of course occupiers, but if they hadn’t intervened we would not have gotten rid of Saddam. Believe me, the Iraqis would not have accomplished that on their own.

Tageszeitung: But now the US soldiers break into homes and shoot people to death.

Aida Osseyran: Sometimes they conduct themselves improperly but most of the time they conduct themselves properly. I have always been against occupation. I want sovereignty and freedom and I am not an American puppet. But when they’re there, it’s more secure than if they would leave the country. Who should stand up against the murders? When they leave the country, everything will collapse.

Tageszeitung: Do you get involved when the Americans conduct themselves improperly?

Aida Osseyran: Of course. We have teams in the prisons, and we register their every misconduct, in the Abu Ghraib prison, in Umm Qasr, in the Bukka prison. And when they do something wrong, we go to the responsible people and tell them what’s going on in the prisons.

Tageszeitung: Are you satisfied with the way accused U.S. soldiers are dealt with?

Aida Osseyran: No, of course not yet. But not only the Americans conduct themselves improperly. The culture in the Ministry of the Interior and in the police is a continuation of the Saddam-culture. We have to change our soldiers too.

Tageszeitung: I think that, the longer the Americans stay, the more suicide bombers there will be, and the more suicide bombers there are, the longer the Americans will stay.

Aida Osseyran: The suicide bombers don’t want a free Iraq. They don’t want a democracy and they don’t want rights for the people. Before his end Saddam thought he might loose the war and released 11,000 murderers and criminals from the jails. Those are the people that are causing the problems today.

Tageszeitung: Do you think the Americans will be able to create a system in Iraq that will prevent suicide attacks?

Aida Osseyran: I don’t know. We will have to assume the responsibility in the mid-term, but we’re not ready yet. When our soldiers and policemen are qualified, then the Americans can leave.

Tageszeitung: When will that be?

Aida Osseyran: I don’t know.