Hassan family appeals to Iraqis for help in finding sister's body

THE FAMILY of Margaret Hassan, the Irishwoman kidnapped and murdered in Iraq in October/November 2004, are appealing to Iraqi officials to learn the whereabouts of Hassan’s remains from Ali Lutfi Jassar.

Jassar is due to stand trail under section 4 of the 2003 anti-terrorism law in Baghdad today.

Jassar was arrested after attempting to blackmail the British embassy in Baghdad through a series of e-mails and phone calls. Jassar offered Hassan’s body in exchange for $1 million (€700,000) and safe passage out of Iraq. The e-mails began on September 27th, 2007, the phone calls on October 22nd, 2007. If convicted, Jassar could be sentenced to life in prison.

“He has made apologies to us, he has asked for our forgiveness,” said Geraldine Fitzsimons Riney, one of Ms Hassan’s sisters, who lives in Ireland. “He was one of the people who buried Margaret.”

Ms Riney praised the Department of Foreign Affairs for their assistance in the years since Hassan’s kidnapping and murder, and said she hoped the Irish Embassy in Cairo would send a lawyer to the trial in Baghdad.

Ms Hassan was born Margaret Fitzsimons in Dublin, but her family moved to Britain when she was a child. She held triple Irish, British and Iraqi nationality. Her father was an Irish Guard who served in the second World War.

Her siblings, Geraldine, Deirdre, Kathryn and Michael, have fought tirelessly to retrieve their sister’s body. They obtained transcripts of the alleged kidnapper’s messages to the British embassy, which have never before been quoted in the press.

“I am one of the people who participated in the operation of kidnapping and executing Margaret Hassan,” the first e-mail begins. “I have with me all the evidence proving this. Therefore I request securing of a channel of contact with the husband of Margaret, Tahsin Hassan, or with the British government in order that I can give you the true story of her killing. So I can pass on to you her corpse which I still have in my possession. Therefore I request your speedy reply as soon as possible. Thank you.”

In June 2006, an Iraqi named Mustafa Salman al-Jibouri, who had been caught with Ms Hassan’s personal effects, was given a life sentence by a Baghdad court.

The sentence was reduced to 18 months on appeal. Jibouri testified that Sheikh Hussein al-Zubayi, a wealthy Baghdad cleric and a member of the hardline Sunni Muslim Scholars Association, gave him Hassan’s handbag and identity papers.

Jibouri also had large quantities of syringes, drugs, identity papers and telephone SIM cards, strengthening the assumption that the kidnappers act as a mafia-style organisation.

Three men who were tried with Jibouri were cleared. Two were brothers of Jibouri, the third a brother of al-Zubayi and the caretaker of his mosque.

According to a report published by the Christian Science Monitor’s correspondent Dan Murphy, US, Iraqi and Italian investigators believe Sheikh al-Zubayi was behind a series of kidnappings of women in Baghdad, including Ms Hassan and female journalists Giuliana Sgrena, Florence Aubenas and Jill Carroll.

The motive for the kidnappings appears to have been to raise funds for the Sunni insurgency. Al-Zubayi reportedly believed that videos recorded by women hostages had a greater effect on western public opinion.

In a statement issued in June 2006, Ms Hassan’s siblings said: “We believe that the refusal by the British government to open a dialogue with the kidnappers cost our sister her life . . . Margaret, who was vocally opposed to the war in Iraq, was sacrificed for the political ends of Blair and Bush.”

British authorities said the kidnappers did not demand a ransom, but there is evidence they did. According to Italian police wiretaps which were leaked to the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, Abdel Salam al-Qubaisi, a senior leader of the Muslim Scholars Association, demanded €10 million for her life.

“I can help you to find Margaret’s body, because I put her in the grave,” one of Jassar’s messages to the British embassy reads. “I can guide you to the house she was killed in and you can there examine the remaining blood and fingerprints.

Margaret’s camera is still with me and if you want, I can give you model and serial number so you can examine it.”

Ms Riney said Jassar provided photographs of a camera that was the same type of camera that Margaret used and he confirmed that she had $1,500 in her handbag.

Ms Hassan ran operations for the international aid group Care in Iraq and often carried substantial amounts of cash, Ms Riney said.

Jassar has also divulged the name of the man he says killed her, although the family cannot reveal it.

“I talked with her five times,” Jassar said in the transcripts. “I interrogated her. I didn’t find anything against her and I told her killers she is innocent, but they killed her.”

Jassar also said he could draw a plan of the house in which Ms Hassan was murdered and provide the names and addresses of 10 people who participated in her kidnapping.

Jassar’s court appearance is at the same time a glimmer of hope and a dilemma. Ms Hassan’s family would never condone torture, nor would they want to see Jassar rewarded for his grisly knowledge, for example with a light sentence.

But they desperately want to retrieve their sister’s body so they can give her a Christian burial and lay her to rest beside her parents in England.