Copyright: 2003 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Contact: conedit@ajc.com
Website: http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/28
Author: Moni Basu, Staff

IRAQI KIDS HIT DRUGS

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Ahmed Abid Sadeh is waiting to inhale.

Just 12 years old, he stares vacantly with bloodshot eyes. He tugs at his
soiled red-and-white striped shirt and staggers around the filthy public
park, where he sleeps at night and gets high by day.

Removing a dirty blue rag from his pocket, Ahmed douses it with ether and
takes a big whiff. By 6 p.m., he has consumed half a clear glass bottle
that once held cough medicine. When asked why he likes to get high, he can
barely stitch together the words.

"I do it to forget my parents. I do it to forget everything," he said,
rubbing his face caked with dirt.

Both of Ahmed's parents are dead, though in his euphoric state, he could
not recall how that happened. His father was killed in the Iran-Iraq war,
he thought, although that war ended three years before he was born.

Six weeks ago, Firdos Square became one of the lasting symbols of the
U.S.-led war in Iraq when a bronze statue of Saddam Hussein was toppled,
ushering in a new era in the lives of Iraqis.

Today, the square in front of the Palestine Hotel teems with garbage and
stagnant water the color of antifreeze. Where the towering image of Saddam
once stood, local artists are erecting a plaster carving depicting freedom.

And in its shadow, Ahmed and his gang of young friends embody a growing
drug problem taking hold among the children of Baghdad, many of them made
homeless by the war and its aftermath.

Most of them crave cheap highs from ether, glue, painkillers and other
drugs looted from hospitals and pharmacies. Cocaine and hashish are also
making their way into young hands.

Under Saddam's iron-fisted rule, drug addiction and alcoholism were not
major social problems. Now, doctors and social workers are sounding alarms
to save the children across the Iraqi capital.

"They play with drugs just as they play with grenades or cluster bombs all
over this city," said Eman al-Jaboury, a doctor at Saddam Pediatric
Hospital. "They have absolutely nothing to lose."

She said more and more children are becoming addicted to drugs as a means
of escape from reality. "It gives them a floating feeling," al-Jaboury
said. "They forget about their pain, they forget about the heat and, to
some extent, they forget they are hungry."

But over time, abusing ether can kill. Extended exposure can cause brain
damage and destroy other vital organs such as the kidneys or liver.

The plight of Baghdad's street kids in some ways reflects the nation's
postwar dilemmas --- parentless children left over from years of bloodshed
and poverty, a lack of housing, mismanaged state-run institutions and armed
men on the loose, many of them criminals luring children into undesirable
lives of addiction and thievery.

A former prisoner named Sabah, given amnesty before the war, peddles stolen
medicine on the rough streets of Sadr City, the slum formerly known as
Saddam City. His pockets are stuffed with pills taken from hospital
pharmacy shelves. He pulls out several strips of Valium. He said he knew
where to get hashish and even heroin.

Abundant Drug Supply

"The kids are testing their newfound freedoms and taking up drugs as a
hobby," al-Jaboury said. "And the drugs are in abundance because of the
looting of the hospitals."

Many of the children roughing it on the streets came from orphanages or
juvenile delinquency institutions that were pillaged after the Iraqi
regime's collapse. In some places, squatters moved in and the children were
tossed into the streets with nowhere to go. Still other children fled
abusive state-run homes during the war's chaos and refuse to return.

"These children were in prisonlike environments," al-Jaboury said. "They
were not treated properly. There was no guidance for them. The rule they
taught them is: Get what you can get while you can get it."

No one knows for certain how many children were left homeless at war's end.
Al-Jaboury estimated as many as 10,000 children were previously in
institutions while some had their families broken apart in the bombing.

Carel de Rooy, director of UNICEF in Iraq, said street kids were
nonexistent before the 1991 Gulf War but their numbers have been growing
with decades of Iraq's economic degradation. It isn't uncommon for poor
parents to abandon children when they can no longer afford to feed them.

Children Roam Streets

In the neighborhood of Betaween, seemingly innocent children roam the
streets aimlessly with battered Pepsi cans full of ether in hand. One boy,
no more than 10, was so high he could not talk.

Ten minutes away, Firdos Square, where Ahmed and his friends hang out, is
gaining a reputation as a place to find an easy high.

Eleven-year-old Noora, who said she could not remember her last name, lost
both her parents during the bombing and now begs for a living along with
her cousin, Mahmoud, 10, and neighbor Athir, 11.

She said she tries hard to avoid the clutches of the drug dealers in the
square. She and other witnesses said several days ago girls who were
hanging out there were taken away, perhaps by an international aid agency
to a Baghdad orphanage.

Sgt. Antonio Presley of Atlanta, who is serving in the Fort Stewart-based
369th Armored Division, said the soldiers who stand guard around the square
see the kids come and go.

"When we see the bottles of ether, we take them away and burn them,"
Presley said.

Al-Jaboury said children's groups have started trying to round up some of
the street kids, especially girls who were being raped and getting pregnant.

Soad Razaq, 48, came to Firdos Square looking for her two daughters, Rawa,
13, and Ashwaq, 10. Since the fall of Saddam, the two girls have run away
from home several times, and Razaq usually found them sniffing ether or
glue at Firdos. On Tuesday, they were not around because they had been
taken to Dar al-Najat, an orphanage several miles away.

"I bought everything for them: a CD player, a television, a radio. I even
give them an allowance," Razaq said. "But they keep running away. I get
sick from thinking about it. I think they are addicted to the inhaling."