UNHCR's ELIGIBILITY GUIDELINES FOR ASSESSING THE ...

11,000 in the Governorate of Qadissiyah. 465 The Dom Research Center provides a figure of
50,000. 466
b) Current Situation
After the fall of the former regime, the Kawliyah lost the protection once afforded to them.
Conservative local communities as well as members of the Mehdi Army, who had long
resented their differing social norms, violently forced the Kawliyah from their settlements.
For example, on 12 March 2004, dozens of armed Mehdi Army members attacked the
village of Kawliyah in the Governorate of Qadissiyah with mortars, rocket-propelled
grenades (RPGs) and even bulldozers. Fighting erupted between militia members and
Kawliyah villagers and, according to a MNF legal advisor, more than 20 locals
died. 467 Furthermore, 18 villagers were detained and tortured by Mehdi Army members, but
later freed by the CPA. 468 Other reports say the village was looted and burned. There was
no investigation by the police, who were possibly even involved in the attack. 469
A village in the district of Abu Ghraib was attacked by local residents, who destroyed
houses with bulldozers and killed those that refused to leave. 470 It is said that Saddam
Hussein settled the Kawliyah in this area in 1979 as an act of revenge against the
religiously conservative Zawabei tribe, which traditionally settles in the district of Abu
465 IRIN, Iraq: Minorities living tormented days under sectarian violence, 4 January 2007,
http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?reportid=62981; ibidem, Iraq: Gypsies call for greater rights, see above
footnote 463.
466 Dom Research Center, Population Chart of Iraq, http://www.domresearchcenter.com/population/
popiraq.html [accessed January 2007].
467 Melinda Liu, Getting Away With Murder?, Newsweek, 27 May 2004, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/
5079129/site/newsweek/.
468 Ibid.
469 Jeffrey White and Ryan Philips, Sadrist revolt provides lessons for counterinsurgency in Iraq, Jane’s
Intelligence Review, August 2004, http://washingtoninstitute.org/html/pdf/white0804.pdf; Anthony Shadid, In
a Gypsy Village’s Fate, An Image of Iraq’s Future, The Washington Post, 3 April 2004,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A46446-2004Apr2. Other incidents were reported as follows:
another village in the Governorate of Qadissiyah, near Diwaniyah, was attacked with mortars on New Year’s
Day 2005, reportedly killing a woman and wounding three others. The primary school and clinic built by the
former regime had been rendered useless and many houses were destroyed in the attack; see Deepa
Babington, Poverty and fear dominate life for Iraq’s Gypsies, Reuters, 6 January 2006,
http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/480fa8736b88bbc3c12564f6004c8ad5/dca16d353d5bbbf7492570ec001c
ef3d?OpenDocument. The village of Al-Fawar in the Governorate of Qadissiyah was reportedly ransacked by
followers of radical Shi’a cleric Muqtada Al-Sadr. According to the police, no one has been held responsible
for this assault; see IWPR, Gypsies Seek Government Protection, see above footnote 463. Najem Wali,
journalist and writer from Al-Amarah, described how the Roma’s belongings and houses in Al-Amarah were
looted in acts of vengeance by the city’s inhabitants; see: Najem Wali, Iraq Stories, 2005,
http://www.wordswithoutborders.org/article.php?lab=IraqStories. In addition, Kawliyah from Hilla in Babel
Governorate disbanded their settlements after Imams loyal to Al-Sadr condemned them; see: Gaiutra
Bahadur, In now-religious Iraq, no tolerance for Gypsies, Philadelphia Inquirer, 6 June 2005,
http://www.uruknet.info/?s1=1&p=12354&s2=07Read.
470 IWPR, Gypsies Seek Government Protection, see above footnote 463.
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