Post Saddam Hussain’s hanging, things haven’t changed much and a new phenomenon is grappling Iraq, with a new trend emerging with the rise in the number of widows. One such widow is Suad Rzuki Aboud who lost her husband, three sons and a son-in-law when their family bakery was blown off by the Sunni militia. She says: I was pleading for anyone to help. No one came. One of the reasons attributed to this could be the never-to-end violence in the country which gives birth to many widows each day. The skyrocketing prices of the essential commodities coupled with the poverty in the country makes it difficult for the upbringing of the children by a single mother. As if that wasn’t enough, the US–backed constitutional changes gives each religious sect to determine its own set of rules concerning marriage, divorce, inheritance and child custody. Maysoon Al-Damluji, a secular member of Iraq’s parliament is of the view that Article 41 of Iraq’s new constitution is ‘a recipe for disaster.’ The social stigma associated with such a woman in a ‘hardline’ society makes doubles her difficulties. In the eyes of society, women always need a man to protect them and keep them straight. There is still some social stigma about a woman being on her own. The dogma surrounding such widows has reached such new proportions that family members often fake the identity of their kin. One such unfortunate widow was Nuha Farai, who lost her husband 20 days after she tied the knots, whose in-laws, in an desperate attempt to inherit government pension, faked his status as single! The aftermath of the bloodshed has left these widows with a very few choices with some even resorting to prostitution and others taking up begging on the streets of the city. It was only this week that the Sunni militants gunned down three such widows in a country where such professions are treated as immoral. Source: USA Today