How last-minute diplomacy halted a genocide
Photo - Safe Haven: © Ikin Yum
Daniel Nelson
Safe Haven brings to the stage a hold-your-breath moment in Kurdish and Iraqi history when Saddam Hussein, forced out of Kuwait by overwhelming US force in 1991, turned his helicopter gunships on the Kurdish minority.
An estimated 1.5—2 million Kurds were trapped in the mountains, their escape route blocked by Turkey. Genocide loomed.
The American army insisted it was an internal Iraqi affair. They packed their kitbags for the flight home, no mission creep here, job done. The Brits stuck to their sacrosanct post-Suez foreign policy of following the US line.
Then, in a matter of hours, two British diplomats came up with an idea to save the Kurds, got the backing of new Prime Minister John Major, overcame resistance from Foreign Office mandarins and the US military, and stopped a genocide.
In former British diplomat Chris Bowers’ debut play, the driving force for diplomatic intervention arises from junior diplomat Catherine’s gut instinct that Something Must Be Done. Her desperation wins over her stiff-upper-lip, cricket-metaphor-spouting boss — whose rigidity is finally broken by his wife’s goading about his lost idealism and youthful commitment to “making a difference”.
The British duo clash with a US General and Iraqi intelligence chief Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, one of Saddam’s three half-brothers, both performed at the Arcola Theatre with great relish, in contrast to the quiet Kurd studying in London and desperately trying to get the British government to act and his equally desperate sister, who is lost among the fleeing Kurds in the mountains.
The play and production are a mixed bag. The historical background needed by a contemporary British audience avoids klunkiness, the story is engrossing, and the mix of real and fictional characters is intriguing, but the drama is lacking in terms of character development,
Bowers says he wrote the play “because it’s a story that has to be told” and he’s right, not least in the sense that many Kurds credit the political manoeuvre to save hundreds of thousands of lives as evidence that individuals, minorities and committed networks can make a difference even in a world dominated by ruthless power. Many also argue that the success of the safe haven is directly related to the changed status of Iraqi Kurds, who are now recognised in Iraq’s constitution. The current fighting between the new Syrian government and Syrian Kurds, leading to the escape of an unknown number of IS fighters from camps guarded by Kurdish militias, again spotlights the continuing importance of the position of the Kurds in the region.
Safe Haven, £20 - £29, is at the Arcola Theatre, 24 Ashwin Street E8 3DL until 7 February. Info: Arcola
Post-show events:
+ 23 January, Q&A with Chris Bowers
+ 28 January, Q&A with John Singer MP and the High Representative of the Kurdish Regional Government, Karwan Jamal Tahir
+ 30 January, Q&A with Sir Geoffrey Nice and “a real-life key player” in Operation Safe Haven