FRONTLINE INTERVIEWS

Interview Brig. Gen. Karl. Horst

From 2005 to 2006 Horst was deputy commanding general of the U.S. Army 3rd Infantry Division, responsible for security in and around Baghdad. He recounts his discovery of a secret Ministry of Interior detention/torture center holding 169 detainees, nearly all Sunni, many tortured. It was another indicator of the extent to which militia forces had infiltrated this key ministry, which is in charge of Iraq's national police. This is the edited transcript of an interview conducted on Feb. 9, 2007.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gangsofiraq/interviews/horst.html

Interview Abdul Aziz al-Hakim

Shi'ite cleric Abdul Aziz al-Hakim heads the Shi'ite SCIRI party (Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq) and he is the main rival of powerful Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. After spending 20 years in Iran leading the 10,000-man Badr Corps, an anti-Saddam militia, Hakim and his older brother, Ayatollah Muhammad Baqr al-Hakim, ended their exile after Saddam's fall in 2003. Hakim's brother was considered by many to be Iraq's new leader. But three months after the Hakims' return, Sunni insurgents detonated a car bomb outside the holy Shi'ite shrine in Najaf, killing his brother. The Shi'a never forgot.Hakim's Shi'ite party won a majority in parliament in the January 2005 elections and he quickly placed party members and Badr militiamen in top government posts. He selected one of his party's top deputies, Bayan Jabr, to head up the Ministry of Interior. Jabr started restaffing the ministry's commando units, largely Sunni, with Badr Corps commanders. This is the edited transcript of an interview conducted Nov. 15, 2006, and is translated from Arabic. Editor's Note: FRONTLINE previously interviewed Hakim in December 2003.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gangsofiraq/interviews/hakim.html

Interview Bayan Jabr

A top deputy in the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), a major Shi'ite political party, Jabr was appointed minister of interior after the Iraqi elections in January 2005. After his appointment, allegations surfaced that the Ministry was serving as cover for Shi'ite militia forces bent on eliminating Sunni rivals. Jabr denies this and says his forces were focused only on taking out terrorists and insurgents. This is the edited transcript of an interview conducted on Nov. 21, 2006.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gangsofiraq/interviews/jabr.html

Interview with Gen. David Petraeus

Currently the top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. Petraeus was sent by the Pentagon in mid-2004 to take charge of training Iraqi security forces. In this interview, Gen. Petraeus talks about challenges he faced back then in coordinating a revamped training system amid growing sectarian violence and insurgent activity and whether sectarian militias were infiltrating the civilian security forces during that period. This is the edited transcript of an interview conducted on Oct. 11, 2006.

http://www.pbs.org/search/frontline/redir/http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gangsofiraq/interviews/petraeus.html

Interview Matthew Sherman

As deputy senior adviser to Iraq's Ministry of Interior from December 2003 to January 2006, Matthew Sherman advised four ministers and in this interview offers a detailed, inside view of the obstacles in building an Iraqi civilian security force that could staunch the escalating insurgency and sectarian violence. This is the edited transcript of an interview conducted on Oct. 4, 2006.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gangsofiraq/interviews/sherman.html

Interview Dexter Filkins

From 2003 to 2006 Filkins reported from Baghdad for The New York Times and won a George Polk Award for his coverage of the Marines' bloody battle in Fallujah in November of 2004. This is the edited transcript of an interview conducted on Dec. 22, 2006.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gangsofiraq/interviews/filkins.html