Nov 12, 2019
Prince Edward, Lady Sarah Chatto, Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Andrew, Sarah Ferguson, her sister Jane their mother Susan
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Prince Edward, Lady Sarah Chatto, Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Andrew, Sarah Ferguson, her sister Jane their mother Susan
Jane Ferguson
[TOP] Jon filming inside a former makeshift ISIS prison, in a village south of Mosul city.
[MIDDLE] Police at the frontline in Qayarrah town - manning a checkpoint, as oil burns in the background.
[BOTTOM] Children running to greet us on a hillside by a village near Qayarrah town.
Image and Text by Jane Ferguson. For more of Jane’s reporting visit her project, “Iraq: Battle for Mosul”.
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Front to Back - Lady Sarah Chatto, Prince Edward, Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Andrew, Jane Ferguson and Sarah Ferguson.
The Duchess of York (L) with her sister Jane at their family home Dummer Down House.
Jane Ferguson
[TOP] A signpost outside Qayarrah town - which was retaken from ISIS about a month ago. The Americans are helping get a nearby military airfield up and running again and this is largely expected to be where the main assault on the city is staged. In the picture, oil fields, lit by fleeing ISIS fighters are burning and creating large black clouds. The sign reads, “Here is Qayarrah, key to liberating Mosul”.
[MIDDLE] a Peshmerga fighter at a post to the East of Mosul city. It is the closest point on the front line to the city, some 11 kilometers away, and on clear days they can see the city itself.
[BOTTOM] The destruction in Fallujah city.
Image and Text by Jane Ferguson. For more of Jane’s reporting visit her project, “Iraq: Battle for Mosul”.
Jane Ferguson
The idea of a nightlife in Baghdad seems like the nostalgic memory of an older Iraqi, reminiscing over the Saddam years. Speak to reporters who were last here during the constant, murderous violence of years gone by and they cannot believe you might walk down the street to a bar or restaurant for the evening.
Yet there are plenty of people out on the Iraqi capital’s streets after dark—grilling Masgouf river fish, and swinging red-hot shisha coals in the night as sparks fly off into the darkness.
A bridge over the Tigris regularly hosts dozens of parked cars at night, squeezing the already slow-moving traffic, as wedding parties get out and dance on the sidewalk.
The sound of a roaring, outdoor nightclub could be heard from my bedroom until late, as Baghdadis enjoyed the relief of cooler nights after a brutally hot summer.
When ISIS raced into Iraq in 2014 and swept down to Baghdad’s doorstep, people here were rightly panicked. The sectarian hatred of the radical Sunni group for the country’s Shiites—and their brutal treatment of the Sunni populations they ruled—was clear for everyone to see on nightly TV reports.
The momentum has now swung in the opposite direction, and with US airstrikes and offensives by the Iraqi military, the group is retreating. Horrific ISIS car bombs do still rock the capital, killing innocents, but there is also a feeling of increasing confidence here.
Yet even the most optimistic Iraqis have learned not to expect such periods to last. Fighting against ISIS alongside the regular Army are Shia militias. They are empowered, heavily armed and number tens of thousands. They are also not under the full control of the Iraqi government. People here really don’t know what those young fighters will do if ISIS is defeated. Having huge numbers of armed young men without jobs in any country is an alarming prospect. Many here fear that they may bring the next wave of violence.
Image and Text by Jane Ferguson. For more of Jane’s reporting visit her project, “Iraq: Battle for Mosul”.
Jane Ferguson
[TOP] Children outside the frontline town of Qayarrah run towards our car. In the background is the smoke of the burning oil wells, lit by ISIS as they retreated.
[BOTTOM] The view from a tent in a sorting camp for displaced Fallujans. People here are waiting to be given permissions to return to their homes in the city and it's surrounding villages.
Image and Text by Jane Ferguson. For more of Jane’s reporting visit her project, “Iraq: Battle for Mosul”.
Iraq September 2016
Jane Ferguson
Fallujah city is a silent monument to war. Abandoned since the guns fell silent in June and ISIS were driven out, it sits like a bullet-riddled Chernobyl. Not even the dogs trotting through the streets make a sound.
The Iraqi Army have set up checkpoints throughout the main thoroughfares, but with few civilians allowed in, these are mostly manned by bored soldiers, baking in the searing heat. But a small number of lucky families have been allowed to return in the last few days.
They drove past us in a slow-moving convoy of small, white trucks loaded with their only remaining possessions – a satellite dish, foam sleeping mattresses, a child’s bicycle. Flanked by military gunmen, their drive back to their neighbourhoods feels staged, awkward, and even tense. These people have been through hell, and have had to persuade the government they had nothing to do with ISIS before being allowed back in.
A ten-minute drive down the road from Fallujah sits the sorting camp they came from. It’s difficult to decide what to call it – registration centre? Internment camp? It’s not a refugee camp. The several thousand or so people there have come from refugee camps to this place in hope of qualifying for approval to return home. The tents protect people from the midday sun when the bureaucracy takes hours or even days. They are not allowed to leave until their name is placed on a list of the approved.
The men queue up at a building on the camp, waiting to be told through the windows if they have been deemed non-ISIS members. Inside the building, military and security officials from every apparatus in the government sit at desks and frantically type into laptops. Every few seconds a Military commander shouts out a name and everyone shouts back ‘white’. If you re on the white list then you are going home. If you are on the black list then you will be arrested.
Image and Text by Jane Ferguson. For more of Jane’s reporting visit her project, “Iraq: Battle for Mosul”.