Baghdad curfew makes life harder for ordinary Iraqis as violence continues

An indefinite night-time curfew imposed on Baghdad in an attempt to increase security in the city has failed to make daily life any better, residents say. Interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi declared a curfew in the capital and its surroundings following bombings last week at two churches and the Yarmouk Hospital, which left over 15 dead. The curfew, which runs from 22:30 until 04:00, also came two days after the government declared a 60-day state of emergency in most of the country, giving the government extraordinary powers as violence continued to escalate. "During the week that the curfew has been established we haven't seen any change in security, it just makes it harder to go anywhere. Even if you have someone sick during the night in your home you have to wait until the next day to take them to a hospital," Ali al-Abdul Hassan, a local resident, told IRIN. Since the imposition of the curfew last Tuesday, the number of explosions in the capital have increased. But according to the Ministry of Interior it will help to restrict the movements of insurgents and make more difficult for them to get to their targets. "We believe that this condition is very important for residents' security in the capital, especially as the fighting in Fallujah is having a knock-on effect in Baghdad - according to our information many insurgents from Fallujah have left the city and come to the capital," ministry spokesman, Sabah Kadham told IRIN. Shopkeepers say that their business had been hit because of the curfew, with ongoing insecurity and daily explosions in the capital making it worse. "People are afraid to leave their homes, how long are we going to live like this?" Muhsen al-Kubaissy, 35, a shopkeeper from the Mansour district of Baghdad, asked. Others are being affected in more dramatic ways. "We went in the night to take my wife to have a baby at the hospital and on the way US troops made us return home so we had to make the delivery alone," husband and father Sinawi Abbas, told IRIN angrily. The increased violence across the country has come at the end of the holy month of Ramadan during the Eid ul-Fitr celebrations, with many saying it has been the saddest Eid of their lives. A spokesman from the prime minister's office told IRIN he expected the situation to be temporary, with security improving greatly once US-led troops have secured Fallujah. But many Iraqis doubt that this will improve things. "If the government says that many insurgents have left Fallujah, they can not be certain that the situation here will be better and in my point of view it may get worse. A curfew is not a solution to this problem," Sundus Samawel, a government employee, told IRIN.