Hilzoy highlighted this New York Times story. It's exceedingly depressing, and a reminder of why the US my not be winning "hearts and minds" in the region.
Still, only about 120,000 widows - roughly one in six - receive any state aid, according to government figures. Widows and their advocates say that to receive benefits they must either have political connections or agree to temporary marriages with the powerful men who control the distribution of government funds.
"It is blackmail," said Samira al-Mosawi, chairwoman of the women’s affairs committee in Parliament. "We have no law to treat this point. Widows don't need temporary support, but a permanent solution."
The latest plan, proposed by Mazin al-Shihan, director of the Baghdad Displacement Committee, a city agency, is to pay men to marry widows. "There is no serious effort by the national government to fix this problem, so I presented my own program," he said.
When asked why the money should not go directly to the women, Mr. Shihan laughed.
"If we give the money to the widows, they will spend it unwisely because they are uneducated and they don't know about budgeting," he said. "But if we find her a husband, there will be a person in charge of her and her children for the rest of their lives. This is according to our tradition and our laws."
One of my biggest reasons for opposing the war is that I find it morally objectionable that we would be spending American blood and treausure to support decision makers like that, to spend precious US resources to create and extend that sort of situation.
Posted by armand at February 24, 2009 09:47 AM | TrackBack | Posted to Iraq