War graves restored as Iraq conflict eases
The damaged graves of nearly 200 Second world war casualties buried in the Iraqi desert have been restored after decades of conflict prevented their upkeep.
Habbaniya War Cemetery, 60 miles west of Baghdad, honours 173 Second World War casualties and 117 who died in conflicts in the late 1940s and 1950s.
Since 1990, war and political instability has made it unsafe for staff at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) to manage the site.
Following an improvement in security, stonemasons at the CWGC’S operations base in Beaurains, France, began producing nearly 300 white Portland stone headstones last December l to be transported to Iraq.
Local contractors started work on the ground in March, and now the stones have been installed and the cemetery restoration is almost complete.
Graves had deteriorated over time due to the high salt content in the ground.
If stonework is not properly maintained it becomes dried out and can crumble.
Habbaniya War Cemetery sits inside what is now an Iraqi air base, making it a more secure location to begin repairs. It is in the area called the “Sunni Triangle” which was among the most dangerous parts of Iraq during the insurgency that followed the 2003 US invasion.
Safety concerns led to the CWGC placing its operations in the country on hold for decades, save for brief periods where repairs were possible.
In its absence from Iraq, the CWGC created two commemorative books that form the Iraq Roll of Honour, which contain more than 54,000 names.
The CWGC is committed to maintaining 23,000 memorial and cemetery sites around the world, helping to commemorate 1.7 million Commonwealth war dead.
Iraq is its fifth largest commitment, where 51,000 casualties from the First World War and 3,000 from the Second World War are commemorated.
CWGC staff maintain sites from the battlefields of France and Flanders, Belgium, to countries such as Egypt and Canada.
The organisation has recently launched its To The Four Corners campaign to highlight its global work.
Visitors to its website will be able to read staff diaries, take virtual tours of cemeteries and read stories from the CWGC archives.
Victoria Wallace, director general of the CWGC, said: “Our teams reach some very remote locations in their care for war graves, and it is an endless task of which we are hugely proud – and that we will never give up.”