Iraq's secret women's shelters

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.3 • 2.6K Ratings

🗓️ 24 October 2024

⏱️ 27 minutes

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Summary

There is virtually no state provision for victims of domestic abuse in Iraq. As a result, Iraqi women have been left to protect and support each other, organising secret shelters for survivors and trying to assemble health and legal support for victims. From inside one of the secret shelters, 22-year-old ‘Mariam’ tells the BBC’s Rebecca Kesby about the abuse she suffered at the hands of her husband and his relatives. Iraqi feminist Yanar Mohammed, who set up the first known women’s safe house in Baghdad in 2003, tells Rebecca how her work has led to death threats and law suits, forcing her into hiding. A former member of the Iraqi parliament tried in vain to force a change in the law to criminalise domestic violence, and a policewoman struggles on a daily basis to contain the rising violence in the home.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the documentary from the BBC World Service.
0:07.0	Like many countries, domestic violence in Iraq is a major problem. There's a toxic legacy of war, poverty, and an increasingly
0:17.8	extreme religious culture. Cases of violence in the home have more than doubled within the past five years according to the United Nations.
0:27.0	We hear and see every day kinds of violence that Iraqi society never seen before.
0:37.0	But unlike many other countries, Iraqi law does not specifically criminalize domestic violence.
0:44.0	At the moment, there is no crime if a beating took place to discipline a wife.
0:51.0	That is still the legal right of a husband. And people who try to help
0:56.2	survivors escape are often themselves prosecuted and even threatened.
1:01.6	I was told if I don't stop this work,
1:05.0	I will be killed right away.
1:07.0	All women activists are in danger.
1:10.0	But still, a group of brave women have built a network of secret shelters for victims of domestic violence.
1:18.0	I'm Rebecca Kesby, and some of those involved in this dangerous and illegal work have shared their stories with me.
1:26.0	What do you think would have happened to you had you not been helped by a woman's shelter?
1:32.0	Oh, I don't know.
1:35.0	I'd probably be dead.
1:37.0	Most likely dead.
1:40.0	This is Iraq's secret women's shelters. No, no, from the outside no, no, from the outside no one would be able to tell this as a shelter. It looks like any other normal house.
2:05.4	When we set up a new shelter, we try to find an area where we won't get asked too many questions,
2:10.8	like why there is no man living in this house. This is Jeanette, it's her
2:15.6	code name. She's giving us a virtual tour of one of the secret women's shelters she helps
2:21.2	to organize in a major city in Iraq.
	...

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