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CNS Research StoryLeading Iraqi Nuclear Scientist, Once Imprisoned, Elected to Prominent Post
By Sammy Salama and Cameron Hunter June 7, 2005
Among the many other notable new Iraqi officials is the recently elected deputy speaker of parliament, Dr. Hussein Shahristani, formerly a prominent Iraqi nuclear chemist who ran with the Shi'i United Iraqi Alliance. Dr. Shahristani had also been a leading candidate for prime minister. Earlier, during the process to select an interim prime minister, he was the first choice of UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, but Dr. Shahristani turned down the position. This article will review the distinguished career of Hussein Shahristani, from his rise to prominence as Iraq's leading nuclear chemist, through his fall from grace due to his refusal to empower Saddam Hussein with a nuclear weapon, and his decade long imprisonment and escape, to his rebirth as one of post-war Iraq's most respected politicians. Shahristani's Early Years Hussein al-Shahristani was born in Karbala, Iraq in 1942. From an early age, he showed great prowess in the sciences, graduating from secondary school with the second-best exit scores in the entire country in 1959. Under the revolutionary regime that then ruled Iraq (from 1958 to 1963), talented youth like Shahristani were encouraged to study abroad upon completion of high school. The young scientist's application for foreign study was approved and he was notified that he could expect to study chemical engineering in his first choice of countries, the United Kingdom. However, a communist member of the Study Abroad Directorate arbitrarily decided to send him instead to Russia, foreshadowing later events in his life when his personal agency and life's work would be undermined by the whim of those who controlled the government of Iraq. Shahristani returned to Iraq a year later on a visit home from his studies in Russia and noticed the decline of communist ideals within his country. He appealed to the director of the Study Abroad Program to have his assignment changed back to Britain, and finished out his undergraduate work in chemical engineering at the Imperial College in London. Due to his performance at the college, Shahristani graduated at the top of his class and earned a scholarship from the United Kingdom for further study. After considering many institutes around the world, he finally settled on the University of Toronto in Canada due to its proximity to a nuclear plant.[1] He earned a Masters degree in nuclear engineering as well as a Ph.D. in nuclear chemistry at Toronto. While studying in Canada, Shahristani met Janet Holtom, a Canadian national working at the Department of Engineering at the University. The two married, and soon after completing his studies in 1970, Dr. and Mrs. Shahristani returned to Iraq. The Nuclear Scientist Over the next decade, Shahristani quietly worked his way up in the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC), where he worked alongside another prominent scientist and friend, Ja'afar Dhiya Ja'afar. From 1979 to 1992, the IAEC was one of the two primary Iraqi organizations that pursued nuclear weaponization; it was headed by Saddam Hussein himself and was headquartered in the al-Tuwaitha Nuclear Research Center, 25 km from Baghdad. The second Iraqi organization that pursued nuclear weaponization was the Ministry of Industry and Military Industrialization (MIMI), which was headed by Hussein Kamel, Hussein's son in law.[2] Before 1979, several of the projects on which Shahristani worked during his employment at the Nuclear Research Center earned him international acclaim. During the early 1970s when crop disease caused mass starvation across the country, the government, then under the control of Ba'ath party (which came into power when General Ahmad Hassan al-Bakr seized control in 1968),[3] distributed mercury-contaminated wheat seeds to farmers meant to kill fungus. This solution to the agricultural crisis failed when farmers used the seeds to make bread and fed them to their animals instead of planting them. Mass starvation was replaced by mass poisoning, crippling those who had consumed the contaminated seeds as well as causing mental illness.[4] At the time, scientists in Iraq had no capabilities or knowledge of how to extract the mercury from the seeds and food. Shahristani was able to develop an efficient and rapid way to extract the mercury using nuclear resources. Early Career as Chief Scientific Advisor In June 1974, Shahristani joined a delegation of scientists from the IAEC on a trip to France to discuss the possibility of purchasing a nuclear reactor that was modeled on the Osiris reactor, designed by the French. The reactor was named Tammuz, but is known internationally as Osirak, and required 93% enriched uranium fuel.[5] The French charged Iraq $300 million for the reactor, twice the original quote, but the Iraqi delegation purchased it anyway.[6] Although it is widely believed that the Iraqis were willing to pay double the original French quote due to the reactor's suitability for plutonium extraction and eventual production of nuclear weapons, which prompted Israel to preemptively bomb the reactor in June 1981, several Iraqi and western experts challenge this belief. Recently, former Iraqi nuclear scientist Imad Khadduri argued that Tammuz simply was not technically suitable for such work: The second contention, based on Israel's own production of plutonium [is]...that Tammuz, the 40 MW reactor, would be used to produce plutonium. The possibility of such an undertaking by Iraq is delusional. The tight refueling schedule for such an endeavor, which is required to prevent "poisonous" plutonium 238 from developing, would be impossible to hide from the French scientists who would have been collaborating with us for years and the IAEA inspectors. Had we even diabolically thought of kicking both out and running the reactor ourselves for such a purpose, the limited fresh fuel that was allowed for us would have aborted any such attempt at the outset. Neither would the unique design of the reactor core for the "Caramel" fuel allow for fuel designs specific for plutonium production.[7] Richard Wilson, then head of the Physics Department at Harvard University, visited the Tuwaitha nuclear site in December 1982 (more than a year after the Israeli bombing) and came to similar conclusions. He wrote "there are a number of reasons why the Tammuz reactor is not very suitable for plutonium production. It is a light-water moderated reactor, and there are no spare neutrons to produce plutonium. The plutonium production rate would be about one third of the rate of the destruction of uranium-235... The reactor is very different from the heavy water moderated reactor of the Chalk River NRX type, or Savannah River type, which can run on natural uranium, and has neutrons to spare to produce plutonium."[8] Regardless, in the 1970's the Iraqis did purchase the French reactor at double the originally quoted price. It may have been that the use of Osirak was intended to enhance the experience of Iraq's nuclear cadre in the operation of reactors, a much needed skill were Iraq to ever have purchased reactors capable of significant plutonium production. However, this may not have been correctly understood by Saddam Hussein, who in 1979 demanded that Dr. Shahristani begin extracting plutonium from Tammuz for the purpose of building a bomb. Throughout his years at the IAEC, Dr. Shahristani headed the plutonium separation program and the Chemical Department, where he proved himself to be a scientist of exceptional value.[9] Up until his arrest in 1979, he held the position of Chief Scientific Advisor in the IAEC, one of the highest scientific posts in the country. He worked together with the heads of all IAEC departments, overseeing many advancements in Iraq's nuclear energy program, until 1979 when Saddam Hussein took over the presidency from General al-Bakr, and began to pay much closer attention to the activities of the IAEC. Toward the end of 1979, Saddam Hussein instructed the Iraqi scientists at the Nuclear Research Center to begin extracting plutonium for the production of a nuclear weapon, a move which Shahrastani opposed. Refusal to Build Nuclear Weapons Shahristani was removed from his position as Chief Scientific Advisor at the IAEC and transferred to an Iraqi prison for eleven years on December 3, 1979. The reason for his arrest was his refusal to halt his work on the peaceful uses of nuclear energy and begin efforts to build a nuclear bomb. In early December 1979, Saddam Hussein entered the compound of the IAEC, sealing the area with guards, machine guns and dogs. The top nuclear scientists were summoned into a room for a meeting with the dictator. His first question inquired as to when the plutonium would be ready for use in a bomb. When met with silence, he repeated the question, and followed the gazes of everyone in the room who looked to the scientist in charge of plutonium extraction. Shahristani protested that building a bomb would be inconceivable and that the materials that Iraq possessed were technically under the conventions of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Hussein told him to concern himself only with the sciences rather than treaties or politics.[10] Shortly after, Dr. Shahristani was arrested. According to Shahristani's account of his arrest, he was sitting quietly in his office at the IAEC when plain-clothed strangers entered the room and engaged him in conversation. After a short period of time, they asked him to accompany them downstairs to a waiting car, where he was handcuffed and blindfolded.[11] The car took him to the headquarters of the Mukhabarat (Iraq's general intelligence agency) where his interrogation began. The Mukhabarat's primary function was to monitor anti-regime activity within Iraq, and was well known for the torture and abuse of its prisoners. Arrest and Interrogation Once arrested, Shahristani was charged with a number of varied offences. He was asked about his involvement in explosions that had resulted from faults in the reactors purchased from France. He was accused of collaborating with Israeli sabotage agents, since he had been involved in the inspection and purchase of the equipment. In later interviews, Shahristani maintained that he did not think his interrogators actually believe their own accusations, but merely assailed him with a litany of allegations as this was the standard practice of the Mukhabarat in interrogations.[12] When these charges were withdrawn, he was advised to testify against his colleague, Ja'afar Dhiya Ja'afar--who would soon become the head of the Iraqi nuclear program and had worked alongside Shahristani for most of their careers at the IAEC--for similar offenses, and was encouraged to corroborate such charges. Shahristani refused to implicate Ja'afar, and his interrogators moved on to question him about his religious affiliations to the Islamic Dawa Party, which was hostile to Saddam Hussein's Ba'athist party.[13] He was reported to have been heard condemning the mass arrests and imprisonments of Shi'a across Iraq, and a man was brought in who accused him of aiding the Dawa party. The man bringing the false accusations went as far as to declare that Shahristani had smuggled Dawa party political instructions into Iraq by hiding them in toothpaste tubes when returning from business trips in Europe.[14] The Dawa party that Shahristani was accused of aiding during his interrogation was founded by Mohammed Baqir al-Sadr in 1957. Literally, Dawa means "call to Islam." It was the first Shi'i political group in Iraq and remains predominant today, as evident in the recent election of Dawa leader Ibrahim al-Ja'afari to the post of Iraqi Prime Minister.[15] During Saddam Hussein's regime the group was severely oppressed by the secular Ba'athists. As one of the largest opposition factions, Dawa earned respect within Iraq for its reputation of boldness in the face of Hussein's regime and the many deaths and injuries incurred by its members.[16] Despite Hussein's best efforts to the contrary, the Dawa party enjoyed broad underground support and was revered by Iraq's Shi'i population throughout the Hussein era. In order to make Shahristani fully understand how serious Hussein was about getting his scientists to build a bomb, the Mukhabarat tortured the scientist for 22 days. Shahristani interrogation would later be referred to by international aid organizations as evidence of the severe human rights abuses inflicted upon the Iraqi people by Saddam Hussein. It also spurred Shahristani himself to establish an aid organization that would assist in the escape of persecuted Iraqis to Iran. He endured the humiliation of being stripped naked during the entire ordeal, and hung by his wrists from a rope attached to the ceiling. The Mukhabarat beat him continuously and attached electric probes to his body. Yet through all this, Shahristani maintained that he was 'lucky.' In his own words, he describes how much worse his fate could have been: However, I was more fortunate than many of my fellow political prisoners in the country. I did not have holes drilled into my bones, as happened in the next torture room. I did not have my limbs cut off by an electric saw. I did not have my eyes gauged [sic] out. My three children were brought in to the torture chamber but they were not tortured to death in front of me to force me to make confessions to things I had not done. Women of my family were not brought in and raped in front of me, as happened to many of my colleagues. Torturers did not dissolve my hands in acid. I was not among the hundreds of political prisoners who were taken from prison as guinea-pigs to be used for chemical and biological tests.[17] Throughout his torture, Shahristani was repeatedly asked about his involvement with Israeli spies, equipment sabotage, Ja'afar's activities, and religious activist groups. At the end of the 22 days, the only thing that the agency could get him to confess to was his possession of a Dawa party pamphlet printed in England that criticized the persecution of Shi'i Muslims by Saddam Hussein's regime. Dr. Ja'afar Dhiya Ja'afar Thanks to Shahristani's friends and
colleagues, both within Iraq and internationally, his arrest was not quietly
accepted. Dr. Ja'afar Dhiya Ja'afar was among the first to come to
his defense, though his intercessions remained fruitless despite his reputation
and stature. Ja'afar was a longtime friend of Shahristani. He too grew
up in aristocratic Iraqi family and received a Ph.D. abroad: a doctorate in
physics from the University of Birmingham in England during the mid-1960s.
Mid-career at IAEC, he left Iraq to spend three years in Switzerland working at
the highly acclaimed CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research), the
world's largest particle physics
laboratory.[18] In April of 1974 he was
enticed into returning to Iraq, where he worked alongside Shahristani and served
as Vice Chairman of the IAEC.
Shahristani's Prison Years Shahristani went on trial in February 1980. Shahristani appeared before a judge and two other slumbering officials,[20] and was sentenced an hour later to 20 years in prison for suspected Iranian ties and possession of the subversive Dawa party pamphlet, an anti-Ba'ath act. He was sent to Abu Ghraib. Shahristani was given one last chance to recant his former protestations against working on nuclear weaponry. Three months after his imprisonment at Abu Ghraib began, he was transferred to a Baghdad prison called al-Hakimiyya, and then brought before a meeting of high ranking officials in a private house. One of these officials the head of the IAEC at the time, Abderrazzaq al-Hashemi; the other official was Barazan al-Tikriti, Saddam Hussein's half brother and the head of the Mukhabarat. The officials implored him to return to the IAEC, saying that the program was in need of his expertise. At one point in the discussion, Barazan threatened Shahristani, saying that "The person who refuses to serve his motherland does not deserve to live." Shahristani answered, "I agree with you a person should serve his motherland, but what you are asking me is not a service to the motherland..."[21] The private home in which he was questioned would become his prison for the next few years as events took the governments' attention away from Shahristani. In June 1981 the scientist was informed of the destruction of the Osirak nuclear reactor by Israeli jets, and given hope that he would be released to assess damage. He remained in the house, however, until late 1982 when he was returned to Abu Ghraib. He was put in solitary confinement for the next seven years. During his December 1982 visit to Tuwaitha, Harvard's Dr. Wilson was informed by an IAEC vice chairman that Shahristani was serving a six year sentence for sedition and for visiting Dawa party head Ayatollah Muhammad Baqir al Sadr. At the time, erroneous reports to Amnesty International indicated that Shahristani had been executed.[22] Shahristani maintains that he was lucky to be in solitary confinement, if for nothing more than the fact that he did not have to bear witness to the atrocities that were inflicted upon the other prisoners. He spent seven years in a single solitary cell, with a toilet, and guards that brought his food twice a day. While the guards were instructed not to utter a word in his presence, he eventually became friendly enough with them that he was able to acquire a copy of the Koran and pencil and paper. He spent his days praying and even tried to author a chemistry text book to be used at the junior college level. He wrote notes for a nuclear chemistry book, and journals on nuclear sciences implemented in industry, environment, and agriculture. He smuggled the notes out to his family during their short monthly visits; eventually they numbered close to 1,000 pages. He later said that he suspects the notes were destroyed after his 1991 escape from prison, when Iraqi security personnel searched and destroyed his home and belongings.[23] Despite undergoing torture and spending years in prison, Shahristani was left relatively untouched and without visual scars. He likely escaped some of the more appalling forms of torture imparted upon his fellow prisoners due to his value to Hussein. His knowledge and expertise was vital to the IAEC's nuclear program, a fact corroborated by Ja'afar. His marriage to a Canadian woman also served to protect his family; many reports exist of the torture of Iraqis, but offences against Canadian citizens in Iraq would be more likely to bring unwanted international attention. By 1990, he was released from solitary confinement and allowed to live amongst other political prisoners in the prison. He searched for other Shi'i prisoners that had been incarcerated around the same time as he, but found almost none remained. In the years he spent in solitary confinement, large numbers of Shi'i prisoners had been taken away and never heard from again. Escape from Prison Not long after his emergence from solitary confinement, Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, sparking the Gulf War of 1991. In the months leading up to the war, Hussein's security agencies were engaged in many extra duties besides their activities in the political prisoner's wing of Abu Ghraib. When the bombings signifying the start of the war began in Baghdad, the city was in disarray and a few prisoners seized the opportunity to escape. Assisted by a guard who had expressed admiration for Shahristani's refusal to bow to Saddam Hussein's will, the scientist donned the clothes of a member of the Mukhabarat, and stole one of their official vehicles.[24] By Iraqi law, not even security personnel could search a Mukhabarat car, and he was able to drive through the multiple gates and security check-points of Abu Ghraib with no interference. The only thing he took with him from the prison was a list of 1,350 inmates still inside the wing he resided in for so many years; he hoped to use the list to contact prisoners' families and bring them news of their loved ones.[25] The 1991 Uprising After his initial escape, Shahristani collected his family and fled first to Kirkuk, then to Sulimaniya in the Kurdistan region of Iraq. He stayed hidden in anticipation of a Shi'i and Kurdish uprising. After the United States had successfully ended Saddam Hussein's occupation of Kuwait, President George Bush encouraged the Iraqi Shi'a and Kurds to rise up and overthrow Hussein's regime. The Iraqi Kurds seized control of cities in the north, while the Iraqi Shi'a gained control of regions in the south. Shahristani participated in the uprising from his hiding spot in Sulimaniya. Soon 14 of Iraq's 18 provinces had been taken over by the uprising. Unfortunately, President Bush failed to back the uprising after it began. The coalition allowed Baghdad to use armed helicopters to subdue the rebels. Because of this turn of events, the uprising was swiftly quelled, and tens of thousands of Shi'a were executed by Hussein's forces for their participation in the uprising.[26] This event continues to be a dominant factor in the collective memory of Iraqi Shi'a, and has resulted in their distrust of U.S. forces and U.S. intentions in Iraq, even after more than a decade of time has passed.[27] After the failed uprising, Kurds and Shi'a alike fled to the Iranian border to escape Saddam Hussein's revenge. Amid this flow of refugees, Shahristani finally was able to escape Iraq. Before leaving the country, Shahristani expressed what it felt like during the uprising when it seemed that Hussein might actually have been ousted by his own people: Before I crossed the border, during the height of the uprising when I heard that 14 provinces were liberated I was overwhelmed with joy. I was thanking God almighty for leaving prison and for seeing Iraq free, it was a great joy. It is true that the person celebrates his personal freedom, but when he sees his people liberated as a whole, then his personal happiness pales in comparison. Unfortunately that happiness did not last long, the United States quickly permitted the regime to purge the uprising.[28] Shahristani's happiness for his people did not fully come to fruition in 1991, but he did successfully escape Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq and lived to see the day that Hussein was ousted. The Humanitarian Once in Iran, Shahristani attempted to support the uprising from within Iraq once more, reentering through the southern city of Basra, but quickly realized that these efforts were in vain and returned to Iran. However, he did not stop in his struggle against Hussein's regime; Dr. Shahristani established the Iraqi Refugee Aid Council (IRAC) in Iran to aid Iraqi refugees in their flight from Ba'athist Iraq. IRAC has since moved its base to the United Kingdom, and has expanded to service not only Iraqi refugees, but also Iranian and Afghan refugees as well. Shahristani and his wife shuttled between Tehran and the United Kingdom working for aid organizations and as a visiting professor. The scientist himself returned to Iraq in April 2003, two days before Saddam Hussein's regime fell. He went to back to Karbala, his birthplace 50 miles south of Baghdad, bearing supplies ranging from shoes to farm equipment to diary products.[29] He stayed to establish a branch of his aid organization, to aid returning Iraqi refugees and the local Iraqi population. Since the invasion of the coalition forces, Shahristani has been able to distribute humanitarian aid on a much wider scale across the entire country of Iraq. I devoted my time to helping fellow refugees. I chair the Iraqi Refugee Aid Council, which helps refugees who had to flee the country because of Saddam¼ Since then we have moved to the central and southern parts of the country, discussing with the poorest communities their most urgent needs. We have carried out scores of projects helping local clinics obtain medicines, fixing the schools, repairing water pipelines, putting in street lighting and so on. We are also supporting families that are headed by women, and rehabilitating former political prisoners who have been deprived of any education, training or job opportunities. We are looking at the most vulnerable groups in the society and trying to create opportunities for them.[30] Pre-War Assessments of Iraqi WMD During his time working for aid foundations, Shahristani gave multiple interviews in which he discussed the controversial issue of whether or not Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. While he was not in the best position to gather intelligence on the issue from his cell in Abu Ghraib, his previous work with the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission gave him insight into the capabilities of Hussein's regime. He stated that Iraq did not possess the capability to make nuclear weapons, as it lacked 93% enriched uranium, and could not produce this material on its own. He knew that all the equipment the country had for the purpose of enriching uranium had been destroyed by inspections teams, and his colleagues at the IAEC had been unable to procure any more after the 1991 Gulf War.[31] In spite of this accurate assessment of Iraqi nuclear capabilities, he was erroneous in his assessments of Hussein's chemical and biological weapons holdings, as well as missile capabilities. Shahristani accused Hussein of still possessing chemical and biological weapons in an interview with CBS's "60 Minutes" in February of 2003, an assertion found to be false in the wake of the US-led invasion. The scientist claimed to have knowledge of a hidden labyrinth of tunnels beneath Baghdad originally meant for the purpose of building a subway system. The existence of the tunnels had been confirmed by UN inspectors, but no source had first-hand knowledge of their whereabouts or what was inside them. Shahristani maintains that plans by international firms, including one based in Pasadena, California,[32] had been presented to Saddam, who in turn used them to build an underground network for hiding weapons and escaping Baghdad himself in case the need arose, rather than the intended subway system. The Iraqi President saw the tunnels as a perfect opportunity to clandestinely produce weapons of mass destruction and move them about without detection. Shahristani noted specifics, saying he had knowledge of Sarin, possibly anthrax, and the nerve agent VX.[33] He said also that he thought Saddam would use the tunnels for his own protection in the event of a nuclear war. Finally, unlike other Iraqi defectors who made rosy predictions of Iraq following the overthrow of Saddam's regime, Shahristani imparted a more realistic and sober assessment, predicting many of the difficulties currently encountered by the coalition and the Iraqi Shi'a suspicion of U.S. intentions. Leading Nominee for Interim Prime Minister An Iraqi nuclear scientist renowned for his scientific advancements and humanitarian commitment, as well as a history of perseverance in the face of political persecution, Shahristani proved to be an attractive candidate for the coalition and U.N. envoy to support for prime minister of the interim government of Iraq. He was a leading candidate due to many factors. Shahristani is a Shi'i, like 64% of Iraq's population, a group particularly oppressed by the Ba'athist regime. In addition, Shahristani is an advisor to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq's most influential religious cleric, with whom he has conferred several times since the fall of Saddam. Shahristani's years building an international reputation as a nuclear scientist and researcher, as well as his work with refugees and aid organizations after his escape from prison, also laid a strong foundation for a political career. During the nomination process for interim prime minister in May 2004, a senior U.S. State Department official stated, "The game has not played out yet, but Shahristani is the candidate to beat."[34] Rejection of Nomination Yet Shahristani rebuffed the efforts by U.N. envoy Lakdar al-Brahimi--who had been leading the discussions concerning the formation of the new government--to name him head of the Iraqi interim government, a position eventually given to Iyad Allawi. While Shahristani did not openly refuse the position, he expressed his reluctance to be appointed, saying that he would rather serve his country in other ways. "I've always been actively working to help the Iraqi people to free themselves from Saddam's tyranny, but I have always concentrated on serving the people and providing them with their basic needs rather than party politics."[35] Part of his refusal may have been due to his desire to not be seen by the Iraqi 'street' as an appointed coalition puppet, taking a position that might erode his credibility in the long term. Despite his withdrawal from consideration for interim prime minister, Shahristani remained in the political foreground, supporting controversial positions such as the continued presence of U.S. troops and a swift election, while also criticizing the United States for the way it has handled Iraqi justice and politics. He has been a high profile leader in the United Iraqi Alliance party, and has suffered from some of the same accusations that were thrust upon him by Saddam Hussein, namely of being an Iranian stooge bent on sculpting the new Iraqi government into a replica of the Shi'a-dominated Iran. While he supported the removal of Hussein, prior to the recent Iraqi elections in January, Shahristani worried about the vacuum of power that could ensue, and voiced such apprehensions in interviews early in the war. Like Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and other leading Iraqi Shi'a figures, Dr. Shahristani advocated a free Iraqi election by January 2005, and rejected a delay of the Iraqi election. He feared too much perceived influence from U.S. forces and the postponement of free elections. Prior to the January's election in 2005, he warned, "if that process doesn't happen, God only knows what will be the consequence of such a move."[36] Originally, the Coalition Provisional Authority's plan did not feature free and full elections in Iraq, rather endorsing a somewhat complicated scenario comprised of selected local caucuses that were to convene in each of Iraq's 18 regional governorates.[37] Each governorate was to elect delegates from their caucus to become part of the Iraqi Transitional National Assembly. By June 30, 2004, this National Assembly was to elect Iraq's leaders from its ranks, who would then assume full sovereignty of the country.[38] At the time, the United States believed that the security situation was too volatile to hold free and fair elections - a position with which UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan agreed.[39] Despite political upheavals and the calls of many to postpone the elections due to Sunni dissent and lack of security, Shahristani worked with coalition officials to bring the election about in a timely manner. He had waited for such an election through years of exile and solitary confinement in one of the most notorious prisons in the world, and was intent on seeing Iraq's new democracy succeed. "If the nation was deprived of this right, I am afraid that many of the Iraqis who remained patient and waited to see a national government will be frustrated and... will resort to other means which we don't want to see."[40] Shahristani was not alone in this sentiment. His party, the United Iraqi Alliance, emerged as the biggest winner with 49% of the vote on January 30, 2005. Election to Deputy Speaker of Parliament Described by fellow scientists as "wise in politics as well as science,"[41] Shahristani proved to be more willing to take a place in the elected government than he was in the interim government of 2004. Still enjoying the support of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the nuclear scientist remained a viable candidate for prime minister. However, true to form, Shahristani again balked at the prospect of such a high-profile position, and withdrew in support of fellow United Iraqi Alliance nominee and frontrunner Ibrahim al-Ja'afari of the Islamic Dawa party. Satisfied with the legality of the January election, Shahristani accepted his nomination to deputy speaker of the parliamentary assembly. On Sunday, April 3, 2005, nine weeks after Iraq's first free elections in decades, the elected members of parliament elected a speaker and his deputies. Although only 241 of 275 members of parliament voted, the election was considered a success. A Sunni, Hajem al-Hassani, became speaker with 215 votes, while Shahristani received 157 votes and a Kurd, Aref Tayfur, received 96, making each a deputy speaker.[42] The election took place only a few hours after an explosion outside of the Iraqi Foreign Ministry and an attack earlier in the day on Abu Ghraib by insurgents. Members of the Iraqi parliament were nevertheless extremely positive about the outcome of the speaker and deputy election, noting that this agreement boded well for the prospects of overcoming sectarian discord. Conclusion Contrary to various rosy predictions suggesting that Operation Iraqi Freedom would be a "cakewalk" and that U.S. forces would be greeted with flowers, it has become quite clear that the current war in Iraq has had various dire and negative consequences. The operation has caused the death of thousands of Americans and Iraqis. More than 1,680 U.S. soldiers have been killed since the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom.[43] Estimates of Iraqi deaths exceed tens of thousands civilians killed in the war and the insurgency that followed.[44] Even more worrying, as various leaders such as Egyptian President Husni Mubarak warned prior to its commencement,[45] the U.S. occupation of Iraq has become a recruiting tool for Islamist extremists such as al-Qa'ida, and is increasing the international terror threat. As recently stated by CIA director Porter Goss, "The Iraq conflict, while not a cause of extremism, has become a cause for extremists ... Those jihadists who survive will leave Iraq experienced in and focused on acts of urban terrorism. They represent a potential pool of contacts to build transnational terrorist cells, groups and networks in Saudi Arabia, Jordan and other countries."[46] Since the onset of the invasion of Iraq, various reports have indicated that al-Qa'ida recruitment has actually increased. The Iraqi insurgency includes members of the former regime security agencies, foreign Islamist fighters who infiltrated Iraq to engage U.S. soldiers, local Iraqi Islamist insurgents, and new Iraqi recruits to all these groups. Some of these Islamist insurgent groups have indeed sworn allegiance to al-Qa'ida. As a whole, the insurgency remains largely undiminished and currently averages 50-60 attacks per day, targeting coalition troops, Iraqi troops, civilians, government facilities and Shi'a holy sites.[47] In spite of intense coalition efforts aimed at curbing this insurgency, it remains exceedingly deadly and destabilizing, threatening to throw Iraq into a bloody civil war and undermine any political gain made by the formation of the new elected government. Current estimates place the number of insurgents above 40,000 active fighters and several tens of thousands of supporters.[48] To curb this intense insurgency, U.S. and new Iraqi forces have launched major offensives in Baghdad, Tal Afar and other Iraqi locations.[49] Meanwhile, it is estimated that the war in Iraq will cost the United States more than $200 billion, far exceeding early predictions by war advocates, who suggested that exports of Iraqi oil could finance much of the endeavor. For the moment, relentless attacks and acts of sabotage by the Iraqi insurgency on oil facilities and pipelines have for the most part prevented secure and consistent Iraqi oil exports. Nevertheless, many positive changes can be identified in today's Iraq. Following three decades of rule by a tyrannical regime, three major wars and the death of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, Iraq may be on its way to a better future. For the first time in centuries, Iraq's Shi'a majority finally seized control of the government through open and fair elections. Iraq's large Kurdish minority, which suffered greatly under Saddam's "Anfal" ethnic cleansing campaign, has finally been integrated into the political process. Jalal Talibani, one of the top Iraqi Kurdish leaders, was just elected president of the new Iraq, an important symbolic position. Furthermore, much of Iraq's debt has been forgiven by the creditor nations since the fall of the Hussein regime, and the once crippling international sanctions imposed by the United Nations have also been removed. Tens of thousands of prisoners that once suffered in Iraq's notorious prisons, often guilty of no more than political deviation or minor criticism of the regime, have been released and returned to their families. If the new Iraq is able to
overcome its current challenges, which are considerable, and make the transition
into a stable, secure, inclusive and pluralistic state, it should be able to
realize its substantial potential. Unlike most other nations in the region,
under superior management Iraq could make significant leaps in development due
to its rich natural resources, advanced scientific base, bountiful water supply,
and the absence of crippling overpopulation. While much of the news from Iraq is
still rather troubling, many positive developments and remarkable changes have
also come to pass. Among the many success stories, the story of Dr. Hussein
Shahristani is truly noteworthy. A leading Iraqi nuclear scientist, he fell from
grace due to his refusal to empower a tyrant with a nuclear bomb, was imprisoned
for more than a decade, escaped Iraq's notorious prisons and torture
chambers, and established a humanitarian aid organization working to help less
fortunate refugees. A reluctant politician who refused the post of interim
prime minister, he has now been elected to a high position in the new Iraqi
government.
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