Muqtada: Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shia Revival, and the Struggle for Iraq

Featuring:
Patrick Cockburn, author, Muqtada

Interviewed by:
Nadia Bilbassy-Charters, Senior Correspondent, Middle East Broadcasting Centre

With introductory remarks by:
Rick Barton, Co-Director, PCR Project, CSIS

The PCR Project’s Mixed Blessings report recommends a broader public discussion of religion to improve U.S. government engagement with religion abroad. As the first event in a series devoted to improving the understanding of prominent religious figures, we welcome Patick Cockburn, author of Muqtada: Muqtada al-Sadr, the Shia Revival, and the Struggle for Iraq. Cockburn, along with MBC News Senior Correspondent Nadia Bilbassy-Charters, will discuss Muqtada al-Sadr, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, and the Iraqi army move into Basra, Sadr City and Mosul.

Nadia Bilbassy-Charters is the Senior Correspondent for MBC News (Middle East Broadcasting Centre). Prior to moving to Washington, she was embedded with the 101st Marines Divison in Kuwait on the push to Baghdad in March 2003. From 1997 to 2003, Bilbassy was the Bureau Chief for MBC TV, Middle East Broadcasting Centre based in Nairobi, Kenya, where she covered most of Africa's conflicts. She has traveled extensively in southern Sudan with the SPLA, The Sudan People’s Liberation Army. She reported regularly from war torn areas like the DRC, Rwanda, and Burundi. She has been in and out of Mogadishu during her six year tenure in Africa. Ms. Bilbassy was based in Sri Lanka between 1990-1994, covering the country's civil war for The Independent and later for IPS. She started her career as a correspondent for Agence France-Presse in 1987, where she covered the first Palestinian Intifada in the West Bank and Gaza. Ms. Bilbassy has a B.A. in humanities from Bradford University, UK and a master's degree in journalism from City University in London.

Patrick Cockburn is the Iraq correspondent for The Independent in London. He has visited Iraq countless times since 1977 and was recipient of the 2004 Martha Gellhorn Prize for war reporting as well as the 2006 James Cameron Memorial Award. He is the coauthor, with his brother, Andrew Cockburn, of Saddam Hussein: An American Obsession and the author of Getting Russia Wrong: The End of Kremlinology, The Broken Boy, and The Occupation: War and Resistance in Iraq, which was short-listed for a National Book Critics Circle Award in 2007.

Visit our blog, www.pcrproject.com, for publications, commentary, and more information about our work.