On September 13, American Libraries editor Leonard Kniffel spoke by phone with Saad Eskander, director of the Iraq National Library and Archives. The conversation, covering President Obama’s announcement of the pullout of U.S. combat troops from Iraq, the progress made in rebuilding the library, and the mood of the people of Baghdad. Due to the poor telephone connection, the interview is transcribed within the video to the extent possible.
Transcript:
It’s hard to believe that it’s been three years since the last time you did an interview with American Libraries. What prompted us to contact you again was President Obama’s recent announcement that the United States has reached “the end of our combat mission in Iraq.” In 2007, you said that only the extremists in Iraq would benefit from a U.S. withdrawal. Do you still see that as the case?
I think the events of this month and last month proved that I was right. The terrorist people here have intensified the terrorist attacks against civilian targets in Iraq. The last attack was near the National Library and Archives. When the … Ministry of Defense was attacked by group of Al-Qaeda fighters, the National Library suffered from a lot of material damages. Most of the doors and windows were destroyed during in the attack. We are passing through a very, very difficult period. And I am afraid it’s a period of either make or break for us. We have a critical crisis. We have a security gap, and there is no light at the end of the tunnel.
Can you bring us up to date on what progress you’ve made in the in rebuilding the National Library and Archives over the past three years?
We’ve continued to … the National Library and Archives. Now we are constructing two additional buildings to add to the main buildings. One for the National Archive, which will house all the maps we have installation maps, microfilm maps and all our archival collections. That will be a big building with a lot of storage area. We have another building that the construction of that building started early this year and probably will end at the end of this year. That building is, what we’ve dedicated it for, for children. A library for children between the age of 3 and 15 . On the other hand, we continue to modernize our workforce…. We are now member of the World Digital Library. And we issue three e-journals. One for cultural heritage, the second is for women’s rights, and the third is for book reviews. During this last year, we were able to restore thousands of … local documents, and a lot of rare publications. We brought from the British Library digital copies of their records and documents and maps and photographs related to Iraq… We were able to … executive orders, where all Iraqi NGOs … documents to the National Archive. We collected around 1 million documents from the Saddam period. On the other hand, we started to negotiate with the American government the return of all Iraqi records and documents by way of the U.S. army. These are the most important work we have done during this period.
Early in the U.S. led invasion, it was reported that many books were looted or, in some cases, taken from the library for safekeeping. Can you tell us any more about these materials that were supposedly looted? Have they been returned? Are they out on the black market?
Unfortunately, we were not able to retrieve all of these rare books, documents, maps, and photographs, because they were smuggled abroad, and the neighboring countries won’t cooperate with us in relation to this issue. So very few of the lost rare books were retrieved. Because they were handed over by some Iraqi citizens who purchased these rare books on the black market.
Can you tell us what the mood of the people in Baghdad is right now? Your staff in particular. Are people feeling hopeful, angry, despair? How are they reacting to this period?
It’s all of the things you mention. The are angry and disappointed and they are pessimistic about their future. They are angry at the politicians for failing to form our national government. They’re angry because there is no public services, no electricity, no clean water, and the situation is getting worse. Security is sinking, no real reform of the economy or culture or education. We are still living in the old Iraq.
Do you feel that the work you’ve been doing over the past three or four years is in danger of falling apart, of being reversed?
Yes, all the advances we have made were in the political sphere. Not in cultural, economic, or education spheres. And that’s why we are facing a lot of challenges. You cannot have democracy in Iraq by just holding elections. You need to change people and policy. You need to enable Iraq’s core of citizens to have free access to information, absolutely all, all of legislation. You have to have all the cultural and educational institutions so that they could sort the truth of Iraq. We are 10 years behind, and we need the social and cultural and educational field to catch up with these political changes. If we don’t reform and carry out radical reforms in terms of culture and education, I’m afraid all the political advances and progress we have made will be lost, because people will not accept, they will not be happy with democracy that will remove liberty, and political violence. Unless they see democracy with order, not chaos, authority.
Everybody is threatened. This year, I lost some of my staff; he was the victim of a car bomb attack. Last month, a lady from the national library was the victim of a car bomb attack, and she lost both of her legs. We know the situation is very serious. I would say it’s going from bad to worse, not only for me, to all Iraqis, regardless of ethnic or religious background, whether they are director or … We all are targets. People like to… Everybody is targeted. It’s a blind attack on all Iraqis.
We’re being told that by the end of the year, it’s expected that the remaining 50,000 American troops in Iraq will be gone. Is the government prepared for that? What is that going to mean to you and your work and your staff?
I want to say that it’s premature to withdraw the U.S. forces, not because I love occupation, no one loves to see his country occupied by foreign forces. But the Americans created this problem, and they should stay as long as it takes to control the situation. The terrorists intensified with terrorist attacks as soon as they learned the U.S. forces will withdraw from the country. Iraqi security forces are not ready yet. We don’t have weapons, we don’t have ? professional army that will serve the people not the particular aims of certain politicians … We are … So I don’t think the withdrawal of forces will help us and won’t persuade politicians to compromise among themselves and to look at the real interests of the country and the people. I think we’ll see, with the withdrawal of the U.S. forces now, a political crisis on a larger scale because Americans are trying to minimize their role in Iraq. Security is slipping.
Before we end this talk, I wonder if there is anything else that you can think of that American librarians particularly–the people who listening to this interview are American librarians–and what does the support of your colleagues mean, and what can we do on the other side of the world to help you?
We have to seek a lot of moral and material support from our colleagues in America. The moral support is as important as the material support. We are fighting the same enemy. The enemy of this country is the enemy of every country. The enemy of our culture is the enemy of your culture, because our culture is part of your culture. All I ask that you to believe that working on the library and archives is an important job. Especially when your country is in a national crisis. Our country is in search of identity, in search of peace. And our work is important to successfully transition from dictatorship to democracy. All I ask is the continuation of your support for us, your colleagues in Iraq.
Thank you, and I hope that you will keep in touch.
