Baghdad - Bittersweet Memories by Margherita Amodeo

Today, 19 August 2024, marks the 21st anniversary of the bombing of the UN HQ in Baghdad when we lost 23 of our friends and colleagues with over 160 injured. Every year, this anniversary brings back vivid and precious memories of the people and places I met during my two-year assignment in Iraq.*

It was September 1997. The UN plane landed on a bumpy pot-holed runway and stumbled over to what was left of the Habbaniya military airport located 20 km outside Baghdad. Through the murky windows, we could see abandoned buildings and destroyed military planes. Iraq was under heavy sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council after its invasion of Kuwait in 1990. These sanctions forbade Iraq to fly its own planes. Ours was the last UN flight as Saddam Hussein decided to retaliate and forbid the UN to fly in Iraqi air space - thus forcing UN staff to endure 12 hours on the monotonous highway linking Baghdad to Amman and the outside world.

Untitled (painting collage) by Ismael Fattah, 1934-2004, Baghdad, Iraq.

Photo by Margherita Amodeo.

As we disembarked, we were hit by a blast of hot air heavy with dust – a mini desert storm - which found its way into our nostrils, our eyes, our ears, our mouth, our hair, our clothes. Soon we were ready to be deep-fried under the relentless sun. We then drove several miles to the Canal Hotel in central Baghdad, where the UN offices were housed. There was nobody in sight. Everyone was gathered in the lounge watching Princess Diana’s funeral on the only TV set in the building.

I had been in Baghdad before and was curious to see if anything had changed. It had – for the worse. A few years earlier, the pleasant streets and lovely avenues were animated with people going about their business. Shops and markets were bustling with people making up for the time that they had spent sheltering for safety during the eight-year war with Iran. They were busy rebuilding their lives. Streets were busy with heavy traffic. The din of horns honking, motorcycles revving, and old buses coughing coupled with the overwhelming heat made conversation impossible. Relief was palpable and hope was in the air.

 

Birdseller in Baghdad   Photo by Margherita Amodeo

All this was in the past. Now, sanctions had taken their toll. Palaces lay derelict, witesses to the grandeur that was once Baghdad. Palm trees lining the once majestic avenues were no longer green with their arms lifted upwards; they were brown, drooping and covered in dust! Even the magnificent Tigris and Euphrates seemed muddy and lifeless and the once bustling fish restaurants on their banks were now empty and ghostly. There were no more fish.

The Baghdadis looked weary. Shuffling along in worn out shoes, they looked as miserable as their city. Hope had been replaced by sorrow and dejection. The malnutrition rate in children had risen astronomically – a clear signal that food was insufficient both for children and adults. A cry of alarm was raised by UNICEF when a study published in the Lancet found that over 500,000 children had died of malnutrition and related illnesses since the imposition of sanctions.

 

E.T. in his Kurdish Harem, painting by Rostan Zadh-Namo known as "Rostan"  born 1964, Erbil. 

Photo by Margherita Amodeo

Iraq was unable to restore public services. The water supply, the electricity grid and the sanitation system had been decimated. Schools were damaged or destroyed. The hospitals could not function as they did not have the drugs, equipment, power, water, staff, etc. to provide the badly needed services. And food and medicine were in poor supply. It was obvious that Iraq needed a UNICEF-style multi-sectoral assessment aimed at meeting all the population’s needs. Together with the UNICEF Representative and other UN Agencies and Programmes present in Iraq, we set to work. The assessment found that repairs to the infrastructure, provision of clean water and sanitation services, a reliable electricity supply, as well as rehabilitation of schools, education services, animal health, etc. were essential.

Down by the river. Photo by Margherita Amodeo

In response to our findings, the UN Security Council agreed that funds had to be increased multifold ($5.2 billion every six months) to cover all the additional requirements. Raising the funds was easy as all it entailed was to allow Iraq to sell more oil. However, the magnitude of the new programme raised its own obstacles and hurdles for the UN Agencies. These were exacerbated by the sanctions and the over-meticulous scrutiny by the various teams of observers. It was a constant struggle against those who sought to undermine the effectiveness of the humanitarian intervention under the guise of “observation”.

 

Life under surveillance

Scrutiny was not limited to “oil for food”. Each one of us was under surveillance 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Living in Iraq was like treading gingerly through a minefield. Ostensibly on security grounds, the Government did not allow UN personnel to rent their own accommodation. We were forced to live in officially selected apart-hotels. My home in Baghdad was a simple serviced apartment in the Summerland Hotel. My phone would jump to attention every time that I entered the front door. I was never alone. I had been warned that, in Baghdad, even the trees had ears and that mirrors had eyes! I covered my mirrors with beautiful scarves. I turned my TV on maximum volume every time I had a conversation. I became alert and vigilant as the intrusion on my privacy and intimacy was very disturbing.

The first time I went into an Iraqi home, I was shocked at the loud blaring TV which made talking almost impossible. I asked my host to lower the volume. A dance of signs followed indicating that the walls had ears and so did every electronic device, and so on and so forth. Every person on the street was a potential spook or informer or simply scared as people invariably noted my car’s number plate whenever I stopped somewhere and did the same when I left. Invariably, they were not the same persons who took my number when I had arrived. I couldn’t fathom the point of this exercise.

Our movements outside Baghdad were restricted. Fortunately, work took me all over the country allowing me to visit areas like the marshlands in the south as well as some of the most important ancient and sacred places in Mesopotamia, also known as the cradle of civilization. It was a welcome respite to step back in time albeit briefly. In my mind, there was no doubt that Iraq, like the Phoenix, would rise again from the ashes the way that it has always done. Unfortunately, that day has yet to come.

 
Baghdadi Friends

I set out to find old friends who I had met on previous visits. Gadi, a young pianist, and his family still lived in the same house in Mansur, a once elegant part of Baghdad. Their hospitality had not changed despite the scarcity of absolutely everything. Gadi’s sister, Ban, who had a marvelous soprano voice, was awarded a scholarship in Leuwen, Belgium. Ban returned home to Baghdad before completing her studies. She was homesick and preferred to be back home facing hardship with her family rather than worrying about them while living in comfort in Leuwen. She sang to us accompanied by Gadi on the piano. Unforgettable moments in the strange limbo that Baghdad had become.

Life on the River, Artist Anonymous 

Photo by Margherita Amodeo

Against all odds, Ami continued to host her Tuesday night literary evenings in the back garden of her bookshop on Abu Nawas Street. Her garden was fragrant with jasmine creepers and roses - a little haven on the banks of the Tigris. These literary evenings brought together musicians, artists and intellectuals seeking a moment of shared delight and solace from their enforced isolation. After the readings, we would spend hours chatting in the shade of frangipani trees sipping lemonade or mint tea.

 

Screen with painted glass of Arabian mythical scenes made to order by Ami (Baghdadi Bookshop).
Photo by Margherita Amodeo

The bookshop I knew from earlier times had been transformed into a treasure trove of unusual artifacts, silk hangings and throws, antique bed linen and towels and some other mystery items whose significance Ami explained to me. I spent several wonderful hours with Ami learning about Iraqi customs and traditions. Sadly, families were forced to sell their family heirlooms to pay for necessities. They also had to relinquish some of their furniture, their musharabiya (shuttered) windows and screens, their carved Baghdadi doors, artworks, silver and antique books, in order to survive. Auction houses flourished selling precious items to foreigners who spirited them out of the country thanks to their diplomatic immunity.

Whenever I found the time, cafes in Baghdad were always a great place to spend time sipping Arabic coffee, surrounded by men of all ages wearing their heavy moustache, smoking the ubiquitous nargileh (waterpipe) and watching life go by often in silence. Shabandar and Um Kalthoum cafes were wonderful with their walls covered with black and white pictures of past and present celebrities. On Fridays, there was always a book market where intellectuals and students vied for the precious books. We met several contemporary artists, whose work was very moving, sometimes heart-rending, as it reflected the pain the Iraqis had experienced in the recent past. The few pieces that hang on the walls of my home today continue to bring back the same mixture of pain and beauty to the point that I can’t always cope with their heavy presence.

 

Lady in Red by Muhammad Arif (1937-2009), Erbil
Photo by Margherita Amodeo

It is not surprising that Christmas 1998 is one I will never forget. We lived through Operation Desert Fox, United States’ “precision bombing” from 16 to 19 December 1998. Key Iraqi security buildings located close to our Canal Hotel office were targeted. The sky around us lit up with the relentless fireworks display. We were assured that the UN building was safe. Safe? The whole building shook and windows shattered. So did the nerves of the calmest of my colleagues. It was common knowledge that the UNSCOM Inspectors, who were whisked out of Baghdad before the bombing started, had left behind locked doors several samples of anthrax, niacin, mustard gas and other toxic materials in their fridge. Just one leak could have been lethal. The worst was avoided but the experience frayed the already tenuous relationship between the humanitarian and the political staff.

We were finally evacuated to Amman - just as the bombing petered out – only to travel back to Baghdad the next day. Christmas celebrations were cancelled as a sign of respect toward our Iraqi colleagues. A group of us attended midnight mass at the Catholic Church where Ban sang the same Christmas carols as she always did. This time, her beautiful singing was even more poignant.

 

A Mirage - Artist Anonymous
Photo by Margherita Amodeo

My assignment lasted two years. I had to return to Geneva in August 1999, sad to leave Iraq but relieved that “oil-for-food” was covering most basic services. My relief was short-lived as the “Shock and Awe” invasion of March 2003 brought devastation once more to the Iraqi people. And, more than 20 years later, their suffering is not yet over and, according to various sources, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians have been killed.

*I was seconded from UNICEF to the UN’s oil-for-food programme from September 1997 to July 1999. UN Security Council Resolution 986 authorized Iraq to sell $1.6 billion worth of its oil to pay for the population’s needs in food and medicine. The “oil-for-food” programme was administered and monitored by the UN. In parallel, the UN Special Commission (UNSCOM), an inspection regime, oversaw Iraq’s compliance with the mandate to destroy, render harmless or remove all Iraqi biological, chemical and nuclear weaponry.