| BAGHDAD —
Security risks — bombings and car-hijackings, explosions
and kidnappings — have become the norm in this tense, uneasy
city and are all but overwhelming the work of humanitarian personnel
in Iraq.
Veterans of numerous relief operations — many of them with
experience in Africa, the Balkans or elsewhere in the Middle East
— say they are working in the worst environment they have
ever experienced.
“At least in Sarajevo you could see the risk and assess
the threat,” said Alexander Christof, head of mission in
Iraq for Architects for People in Need (APN), a Munich-based agency
receiving funding from U.S. churches for its work in some of the
poorest areas of Baghdad.
Aid workers such as Christof, 45, now find themselves working
in an environment a former generation of relief personnel would
never have imagined — a world in which humanitarian agencies
find themselves fortified like military sites, protected by armed
guards and walls of sandbags.
Still, it is almost possible to become inured to Baghdad’s
tensions.
“There are permanent pressures here I’m often not
even aware of until I return to Munich and realize I don’t
have to worry about walking down a sidewalk,” Christof noted.
Since the bombing of the United Nations office in Baghdad in August
2003 — an event which precipitated a UN withdrawal from
the city, as well as staff reductions of a number of prominent
aid agencies — direct, targeted attacks and threats against
humanitarian agencies have become less common.
Nonetheless, relief organizations have experienced everything
from grenade attacks to burglaries and robberies.
What is often most draining to many relief workers, however, is
the risk involved in undertaking even routine and simple tasks.
A short 10-minute drive through Baghdad involves danger, especially
if a vehicle gets stuck in traffic alongside a U.S. military convoy,
a frequent target of attacks by insurgents.
“We don’t fear we’ll be attacked so much as
being in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Christof said.
One reason Christof and other relief workers feel committed to
continuing their work is that Iraq’s humanitarian situation
remains grave.
With its muddy streets, lack of sewage facilities and no running
water, Hai Tarek, a predominately Shi’ite neighborhood of
Baghdad, attests to Iraq’s run-down and deteriorated state.
Dozens of women in their black chadors waited in long lines to
see a doctor or refill medical prescriptions in the only available
clinic in Hai Tarek. Nearby, children armed with jerry cans noisily
and boisterously greeted the daily delivery, by truck, of the
neighborhood’s only water supply, which is coordinated by
Christof’s agency.
The damaging effects of war, long-standing neglect and a decade
of international sanctions are largely responsible for the problems
in areas like Hai Tarek, say many Iraqi medical personnel, who
cite a long list of medical problems in the country.
Certain diseases, such as tuberculosis, are re-emerging. Iraq
is also hampered by a lack of specialized medical facilities.
Post-war chaos and distribution problems are causing a shortage
of usable medicines, resulting in what Mazen Mohsen, an Iraqi
physician, called a “vicious circle” in which Iraqis
requiring medical attention are not yet able to access the medicines
that they need.
The combined effect of all of these problems, compounded by poor
security, points to an inescapable and bleak conclusion, Mohsen
told ENI: “We will face a serious medical crisis in the
near future.” |
