Margaret Hassan: They Killed Her !!
MARGARET HASSAN, Director, CARE Iraq
From The Telegraph, article by Kim Sengupta and Nigel Morris
The news that a tape showing the murder was probably genuine came as a shattering blow to husband Tahseen Hassan.
His hope that Margaret Hassan was alive and may be freed had been growing recently.
The video of Mrs Hassan's murder was handed to al-Jazeera last Thursday, but the station decided not to broadcast the film. Instead it contacted British diplomats, who sent a specialist team to the network's headquarters in Qatar. Only when the diplomats were certain of the tape's authenticity did they tell her husband. He was told about the probable authenticity of the video by the British embassy in Baghdad but has not seen it himself.
Mr Hassan said last night:
"All I know is what I have been told, that there is a video of Margaret which shows her death, her murder. Of course I have been hoping that she was alive, that she will come back home one day. I am hoping to hear some more news, at least where her body is, so that I can give her a proper burial. I feel shattered now, I just do not know what to think any more."
Mr Hassan has been pursuing his own efforts to free his wife through private channels, and he had come to believe that she was being held in the Abu Ghraib area, south-west of Baghdad. Intermediaries had also told him that they were negotiating her freedom.
Foreign Office experts analysed the tape purporting to show Mrs Hassan's murder.
Foreign Office experts analysed the tape purporting to show Mrs Hassan's murder.
Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, said Mrs Hassan had "probably been murdered, although we cannot conclude this with complete certainty."
"I want to express my deepest sympathy and condolences to Margaret's family. They have been through a month of the most terrible uncertainty and torment. To kidnap and kill anyone is inexcusable. But it is repugnant to commit such a crime against a woman who has spent most of her life working for the good of the people of Iraq."Tony Blair expressed his "abhorrence at the cruel treatment of someone who devoted so many years of their life to helping the people of Iraq."
US Marines found the mutilated body of a "Western woman" in Fallujah. But the victim was wearing a blue dress and had blonde hair, descriptions which do not tally with Mrs Hassan. Both Mr Hassan and diplomatic sources confirmed her abductors had not made any further demands after two videos in which she pleaded with the Prime Minister not to send British troops north from Basra in support of the Americans, and to free women prisoners.
The kidnappers threatened to hand her to the group led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian militant leader responsible for the beheadings of a number of Western hostages. But a message believed to be from his group called for Mrs Hassan's release and promised to free her if she fell into their hands.
Bertie Ahern, the Taoiseach, said that the Irish government's thoughts and prayers were with the family of Mrs Hassan, who was born in Dublin.
Unassuming yet determined, she hated war and dedicated her life to Iraqis
ARTICLE by Justin Huggler:
17 November 2004
When Margaret Hassan was kidnapped last month her car was waved down by two men in Iraqi police uniforms. Gunmen surrounded the car and dragged Mrs Hassan's driver and unarmed guard from their seats. They started to beat the two men with their guns. Stop beating them, Mrs Hassan told them. I will come with you.
She lived in Iraq through the eight years of war with Iran. Through the bombing of Baghdad in the1991Gulf War. Through the 13 years of sanctions that wrecked the country's economy and brought it to its knees. Through the US-led invasion last year and the chaos and lawlessness that followed.
She never fled to the West, as her Irish and British passports would easily have allowed her to do. She stayed in her adopted land to work for the sick, the weak, the destitute and suffering. She campaigned for them. She built hospitals. She brought medicine and clean water.
And when they heard that she had been kidnapped, they came on to the streets of Baghdad in their wheelchairs to demand her release. Children from a school for the deaf came out holding placards demanding the release of "Mama Margaret".
"If it wasn't for her, we would probably have died," Ahmed Jubair, a small boy in a wheelchair, said that day. "She built us a hospital and took care of us. She made us feel happy again." There can be few greater epitaphs.
She was born Margaret Fitzsimons in Dublin. She was very private about her personal life and details remain sketchy and unconfirmed. She was around 60 years old, and had four brothers and sisters. One sister lives in Co Kerry. Another sister lives in London. Her father is believed to have died a few months ago.
"Our hearts are broken," said a statement from the family last night. "We have kept hoping for as long as we could, but we now have to accept that Margaret has probably gone and, at last, her suffering has ended."
When she was still a child, the family moved to London. That is why she had both British and Irish passports as well as her Iraqi citizenship, and why there was so much confusion over her nationality. It may have given Fleet Street a better story to call her British, but it probably did her little good while being held by the kidnappers. Her colleagues said she considered herself Iraqi, and there can be no stronger evidence than the fact she stayed in the country through so much hardship.
She moved there in 1972. She had met an Iraqi man, Tahseen Ali Hassan, while he was studying in Britain. Again the details are not clear, but according to one report they married when she was 17 and he was 26. At any rate, they went to live in Iraq where Ms Hassan at first worked for the British Council, teaching English.
In 1972, Saddam Hussein had not yet seized power, and the tragic future that was in store for Iraq had not yet begun to reveal itself. According to her friends, Mrs Hassan fell in love with the country and its people. She learnt Arabic. She converted to Islam and took Iraqi citizenship. The men who killed her did not kill a foreign infidel. They killed an Iraqi Muslim.
Mrs Hassan rose to become assistant director of studies for the British Council, and then director of the Baghdad office - a senior appointment. But after Saddam invaded Kuwait in 1990 and the build-up to the 1991 Gulf War began, the office closed.
Mrs Hassan was out of a job, and facing the worst aerial assault the Middle East had ever seen. She survived the 1991 war and emerged from it to become a director of the humanitarian organisation Care International. It was the beginning of the apotheosis of Margaret Hassan.
Care International is the biggest humanitarian organisation in the world. In Iraq, it specialises in health, nutrition, water supplies and sanitation. She began to tackle the aftermath of the devastating 42-day bombing campaign, and the consequences of the draconian sanctions imposed on Iraq. Margaret Hassan was born for that hour.
She and her husband never had children, but she took the children of Iraq to her heart. She began to work tirelessly for the children who suffered the consequences of the 1991 war, the destruction of water facilities and the American use of depleted uranium shells, and from the sanctions that crippled Iraq's medical services and economy.
The quietly spoken English teacher had become a modern heroine. She became one of the most unrelenting campaigners against the sanctions. She did not oppose them because of some political theory spun in the comfort of London or Washington. She opposed them because she lived with their consequences and walked among the child victims of the sanctions she called Iraq's "lost generation".
In the build-up to the US-led invasion last year, she travelled to New York and London to campaign against a new war that would heap more agony on Iraq. She told the UN security council. "The Iraqi people are already living through a terrible emergency," she said at a House of Commons briefing. "They do not have the resources to withstand an additional crisis brought about by military action."
Margaret Hassan's friend, Felicity Arbuthnot, called her "Iraq's quiet, unassuming, determined best friend".
Now men who claim to be fighting for Iraq have killed her. There are many Iraqi children, the crippled and the sick, who may never forgive those men.
THE 29 DAYS OF UNCERTAINTY
19 October:
Margaret Hassan was seized by gunmen in western Baghdad at 7.30am. Hours later, video footage of her was shown on al-Jazeera TV. An unnamed "armed Iraqi group" claimed responsibility. The Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, said diplomats in Baghdad were in touch with Care International.
20 October:
Her husbandmade an emotional appeal to the kidnappers. Tony Blair and the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, stressed that every effort was being made to free her. The Iraqis condemn the act as despicable.
22 October:
Al-Jazeera aired a harrowing video of her weeping and she pleaded with the British people to save her life, saying she did not want to die like Ken Bigley.
23 October:
Care International's head, Denis Caillaux, made a plea on al-Jazeera.
25 October:
Baghdad rally with protesters carrying pictures of her and banners with "Mama Margaret" on them.
27 October:
A new video on al-Jazeera with her pleading for Britain to withdraw troops and for Care International to stop operations in Iraq.
28 October:
Care International complied.
2 November:
Al-Jazeera declined to broadcast a video of her kidnappers threatening to give her to al-Zarqawi if demands were not met in 48 hours.
4 November:
The 42-hour deadline ran out but no news heard.
14 November:
US forces found the mutilated body of a Western woman with "blonde hair" in Fallujah.
15 November:
Care International said it could not rule out the possibility that the body was that of Mrs Hassan.
16 November:
Video released, apparently showing her murder
PROFILE: MARGARET HASSAN
by
Sally Pook
17 November 2005
Margaret Hassan spent more than 30 years of her life devoted to aid work among the disadvantaged in her adoptive homeland of Iraq.
Born in Dublin and brought up in England, she moved to Iraq after marrying Tahseen Ali Hassan, an engineer, whom she met at unversity.
Once in Baghdad, she began working for the British Council, teaching English to Iraqis. She soon developed a passion for the country, converted to Islam and took Iraqi citizenship.
After Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait in 1990 the council closed its offices and Mrs Hassan joined Care International, the world's largest aid organisation. The charity runs nutrition, health and water programmes in Iraq.
Known locally as "modern-day Mother Teresa", Mrs Hassan was described by friends as an extraordinary woman. She became a tireless advocate on behalf of the Iraqi people, particularly children.
"She is one of those slender people with a spine of steel," said Felicity Arbuthnot, a film-maker who travelled to Iraq to document her work. "She stayed there through the 1991 war, the bombings last year, all the horrors of the embargo. She was so loved and everybody was so open with her."
Mrs Hassan was a vehement opponent of the sanctions imposed against Iraq. Before the war last year, she warned both the United Nations Security Council and MPs in London that a fresh conflict would provoke a humanitarian catastrophe.
"The Iraqi people are already living through a terrible emergency," she told a House of Commons briefing. "They do not have the resources to withstand an additional crisis brought about by military action."
Mrs Hassan remained in Iraq during the war and continued to work for Care International, believing her Iraqi citizenship would afford her protection.
At the time of her kidnapping, she had run the Iraqi operation of the charity for more than 13 years.
Mrs Arbuthnot described travelling with Mrs Hassan to a water sanitation plant in a poor area and seeing her affect on the local people.
"A crowd gathered and tiny children rushed up and threw their arms round her knees, saying, 'Madam Margaret, Madam Margaret'. Everywhere she went, people just beamed."
Niall Andrews, the Irish former MEP who visited Iraq several times, said of Mrs Hassan: "She struck me as a very powerful woman, a very strong person and a good person. I would describe her as a secular Mother Teresa. She is an extraordinary woman."
Mrs Arbuthnot said shortly after her friend disappeared: "If anybody can cope with this situation is it Margaret Hassan.
"She knows the region, speaks impeccable Arabic and is used to difficult and dangerous situations. She will find out where these people are from – Jordan or Syria for instance – and will be immediately using that to psyche them out.
"She can do that with people. I have seen her in difficult situations where people obstruct you and she can wheedle the impossible out of anybody. She can get them eating out of her hands."
Sally Pook
17 November 2005
Tireless worker known as Iraq's Mother Teresa
Margaret Hassan spent more than 30 years of her life devoted to aid work among the disadvantaged in her adoptive homeland of Iraq.
Born in Dublin and brought up in England, she moved to Iraq after marrying Tahseen Ali Hassan, an engineer, whom she met at unversity.
Once in Baghdad, she began working for the British Council, teaching English to Iraqis. She soon developed a passion for the country, converted to Islam and took Iraqi citizenship.
After Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait in 1990 the council closed its offices and Mrs Hassan joined Care International, the world's largest aid organisation. The charity runs nutrition, health and water programmes in Iraq.
Known locally as "modern-day Mother Teresa", Mrs Hassan was described by friends as an extraordinary woman. She became a tireless advocate on behalf of the Iraqi people, particularly children.
"She is one of those slender people with a spine of steel," said Felicity Arbuthnot, a film-maker who travelled to Iraq to document her work. "She stayed there through the 1991 war, the bombings last year, all the horrors of the embargo. She was so loved and everybody was so open with her."
Mrs Hassan was a vehement opponent of the sanctions imposed against Iraq. Before the war last year, she warned both the United Nations Security Council and MPs in London that a fresh conflict would provoke a humanitarian catastrophe.
"The Iraqi people are already living through a terrible emergency," she told a House of Commons briefing. "They do not have the resources to withstand an additional crisis brought about by military action."
Mrs Hassan remained in Iraq during the war and continued to work for Care International, believing her Iraqi citizenship would afford her protection.
At the time of her kidnapping, she had run the Iraqi operation of the charity for more than 13 years.
Mrs Arbuthnot described travelling with Mrs Hassan to a water sanitation plant in a poor area and seeing her affect on the local people.
"A crowd gathered and tiny children rushed up and threw their arms round her knees, saying, 'Madam Margaret, Madam Margaret'. Everywhere she went, people just beamed."
Niall Andrews, the Irish former MEP who visited Iraq several times, said of Mrs Hassan: "She struck me as a very powerful woman, a very strong person and a good person. I would describe her as a secular Mother Teresa. She is an extraordinary woman."
Mrs Arbuthnot said shortly after her friend disappeared: "If anybody can cope with this situation is it Margaret Hassan.
"She knows the region, speaks impeccable Arabic and is used to difficult and dangerous situations. She will find out where these people are from – Jordan or Syria for instance – and will be immediately using that to psyche them out.
"She can do that with people. I have seen her in difficult situations where people obstruct you and she can wheedle the impossible out of anybody. She can get them eating out of her hands."
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