NEARLY
two years after the US-led invasion of Iraq, women there were no better off
than under the rule of ousted dictator Saddam Hussein, the human rights group
Amnesty International said today.
In a report entitled Iraq - Decades of Suffering, it said that while the
systematic repression under Saddam had ended, it had been replaced by
increased murders, and sexual abuse - including by US forces.
Washington promised
that the overthrow of Saddam would free the Iraqi people from years of
oppression and set them on the road to democracy. But Amnesty said post-war
insecurity had left women at risk of violence and curtailed their freedoms.
"The
lawlessness and increased killings, abductions and rapes that followed the
overthrow of the government of Saddam Hussein have restricted women's freedom
of movement and their ability to go to school or to work," Amnesty said.
"Women have
been subjected to sexual threats by members of the US-led forces and some
women detained by US forces have been sexually abused, possibly raped."
Amnesty said
several women detained by US troops had spoken in interviews with the group of
beatings, threats of rape, humiliating treatment and long periods of solitary
confinement.
The Pentagon said
it had not seen the report, but took any allegations of detainee abuse
seriously.
"We have
demonstrated our commitment to ensuring that kind of behaviour is identified
and dealt with properly," spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Joe Richard said
in Washington.
"With this
report, we would like the opportunity to review it and to test the validity of
the allegations."
Amnesty said
women's rights activists and political leaders had also been targeted by armed
insurgent groups.
Women continued to
suffer legal discrimination under laws that granted husbands effective
impunity to beat their wives and treated so-called "honour" killers
leniently, the group said.
"Within their
own communities, many women and girls remain at risk of death from male
relatives if they are accused of behaviour held to have brought dishonour on
the family," Amnesty said, noting some attempts by religious zealots to
make the laws even more repressive against women.
But on the positive
side, the report said several women's rights groups had been formed -
including ones that focused on the protection of women from violence.
Amnesty called on
the Iraqi authorities and newly elected members of the National Assembly to
enshrine the rights of women in the new constitution.
That included
treating honour killings as murder, outlawing violence within marriage and
making sure that any punishment was commensurate with the crime committed, it
said.
