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| Kurds: Karwan Abdul-Qatar (l.) and Salar Ismail at a radio station Taha Barwaria helped set up. Sam Dagher |
A Kurdish idealist returns to Iraq to 'change attitudes'
Taha Barwari came back to northern Iraqi from Sweden with a mission to inspire young Kurds disaffected by decades of war.
from the April 29, 2008 edition
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Nowhere is the impact of what Barwari is trying to accomplish more evident than in some of the remotest and most impoverished corners of the region, such as Choman.
In 1983-84, Mr. Hussein leveled the town in his so-called Anfal campaign against the rebelling Kurds.
"Even the walnut trees were blown up with TNT," says Abdul-Wahid Gwany, the town's mayor.
Residents started returning to Choman and rebuilding their homes in 1991 when the semiautonomous Kurdistan region was established here.
One year ago, Barwari and his aides opened a recreational center here complete with a library, a gym, a movie theater, and a radio station – all facilities that did not exist in the area. Now, three local young people are trying to keep it going on a volunteer basis, despite waning interest from residents, skepticism by local officials, and huge logistical challenges including the lack of reliable electricity supply.
"We have nothing here, so by being involved in this center, I feel like I am giving something to our community," says Suham Mirhamed, who is a nurse by training and dedicates a lot of her time to managing the center.
One of her assistants, Salar Ismail, a high school student who runs the radio station, says that if it were not for the center he and many of his friends "would just spend most of their time on the streets."
Mr. Gwany, who is also the local KDP boss, is not convinced of the value of the center when most of the area's young people come from families struggling to make ends meet in a place beset by inadequate infrastructure and basic services.
"The Kurdish youth are at a boiling point … kids do not have jobs and some can't even meet their most basic needs. Volunteerism is not possible under these circumstances," says the mayor, adding that the youth must be paid salaries in order to be involved in the center. "Barwari's idea is bad and it's coming from Europe."
Mr. Shafeek, Barwari's assistant, says that it's precisely this attitude that they are trying to battle.
"We want our youth to be empowered. We want to create a movement of young people that are strong, motivated and free," he says. "They want slaves."
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