‘This will only make me a bigger star’
Iraqi special forces unit brags of torture tactics, operates with impunity and regrets nothing
Will they get away with murder?
As the world absorbed the impact of images bearing witness to torture in the fight against Daesh, the leader of an Iraqi special forces unit with blood on its hands gleefully admitted to the worst, boasting that the disclosure of his “mistakes” will make him only more famous.
The staggering sense of impunity among at least some fighters that Canada and its coalition-partners have singled out for praise in the battle against Daesh (also known as ISIS) emerged early Friday, as Capt. Omar Nazar of the Iraqi Emergency Response Division took proud ownership of the damning evidence exposed in separate investigations by the Toronto Star and ABC News. “We have made mistakes, but they are all directed toward the enemy, ISIS, and I’m proud of those mistakes,” Nazar told ABC’s Nightline in Arabic.
Claiming an ability to tell in 10 minutes or less who is loyal to Daesh and who is not, Nazar said he operated under orders to take no prisoners. When confronted with brutal images gathered over a span of months by Iraqi photographer Ali Arkady— including a video clip of Nazar and a second ERD soldier, Cpl. Haidar Ali, gunning down an unidentified suspect — Nazar explained human rights do not apply to ISIS.
“He is not human,” Nazar said of the slain suspect. “He is a monster.” The execution, he said, “is not considered murder.” Nazar sidestepped a question on whether Iraqi authorities would now follow through on promises to investigate his unit, saying the outcome would only enhance Nazar’s already substantial culthero status in Iraq.
“I’m already a star in Iraq and Ali (photographer Arkady) would only make me a bigger star by doing this. Why? Because my country is longing for someone who would help it get rid of terrorism.”
Nazar’s comments came amid a chorus of worries that, as dawn rises over the first day of the holy month of Ramadan, impunity may prevail, with Iraqi officials ultimately paying only lip service to coalition demands for investigation and then quietly letting the issue fade away, even in the face of unprecedented images.
Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland said Friday that Canadian diplomats in Baghdad and Ottawa took their concerns to senior Iraqi officials seeking assurances that the actions of the ERD unit will be investigated.
“We are gravely concerned by the allegations and horrific imagery published in the press. We strongly condemn any and all actions that violate international human rights and humanitarian law,” Freeland said in a statement to the Star.
“Canada has raised its concerns directly with the government of Iraq, condemning any and all actions that violate international human rights or humanitarian law.”
In a separate statement, Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan said the federal government and the Canadian Armed Forces “strongly condemn any actions that violate the Law of Armed Conflict.
“While Canadian soldiers in Iraq have not had any direct interaction with the ERD, our government has raised this issue with the government of Iraq so that those who commit these types of atrocities are held to account,” Sajjan said.
The defence minister said that in all missions conducted by Canadian troops, including the ongoing mission in Iraq, the Law of Armed Conflict is at the “centre of the training our soldiers receive and the way they conduct operations.”
The images of violence perpetrated not by a rogue militia group but an elite Iraq unit reverberated among allies including Canada. Col. Jay Janzen, a senior spokesperson for the Canadian Armed Forces, said those in the ranks of Canada’s military were “shocked and sickened” by the pictures and video.
“As a professional soldier, when I see those images, it’s a total break- down in unit discipline, in leadership and in their responsibilities as professional soldiers.
“Quite frankly, that should never happen. It’s completely unacceptable,” he said Friday in an interview.
“It needs to be dealt with. We strongly hope that Iraqi officials deal with these incidents appropriately.”
He said the Canadian military was under no illusion when it deployed to Iraq in 2014 to train Kurdish peshmerga fighters in their fight against Daesh.
“We went into this conflict eyes wide open. A lot of study has been done in terms of the history of this conflict, the potential for sectarian violence, the potential for retribution,” he said. New Democrat MP and national defence critic Randall Garrison noted that in recent months, the Canadian military mission in Iraq has shifted from training peshmerga troops to working alongside Iraqi security forces around Mosul.
“We’ve had a shift here that has never been fully explained,” Garrison said, noting that the evolving mission has put Canadian forces in closer contact with Iraqi units.
“I’d like to know, now that this is public, what is the government’s reaction, what are they doing to make sure that we are in no way complicit with these activities,” Garrison (Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke) said in an interview.
“Who we’re training becomes an important question when units like this are clearly involved in activities that would qualify as war crimes.”
In Washington, Sen. Patrick Leahy, author of the 1997 “Leahy Law” that bars the U.S. from providing material support to allies who engage in war crimes, was shocked not merely by Arkady’s images but also the mindset of the alleged perpetrators.
“The photos are sickening. They clearly depict war crimes. That they were brazenly lauded by the unit’s leader suggests that they were far from aberrations,” Leahy said in a written statement to the Star’s Washington bureau chief, Daniel Dale.
The wide sharing of Arkady’s images sparked polarizing responses in Iraq, where some politicians proclaimed them to be false or manipulated in an apparent attempt at damage control.
But the boastful remarks by unit commander Nazar, in claiming ownership of what the images show, blunted the belated attempts to discredit the messenger.
“We strongly condemn any and all actions that violate international human rights.” CHRYSTIA FREELAND FOREIGN AFFAIRS MINISTER