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It's
one of the most dangerous civilian jobs in one of
the world's most dangerous countries: translating
Arabic
for the U.S. military in Iraq.
One by one, little noticed in the daily mayhem,
dozens of interpreters have been killed -- mostly
Iraqis but 12
Americans, too. They account for 40 percent of the
300-plus death claims filed by private contractors
with the
U.S. Labor Department.
Riding in bomb-blasted Humvees, tagging along on
foot patrols in Fallujah or dashing into buildings
behind
Marines, translators are dying on the job, but also
facing danger at home: hunted by insurgents who call
them
pro-American collaborators.
"If the insurgents catch us, they will cut off our
heads because the imams say we are spies," said
Mustafa
Fahmi, 24, an Iraqi interpreter with Titan Corp.,
the biggest employer of linguists in Iraq. "I've
been threatened
like fifteen times, but I won't quit. A neighbor saw
me driving and said, 'I am going to kill you."'
That fate befell Luqman Mohammed Kurdi Hussein, a
Titan linguist and Iraqi Kurd captured by insurgents
in
October. A video of the 41-year-old's beheading was
posted on the Internet.
Another Titan employee, Sudanese interpreter
Noureddin Zakaria, was luckier. He appeared as a
hostage on an
Oct. 30 broadcast by Al-Arabiya television, saying
he had been captured in Ramadi. His kidnappers later
released him.
In a more recent attack in Baghdad in late March,
two carloads of insurgents gunned down five Iraqi
women
traveling home in a car from their jobs on a U.S.
base. All were killed, the Iraqi police reported,
and at least one
of them was a translator.
The efficiency with which insurgents hunted down
Titan contractors worries the U.S. military. As
militants killed
them in growing numbers, usually in ambushes off
base, the Army and others began housing Titan
workers on
military bases or in Baghdad's fortified Green Zone.
"There was a period when it seemed translators were
being targeted on a daily basis," said First Sgt.
Stephen
Valley, a U.S. Army reservist who worked with Arab
journalists in Baghdad. "There was virtually no way
to
protect these people."
Most Titan linguists now live on U.S. bases.
More than 4,000 translators work for San Diego,
Calif.-based Titan, which supplies the U.S. military
with Arabic-
and Kurdish-speaking linguists. In April, Titan
reported a 23 percent increase in revenues, or $559
million, a
company record. Titan said its contract with the
U.S. Army is its biggest revenue source, worth up to
$657
million by the time it expires.
The human cost has been high. The U.S. Labor
Department reports 126 death benefit claims for
Titan workers in
Iraq out of a total 305 for contractors as of
mid-May. The Titan death toll includes 12 Americans,
and possibly
some non-translators, the company said, with another
149 wounded.
"This is a war zone. Our people are embedded with
literally every military unit in Iraq, facing the
same life-
threatening dangers as our U.S. combat forces,"
Titan spokesman Wil Williams said. "We have lost
more
personnel than any other American contractor covered
by (U.S. government) insurance because of our
unique,
critical and dangerous mission, and because of the
intensity of the insurgents who seek to discourage
Iraqis
from serving their country."
Titan's toll -- which includes both violent deaths
and accidents -- is far higher than any of the
hundreds of
civilian contracting firms in Iraq, including those
with many more workers.
For example, Halliburton, the Houston-based
contractor with 50,000 employees spread between Iraq
and
Kuwait, has had more than 60 employees and
subcontractors killed in the war zone, more than 250
wounded
and one worker unaccounted for, spokeswoman Jennifer
Dellinger said.
Many deaths don't show up in the Labor Department
statistics under the name Halliburton because often
claims
are filed under subcontractor names. The 305 death
claims with the Labor Department represent only part
of the
toll for American and other civilian contractors in
Iraq. The true figure is difficult to estimate
because many firms
don't publicize workers' slayings. The U.S. troop
death toll is over 1,620.
In Iraq, translators are seen as a critical link
between U.S. troops and Iraqis.
"They were important to our mission, and terrorists
were trying to hurt us by hurting them," said Army
Capt.
Joseph Ludvigson, who was based last year in
northern Iraq.
On Baghdad's hostile western outskirts, the Army has
conducted memorial ceremonies for slain Titan
interpreters, said 1st Cavalry Division Maj. Derik
Von Recum.
The first, an Iraqi woman, was killed in July, "shot
execution-style at her home in front of her family,"
Von
Recum said. The second, an Iraqi man, stopped coming
to work in November. It took a few days to figure
out
insurgents had kidnapped and killed him, Von Recum
said.
"The two we lost were like family to us," he said.
"I wish we could have provided them with better
protection."
But some Iraqis working for Titan said they spent
months on the job before being issued helmets, body
armor,
and ear- and eye-protection given to U.S. troops and
foreign contractors.
Titan's Williams said Iraqi workers now get the same
Kevlar helmets and vests issued to U.S. troops.
"Following some initial equipment shortages, our
Iraqi personnel now have the equipment they need
where and
when they need it," he told The Associated Press.
One Titan interpreter said he completed more than
100 missions without body armor and a helmet. The
man
spoke on condition his name wasn't used because he
didn't want to lose his job.
This reporter, who spent more than a year in Iraq,
was accompanied Iraqi interpreters who wore no body
armor
or helmets on many U.S. military missions.
"You look around and see the soldiers and the
international press with you, and they're all
wearing the proper
protection. What about me? I'm one of the team,"
said the Titan interpreter, who emerged uninjured
from two
convoys blasted by roadside bombs.
The interpreter said he asked his U.S. Army
commander why the troops and the American civilians
-- some also
in Titan's employ -- had body armor and helmets, but
not the Iraqis.
"After a while they decided it was wrong. They gave
it to us," he said.
A Titan translator with no military background said
U.S. troops allow him to carry an AK-47, after
having taught
him to shoot it. The 31-year-old Iraqi said he
opened fire on insurgents when his convoy came under
attack near
Baghdad in March 2004. He was slightly wounded.
"I saw an American soldier killed right in front of
me," said the translator, who didn't want his name
used
because he feared for his life. "The insurgents were
shooting at us from the rooftops. I was trying to
shoot them
too. The soldiers yelled at me: 'Hey, don't try to
be a hero. Get down!"'
He said he has survived three ambushes, but a
co-worker with Titan was killed by a mortar round on
a U.S.
base in Baghdad.
As bad as the on-the-job hazards are the dangers
commuting to work.
The Titan translator who had to ask for body armor
said he alters his route, schedule and the cars he
takes to
the U.S. base where he works. He never stays more
than a few nights in one house. And he wears a black
ski
mask to hide his identity while on patrol.
"I stay with neighbors, sometimes with my family,
with my wife's family, my uncle, my parents," he
said. "If
anyone recognizes you, and says, 'Hey, I saw you
with the soldiers,' that's when you're done."
Another Titan contractor, who didn't want his name
published for fear of retribution, keeps a pistol in
his lap
when he drives.
"I don't talk about my job," he said. "If you keep
your mouth shut, no one is going to know who you are
or what
your job is."
Money is the chief reward. The interpreters say
monthly salaries start at $600 and range as high as
more than
$1,000 for those who take the most dangerous
missions. That pay is big by Iraqi standards, where
many
survive on less than $100 a month.
Under those salaries, U.S. government death benefits
for families of slain Iraqi translators would range
from
$300 to $700 a month, according to a formula in the
Defense Base Act, which sets a maximum payout of
less
than $4,190 a month.
Valley said he was amazed Iraqis would show up to
replace a translator who'd been killed.
"They were putting their lives on the line for what
seemed to me a ridiculously small amount of money,
but to
them it was the highest salary they had ever
earned," Valley said.
Valley said his office helped negotiate a new salary
scale that made their translators "some of the best
paid
Iraqi civilian workers in the country."
"If we couldn't protect them from the insurgents, we
could get them a higher monthly salary," he said.
Associated Press writer Jim Krane, who spent more
than a year reporting in Iraq, wrote the story from
Dubai,
United Arab Emirates, where he's based. AP
photographer Jacob Silberberg contributed from
Baqouba, Iraq, and AP researcher Monika Mathur from
New York
AP
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