Is there any chance for us to get any rights for what we did for the British Forces in Iraq?

The following is in her own words, the story of "Cherie", a female translator who has now fled Iraq.

To / Whom It May Concern

Subject / The British Parliament’s Decision to Protect The Iraqi Interpreters

Dear Sir / Madam;

There was a newspaper item in International Herald Tribune, issued on June 22st, 2007, starting the following: “Denmark Mulls Fate of Iraqi Helpers After Troops Withdraw":

“As Denmark prepares to withdraw its troops from Southern Iraq,
the government is being pressed to provide shelter for the Iraqi
interpreters and others who have assisted Danish troops in Basrah”

On August 9th, 2007, another item in Press Esc, issued on its website under the title: “UK Opposition Urges Asylum for Iraqi Interpreters”

“Opposition Liberal Democrats are calling on the British Government
to grant asylum to Iraqis whose work for the British Forces in Iraq has
put their lives in danger”.

In light of these two items mentioned above, I dared to write to you our story, although it is a little bit long, but I‘d appreciate being patient with it when reading.

Allow me to introduce myself: "Cherie Brown", 2x years of age, graduated from College of Arts, Dept. of English. I was one of the interpreters who worked and helped the Coalition Forces, whether British or American associations.

The war was on the year of my graduation when schools, colleges and every vital part of life in Iraq stopped. Backing to college, things were a little bit quieter than before, people were comfortable, happy and relieved with the idea of getting rid of the past regime and having the Coalition Forces in the country, especially in the Southern parts of Iraq.

Backing to college again to complete our second semester and graduate, one of our instructors told us that there was a British patrol with their Sergeant Major , Lt. Thomas xxxxx – Stephen xxxx Camp – Black Watch Regiment, asking him if he speaks English fluently. So, they took him with them to the regiment, and there he directly got a job as an interpreter to the Sergeant Major.

Since we studied English, one of my friends and I were so excited to go with him to improve our English when meeting native speakers. Our instructor agreed after asking them, they needed a few other interpreters for the regiment and patrols. Anyway, we were five, two other men from college, my sister, my friend and me. We met the Sergeant Major, he was so nice with us, he liked us and admired our English.

So, they chose the ladies (us) and a young man, because they refused to hire the other one. We started working on 1st of June, 2003. Maybe we were among the first ladies in whole Iraq risking their lives in the way we did, by entering a British camp we had no idea about, working there from 12p.m. till 8 p.m. in the evening, meeting thieves to translate for them and even seeing them being kicked! We had many translation jobs in the camp, since we couldn’t go on patrols for security reasons as ladies; among which are translating to the officers when meeting people who need help from the British Forces, likes heads of tribes, heads of parties ...etc. We had to answer the phone to register complaints regarding looting, demolition of public possessions, ravishment, and other crimes, in order to translate them into English and send them to the Operations Room to take action.

The other job was to meet people at the camp’s front gate, and this was the most dangerous one ever, because there weren’t any kind of protection for us, unlike the soldiers we stand next to; no body armors, or helmets and such things, as if one is standing daringly in front of his / her future murderer!

In spite of all the risk, we were happy, working hard and trying to do our best to help both the Iraqi people who come with zero English, and the British soldiers who are with zero Arabic. My friend and I were studying, having exams and working for the British forces, we didn’t leave them even one day, we never took one day leave, rather; sometimes we worked even on our days off when they need us, without being bothered, or even complained.

The salary was $68 a month, it was too little in comparison with what we were doing, and the risk we were in. But this makes us happier because our main goal was to improve our English, and help Iraqi people. Anyway, after the security situation got to be worse, we changed our shift to a daily one, from 8.a.m. till 4p.m.

The Black Watch Regiment (the Scottish Forces) finished their duty on June 26th, 2003 and had to go back to Germany to replace them with another one; (1st Queen’s Lancashire Regiment).We stayed with the latter regiment for other three months, and our salaries got even better, $168 a month.

One of the problems we faced at that time, in addition to security, was that when they made us IDs , we were not allowed to copy them, get a reference, a recommendation or even a letter from them explaining that we worked for the British Forces and helped them under all circumstances, in case we leave them or get better jobs.

The other problem was that they started to treat us badly, for example, they moved our office outside the building, under the sun, with no fan or even shadings, in the hottest days of summer in Basrah, they provided us with a table, a phone line and few chairs. Besides, they didn’t care even about our transportation, or even bother asking us how to come and go home, all we had to do was coming very early and respecting every single word they say. Thus, My friend and I left the regiment and got sent to KBR, with better salary, but a worse risk.

My sister stayed in the camp, going to college and working with them at the same time. She had a better role that we did; in the middle of the risk and killing in Basrah, she went out on patrols in tanks and military vehicles with the military police to the Iraqi police stations. She met many bad people inside and outside the camp: parties members, thieves, militia supporters, and even gangs.

As a result, the group of interpreters started to leave the camp one by one. But before mentioning that, there was an interpreter who really served that camp few months before our coming, he was in the College of Engineering in Basrah, and was shot to death because of his job. There was no honoring or any kind of respect made by the camp for him or for his family -- after serving them for nearly a year, no one mentioned anything about him.

Back to our new job in KBR. its location was in Saddam’s Palace, that one was worse than the regiment. I was a security interpreter, so I had to stay at the gate to search people, translate and register the names of the people working for the company.

I left this hell in less than two months because there were many uprisings and angry people gathering with weapons or even stones to use them against us! I asked my employers to offer me any job inside the palace; but no one listens, although my English was better than many of the others working in safe, comfortable offices there.

Regarding my friend, she had a job in the palace with KBR also, but she left it either after threats. We then moved to RTI Organization. It was a very good job with an excellent salary, but security was the problem all the time. I worked for many departments there: operations, media, DDA facilitators (Democratic Dialogue Activity) with the Civil Dialogue Program.

But later started the threats coming to some of the employees there. So, some of them left their jobs, others travel abroad to save their lives, exactly just like what I did. I was obliged to leave my job there which I liked so much, for my parents were so worried about me, that’s why I left the job without telling anyone and live in Xxxxxxx.

Regarding my friend, she is still hiding at home, afraid of getting any job of any kind, thinking that there’s a militia who acts as serial killers, identifying all the interpreters and killing them one after the other after getting a list of their names and full addresses. So, it’s quite normal when any of us hear that one of our colleagues we knew was killed or kidnapped then found dead.

I’m sorry for such a long story, but it is nothing but a gist of what we faced in our country, with Iraqi people, and with the Coalition Forces in general.

The thing which really pains our hearts and souls till the moment is that these forces didn’t support us with any clue which explaining that we worked with them, we have no rights although we asked them many times. We even asked them to get a pistol or even a permission to carry a weapon in case we need it, but no one listens.

We heard that there would be a chance of compensation for the interpreters by the British Parliament to people like us, is there any chance for us to get any rights for what we did for the British Forces in Iraq?

Is there any hope that there would be someone who appreciates risking our lives in serving them after knowing our story, which is one of thousand stories happened and are still happening in Iraq, but no one hears about them?

Thank you very much for such a valuable chance to write to you; I’m really proud of telling my story, proud of what I did, my sister and friends are still honored to help the British Forces, because we did that from our hearts, wishing that things would get better with the passage of time.

Yours Truly,
"Cherie"