Posted June 11, 2004.

LC Specialist Verifies That Saddam Archives Were Torched

An Arab World area specialist at the Library of Congress reports that the fires set by arsonists in April 2003 at the Iraq National Library were targeting sensitive archives from the Saddam Hussein regime, not rare books and manuscripts. Mary-Jane Deeb, who led a team last fall to assess the status of Iraqi libraries, said that the records were torched with a highly flammable material like phosphorus—not a method likely used by casual looters, the Associated Press reported June 8.

“We were up to our knees in ashes,” Deeb said. “All the librarians would tell us was that [the records] were brought to the library in the late 1980s and were put in the charge of almost 90 people who were not librarians.” Little is known of their content. Archives from earlier periods lay untouched in another room.

The team’s report to the Library of Congress stated that the front of the National Library building was badly burned and much of its infrastructure destroyed, making it no longer suitable to house collections. In early June, the Iraqi Ministry of Justice put in a claim to acquire the building for its offices.

Posted June 11, 2004.