Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders Annual Report 2005 - Iraq

International Federation for Human Rights, Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders Annual Report 2005 - Iraq, 22 March 2006, https://www.refworld.org/reference/annualreport/ifhr/2006/en/59969 [accessed 16 April 2024]
LinkedIn

Assassination and abduction of trade unions leaders13

Assassination and abduction of IFTU members14

On 4 January 2005, Mr. Hadi Saleh, international secretary of the Iraqi Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU), was brutally tortured and murdered at his Baghdad home. Mr. Saleh had been sentenced to death in 1969 for his labour activities and served a five-year imprisonment term before fleeing Iraq and settling abroad, where he had continued to work for labour rights in Iraq. He became a founding member of IFTU, after his return to the country in 2003. In spite of an investigation carried out by the Iraqi police, none of the perpetrators had been identified as of the end of 2005.

Messrs. Saady Edan and Moaid Hamed, president and secretary general of the IFTU section in Mosul, were respectively abducted on 27 January and 11 February 2005. Mr. Edan was released on 1 February, and Mr. Hamen on 25 February 2005.

Assassination of Mr. Ali Hassan Adb15

On 18 February 2005, Mr. Ali Hassan Abd (Abu Fahad), a union leader and prominent member of the Oil and Gas Union, was murdered on his way home, close to the Al-Dorah oil refinery in Baghdad. Mr. Ali Hassan Abd was one of the first activists to organise trade unions in the oil industry in a post-Saddam Iraq.

In spite of the investigation carried out by the Iraqi police, Mr. Ali Hassan Abd's assassination had still not been clarified by the end of 2005.

[Refworld note: This report as posted on the FIDH website (www.fidh.org) was in pdf format with country chapters run together by region. Footnote numbers have been retained here, so do not necessarily begin at 1.]

13. See Urgent Appeal IRQ 001/0205/OBS 016.

14. Idem.

15. Idem.

Disclaimer:

This is not a UNHCR publication. UNHCR is not responsible for, nor does it necessarily endorse, its content. Any views expressed are solely those of the author or publisher and do not necessarily reflect those of UNHCR, the United Nations or its Member States.