Iraqi Death Squads Target Gays

These are the ones you don't hear about on the evening news here in the US.

Reports coming out of Baghdad and channeled through British GLBT groups such as OutRage! are reporting more and more cases of men and women who are suspected of being or even supporting gays are being killed and abducted by religious death squads.

November 9th: 5 men working for the Iraqi LGBT organization were speaking with Brittish colleagues on the phone when they were seized at gunpoint by Iraqi police. They had been relaying information about their attempts to document homophobic violence and attempts to create safe houses for GLBT people there. They have not been heard from since.

Later that week 5 more men were abducted by a militia group of Muqtada al-Sadr. One the owner of a men's clothing store, was financially supporting several gay individuals in hiding. The other four were patrons and employees of a babershop reportedly popular with gay men.

In June police stormed the house of 2 lesbians, killing them both and a young woman living with them.

In May Olympic Tennis player, Wissam Auda's car was ambushed by religious extremists. He had previously received death threats for being gay. He, along with his coach and a teammate, was killed in the street.

Earlier, the Badr militia executed a 14 year old boy in the street because he was suspected for being gay.

Family members of gays and lesbians are also killed if they refuse to disclose the whereabouts of their relatives in hiding.

This may all lead back to a fatwa that was leveled against gays by Cleric Ayatollah Ali Sistani in October of 2005.