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BAGHDAD, 12 April 2007 (IRIN) - BAGHDAD, 12 April 2007 (IRIN) - All three of Saleh Rabia’a’s children have been killed in different incidents since the US-led invasion of Iraq began in 2003. As a result, his wife Samya developed mental problems. Living alone since Samya was taken to a mental hospital, 34-year-old Rabia’a, an engineer, is struggling to control his emotions and keep his own sanity.
"I never imagined that the violence would come to my home. I’ve worked hard over the years to have my dreams realised - to marry a nice woman and to have many children. The dream was coming true until this war began and destroyed everything.
"The war made me lose my children and my wife. During the initial invasion [April 2003], my eight-year-old son Omar was playing with some friends outside our home in [Baghdad’s] Dora district when a stray bullet hit him in his head. We never knew where it came from but people said that it was probably fired by [former President] Saddam Hussein’s officials who were in the area at the time, preparing to fight US troops.
"A year later, my four-year-old son Ahmed was killed during an attack in Fallujah. He was with relatives in their house and couldn’t come back to Baghdad because the roads were closed. A bomb destroyed the whole house, killing seven people including my son.
"Those days were terrible. My wife started to become mentally disturbed. Doctors told me that her psychological problems were related to the impact the death of my sons had had in her life.
"To make matters worse, in October 2006 my 11-year-old daughter Samira was killed as she was coming home from her school. A car bomb exploded near the shops she was passing by. She had serious injuries and died a few hours later.
"Since then, I have tried to find a reason to live. I don’t have parents and two months ago my wife had to be taken to a mental hospital for treatment. She couldn’t stand the last death of her offspring and had what the doctors called a nervous collapse.
"I work in a company that does construction projects for private companies and for the government. Since October last year, I’ve not been able to concentrate. When I asked for a few days off, they told me that people in Iraq die every day and their relatives live on - and because of the high number of projects to do, I couldn’t take even a couple of days off to rest.
"Friends try to comfort me but it is hard to accept the loss of all my children in four years’ of occupation. If they died from diseases, I would understand. But I cannot accept that because of an unfair and destructive war, I lost everyone who I ever loved and who one day I dreamt to see growing up with health and hope.
"I don’t know what to do with my life now. Once, I tried to commit suicide but God took this out of my mind and I hope he gives me a reason to continue living in this world."