Ever since Sara Saleem crawled out of her prison window in Basra 11 years ago, the Iraqi-born Kurdish American citizen has been waiting for the kind of help she once expected her government would provide — ensuring that her captors receive proper punishment and that her own stolen fortune is restored.
She's still waiting.
Two decades ago, Saleem became chief of engineering for a property development firm co-owned by Nechir al Barzani, then Kurdistan’s prime minister.
Years later, her business and engineering acumen enabled her company, Al Saqr Al Jarih, to begin construction of a massive residential and mixed-use development called Safat Al Basra.
In an unusual partnership with Nizar, Namir, and Ramez Hanna Nasri (the Hanna brothers), she secured a $100 million loan (using some of their properties as collateral) from the Trade Bank of Iraq to expand and finish the project.
Saleem claims the Hanna brothers left the project unfinished and extorted the money — and apparently, the bank did not foreclose on their properties, leaving the loan repayment in limbo.
On top of that, she was kidnapped by unknown men [whom she now believes were Hezbollah operatives with ties to Iran] who first demanded she hand over the entire loan amount, then opted to settle for $2 million (the Hanna brothers allegedly paid $8 million), perhaps as a "tithe," to finance political campaigns by allies of outgoing Iraqi president Nouri al-Maliki.
She was accused of being a CIA or Mossad agent, tortured, and threatened with death and dismemberment but miraculously found a way to escape.
When she sought help from Iraqi President Fuad Masum (a fellow Kurd), rockets were fired at the presidential palace. She then went to the U.S. Embassy, which helped her fly back to the United States.
However, upon her arrival, she was subjected to repeated eight-hour questioning sessions from FBI officials. After each of her nine interviews, the FBI said they would take action on her behalf.
"They never did," she says.
"My case has been sleeping for 11 years. Not one arrest warrant. Not one move."
Official Washington admits (via a 2021 GAO report) that U.S. agencies lack comprehensive systems to track citizens detained or harmed abroad. Rep. Michael Cloud, R-Texas, introduced the "Freeing Americans Detained Abroad Act" in 2023, but it languished in Congress.
But that alone does not explain the diffidence toward corrupt Iraqi judges and politicians toward an American citizen — and leading Iraqi businesswoman.
Meanwhile, things got worse. When Saleem returned to Iraq in 2017 to try to recover her $1.5 billion business empire (Iraq’s largest real estate firm led by a woman), her passport was seized and a warrant was issued for her arrest.
That led Saleem to file a lawsuit in Iraq against the Hanna brothers, who had been convicted of fraud, sentenced to three years in prison, and then "miraculously" released after allegedly paying a $15 million bribe to an Iraqi judge.
This is not surprising, as a recent London School of Economics study found that judicial corruption in Iraq "poses a risk to the rule of law" and serves the interests of Iraq’s Shia political elite — apparently at the expense of anyone Kurd and female.
Her Iraqi court case was derailed thanks to Iraq’s judicial kingpin — Supreme Judicial Council President Faiq Zaidan, who holds near-complete sway over both the SJC and Iraq’s Federal Supreme Court. Under Zaidan’s "leadership," says the LSE report, politicized networks of corruption and pay-for-play rulings have become the norm, as the courts siphon money, some of which ends up with Islamic extremists.
By then, both the Trade Bank of Iraq and her former employer Nechirvan Barzani had joined with her accusers — and where was the U.S. State Department in the midst of these shenanigans? Saleem believes the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad has been unprotective and may have even shared confidential court documents with Iraqi officials. Iraqi officials, she says, have boasted that Embassy staff work for them — not for Americans.
Last December, Saleem hired the law firm of human rights attorney Robert Amsterdam to steer her lawsuit against Justice Zaidan and several other senior Iraqi officials under the U.S. Anti-Terrorism and Torture Victims Protection Acts.
The charges include "brutal acts of extortion, kidnapping, torture, and attempted murder."
Justic Zaidan had close ties with assassinated Iranian terrorist Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani and issued a warrant for the arrest of President Trump after his timely death.
Current U.S. National Security Adviser Michael Waltz called Justice Zaidan and the SJC "tools of Iranian influence" in Iraq and effectively an enemy undermining his own nation for wealth and power.
On Saleem’s behalf, Amsterdam is seeking a $2 billion payout to cover the loss of her financial empire and the physical, psychological, and mental abuses she has suffered under the Iraqi judicial and political systems.
While Saleem hopefully says, "I have faith in the U.S. justice system," her attorneys have also asked President Donald Trump to intervene in her case.
Human rights organizations have not championed her cause. Why? Nor has the U.S. State Department — four months after her meetings with their human rights staff!
But to whom else can she go?
As Saleem says, "If my own government won’t act, who will?"
Duggan Flanakin worked for Barry Goldwater, and has written for the Washington Free Press, and Christian Restoration Ministries. He's also edited environmental policy newsletters. A senior fellow at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, he is also a policy analyst for CFACT (Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow). Additionally, Mr. Flanakin is a poet, music promoter, and Sunday school teacher. Read Flanakin's reports — More Here.
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