Nawzad

Early on the morning of February 15, 2004, Nawzad went, as he did every day, to the market in Kirkuk where people or companies in need of laborers hired workers on a daily basis. On this day Nawzad wasn’t told where he would be working, but was driven for two hours to the American military base in Tikrit where he worked from 8:00 in the morning till 3:00 in the afternoon. On the drive back to Kirkuk with four other workers, a car pulled in front of their vehicle and exploded. Nawzad only remembers the sound of the explosion and feeling heat. He then fell into a coma for 15 days.

Nawzad’s father came to the hospital and took him home, where he received basic care for the next five months. His family had removed all the mirrors in their home so that he could not see the extent of his burn injuries. A year after the incident, however, while his family was out, he noticed they had forgotten to take the key for a cabinet which contained a mirror. Nawzad opened the cabinet and saw himself in the mirror. He remembers thinking, “I wish I died in that explosion.” He recalls, “I closed the cabinet and cried all that evening and night, and I didn’t tell my family, but they noticed me very sad. They asked me many times, but I didn’t tell them the truth - I said I’m sad because I haven’t left my home for a year.”

It was around this time that Nawzad’s wife left him, after her relatives told her that she had no hope of a normal life with him. Nawzad did not leave his house for two years after the explosion, and when he finally did he found he could not bear the way people looked at him or the way children called him “the burned Nawzad.”

In January of 2008, Nawzad underwent an operation to release a contracture (a tightening of muscle, tendon, ligament, or skin that prevents normal movement) in his left thumb caused by the burn injury. He is still in need of reconstructive surgery on his eyebrows and upper and lower lips, as well as additional surgery on his thumb. DAI is working to provide arrangements and funding for these procedures so that Nawzad may once again feel that he can face the world and begin to move on with his life.

Please click here to help DAI assist Nawzad and other Iraqi victims of war.