Peace team stays in Iraq

2006-03-13 22:53

Baghdad - The three women from Christian Peacemaker Teams remaining in Iraq have no plans to leave or change their routine despite the killing of Tom Fox, one of four men from their group kidnapped and held since last November.

Living in a rented apartment on a quiet downtown street, their only indirect armed security is guards outside a neighbouring Iraqi organisation.

"I don't want to be killed, I don't want to be kidnapped, I don't want to be hurt," said Anita David, 60, a former television set decorator from Chicago.

"But I don't have a personal sense of doom every time I exit my house."

Conscious of their vulnerability the three Americans, ranging in age from 43 to 63, decline photographs but that is one of the few concessions to personal safety they make.

They considered moving but believe they are more secure where people know them. They still walk to the local supermarket in pairs, paying cash for groceries, and travel Iraq by car.

Their last road trip was a few weeks ago to Baquba, 65km north of Baghdad, along one of the most deadly highways in Iraq to a city that sees daily insurgent violence.

"We make our own choices about where to go and how to go, consulting closely with our Iraqi counterparts," said Maxine Nash, 43, from Waukon, Iowa, who was a clinical researcher before becoming a CPT activist.

Road crew

The group's work ranges from helping families find relatives arrested by security forces by talking to US and Iraqi government agencies through to removing trash from local roads.

Response to the Chicago-based group from local people has been positive, they said.

"A lot of response you get depends on how you treat people," said Peggy Gish, 63, of Athens, Ohio who works on a Christian communal farm that grows organic food.

"The American authorities, the American military have a different approach."

They don't know of other Christian groups currently in Iraq, but work with several local Muslim and Christian non-government organisations. The three deny accusations they are naive.

"One may appear naive or illogical but it's not naivete or being illogical," said David. "It arises from one's faith."

Largely funded by private donations from individuals, they are chronically short of money but live like many Iraqis three years after the US invasion.

The sporadic electricity barely illuminates the living room of the apartment. The furniture is comfortable, but old and the carpet worn. Children's drawings brighten a wall.

The Americans say they are neither missionaries nor evangelists and do not attempt conversions.

There are no crucifixes on the walls though that is not by design.

"We're kind of lame about our home decorating," said Nash. "A lot of us carry our own" Christian symbols.

David restricts her religious objects to a small 1950s Greek religious icon. For good luck she has a panda key ring.

Team members, about 40 in all, can spend up to five months in Iraq on rotations of varying lengths and frequency.

"Despite the tragedy, people are ready to come back and do the work," said Gish.

Iraqi entry visas are getting more difficult and they get little support, and some discouragement, from the diplomats in the world's biggest US embassy in Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone.

But they have no intention of leaving.

"They tell us it's dangerous for us to be here," said Nash. "We agree to disagree with them."

They will stay as long as their "presence is more help than harm" said Nash.

And hope that captive Canadians James Loney and Harmeet Sooden and Briton Norman Kember can one day leave too.

- Reuters