REPORTER: Fouad Hady

I have come back to Baghdad, my home town. It is not my first visit since the war but I am still worried about kidnappings and suicide bombers. I am staying in Karrada, near the Green Zone. It was once a peaceful, well-off suburb where people came to eat and relax. There are cafes and barbers and fruit and vegetable sellers. It seems normal enough, but people have been scarred by Iraq’s recent history.

MAN (Translation): The situation is bad, work is bad, life is hard..

This man says he was injured during the US invasion.

MAN (Translation): Yes, by American bombing.

REPORTER (Translation): Where were you injured?

MAN (Translation): In my stomach. It exited out my back, severing a nerve in my leg and disabling me.

REPORTER (Translation): Did they compensate you?

MAN (Translation): Not at all. I got nothing, no treatment or anything.

There are many more street sellers in Karrada since the US invasion, more people trying anything to make a living. And you see this everywhere in Baghdad since the war. These people once lived in this street but have been killed, mostly by insurgents.

REPORTER (Translation): Which is your son?

MAN 2(Translation): That one, with the glasses.

Because politicians and diplomats live here, and it's close to the Green Zone, Karrada has become a special target for insurgents. People who work on the street are especially at risk.

REPORTER (Translation): How is work today?

WALID DINAR (Translation): Well actually, nobody’s got any money, three out of four people who come here ask about the price and go.

Walid Dinar is one of many victims of violence. He received horrible injuries from a car bomb in July last year.

WALID DINAR (Translation): I went behind the car to the boot, I thought I would open it to check it out, but I hardly touched it when the car blew up and I was thrown about 100 metres. I was wounded in my leg and all over this side, I stayed in hospital for about seven months, three months in a coma. I ended up 13 million dinars in debt. The government said they would send me abroad for treatment but only gave me a passport.

Walid needs more treatment but is already badly in debt from his operations.

WALID DINAR (Translation): After seven months in hospital I went to apply and they told me there was a time limit for American compensation and I had lost my right. They did not compensate me for anything. The MP Haider al-Abadi, promised to get me compensation but nothing happened. Another MP sent for me, but nothing happened. They promised to compensate me or treat me abroad this week, next week..

REPORTER (Translation): False promises.

WALID DINAR (Translation): All false promises.

These are Walid's nephews. He's trying to support them, four sisters and his mother and father. There's no way he can make ends meet.

REPORTER (Translation): How is your life in Iraq? Can you explain it to me?

WALID DINAR (Translation): Life is very difficult, you leave for work in the morning but you don’t know if you will come back or not. Our life is very miserable, the government makes promises but nothing happens, car bombs everywhere and innocent people getting killed.

Like all citizens, Walid has to cope with power cuts and no water. You see small pumps like this all over Baghdad now.

WALID DINAR (Translation): It is a well because there is no running water.

REPORTER (Translation): What are these?

WALID DINAR (Translation): Wires from the generator. There is no electricity it’s like this on both sides of the street. All these wires come from the generator, thousand of wires in every street because there is no state electricity. The Minister of Electricity says he has fixed it but it is off 18 hours a day, sometimes it is not on at all.

Baghdad's power problem has created a new industry of generator sales and repairs - something that many Karrada residents can't afford. But the power shortage has made work for some, like Abu Hussein.

ABU HUSSEIN (Translation): Sometimes I fix them twice a month, they are cheap quality, rubbish.

REPORTER (Translation): How long has it been like this?

ABU HUSSEIN (Translation): It has been four years, people are selling their furniture to buy generators. And some live in the dark with their children because they can’t afford them. I swear to God, I often fix generators and don’t charge anything. You have to help people, what can you do?

Like many, Abu Hussein has lost a family member. His brother was killed by a security company as he hailed a taxi.

ABU HUSSEIN (Translation): But they told us Bremer’s law says, you can’t sue foreign companies for killing Iraqis. That’s the country for you and that is all I have to say. That’s the state of your country and government, you are Iraqi in name only. If they granted us approval now we would not stay in Iraq another single day, if they gave us passports and visas, we would go to another country.

As we are talking, a US patrol arrives. I’ve got to be careful with the filming. The children don't mind the patrol but business owners say they drive customers away. The street is quiet after they arrive and they are not happy with the camera.

SOLDIER: Turn it off.

Filming anywhere is a problem. My camera makes me a kidnap target. Even though I grew up here, I still need a security guard with me all the time. He has a gun and has two men with AK47s. For security reasons, they don't want to be filmed.

ABU HUSSEIN (Translation): A child like this doesn’t know what a funfair is or what a Ferris wheel is, he does not know what a park is, at his age, he does not know what a park is. What is with this country? Our generation used to go to restaurants, nightclubs.. we lived a little. He does not know what a cinema is, at his age. What will become of this generation?

Even the barbers of Karrada have a story to tell. The insurgents tried to stop them shaving and cutting beards.

AL-SHARI, BARBER (Translation): I got death threats, I fled to Amman and stayed for a year and a half.

Like all barbers, al-Shari is happy to talk.

AL-SHARI (Translation): People need to put food on the table, it is a crime that a young man doesn’t have 5000 dinars in his pocket. But I am always getting customers who want a haircut on credit. I have been in this business for 18 years but it never happened to me until after the war, even a haircut is now on credit. What can I say about the Americans? They are just killing people. What have they done? Liberated us? No they have not, we are an occupied country. If the Americans leave we will have stability, it will be in our hands.

Because of the power cuts, al-Shari depends on this generator. It runs non-stop all day and in the car park is another reminder of Karrada's problems.

AL-SHARI (Translation): I almost died in a car bombing here, it blew up in our faces almost killing us. God was merciful to our children, to our families, to those who make a living with me. Six cars were burned here, it was a terrorist act, an explosion.

Today I've come to Ghazali cemetery with Yasser Mohammed. He lost nine of his family, including his brother and cousins, when a suicide bomber attacked. 70 people died in the blast.

YASSER MOHAMMED (Translation): I was wearing a jacket, it was winter and I could feel it burning and melting on me. That man... I did not know who he was.. I don’t think he is a human being, because no human being does what he did. He took the things I was carring, he put his hand in m y pocket..

REPORTER (Translation): He robbed you?

YASSER MOHAMMED (Translation): He robbed me and didn’t even get me out, he left me there and took off. I remember that they put me on a truck, on the tray of a pick-up truck. Someone said I was fine and should be put on first, so they did, and started piling others on top of me, injured people, dead people, corpses... I don’t know what else, I almost suffocated.

This is Yasser's brother Mustafa, who was killed in the attack, and his three children. There is no breadwinner in this family now. Yasser's eye could not be saved and had to be replaced. But many of Iraq's good doctors have left the country. He was advised to go to Iran for the operation but his family couldn't afford it.

YASSER MOHAMMED (Translation): So we started knocking on the doors of political parties, politicians and those who say that they take care of the injured and victims, but we never got any money or any kind of assistance and no one helped me to travel abroad for an operation.

REPORTER (Translation): Why is this area targeted?

YASSER MOHAMMED (Translation): Karrada is one of the nicer and more attractive areas where people feel safe and come to shop, and some people do not like that and they do not want the country to be stable or to see a beautiful quite area where nothing has happened.

This was once a peaceful part of Karrada but a bomb went off in July last year. The locals say over 200 people were killed. It is just a wasteland now.

MAN 3 (Translation): This room was the home of one of the four families that lived here, the debris from this room is all that is left, the rest of the house has become rubble.

Unlike many, this boy's family received 5 million Iraqi dinars in compensation. That's about US$4,000.

BOY (Translation): What is the use of 5 million if someone has lost four or five members of his family? It is useless, we will give them 5 million and let them bring our dead back.

There are many families in Karrada who wish they could bring back their dead. This is the bedroom of Wisam Saleh. His mother, Batoul Abdul Hussein, has kept it like a shrine. Wisam was an Iraqi soldier patrolling Baghdad. The identity sign on his vehicle wasn't working. He was killed last year by US forces.

BATOUL ABDUL HUSSEIN (Translation): The end was difficult, my whole life changed when this happened.

According to his mother, the Americans came to see him as he was dying in hospital.

BATOUL ABDUL HUSSEIN (Translation): They apologised on behalf of President Bush and said they would treat him, they knew he was an only child, in the documents I lodged they knew he was an only child. He was my support, I had nobody else.

The family submitted a full compensation claim but were rejected twice. This letter from the US Army says there is no evidence US forces did anything wrong.

US LETTER: “Accordingly, your claim must be denied.”

BATOUL ABDUL HUSSEIN (Translation): A man sitting next to me at the base said “Why wouldn’t they compensate for a human being when he is your only son and support? My cow in Arab Jabour was hit by shrapnel and I was compensated because I told them I lived off it. Why wouldn’t they compensate for a human being?” Where are human rights? They came to Iraq to save Iraq, right? Now the killings are still going on, indiscriminate, intentional or unintentional.

It's extremely hot in the day, so I go out at dusk. This is the Karrada I remember - shops full of goods, footpaths crowded - but as I walk around, I can't help thinking about suicide bombers. No-one seems concerned about the security situation, the American occupation, or anything else at this cafe. The Iraqi soccer team is playing, and scoring. The victory wouldn't be complete without guns firing.
Today we are off to see a woman I met. She is a well-known artist. But first, there is a checkpoint, one of many in Karrada.

SOLDIER (Translation): Hello, where have you come from?

REPORTER (Translation): Baghdad, going to Karrada.

SOLDIER (Translation): Your ID please. Do you have your weapon, can I have a look at it?

The authorities are at least trying to improve security. I'm glad to have my guard with me.

HANAN ALANSARI, ARTIST: Welcome in my small house.

Hanan Alansari used to work and show her paintings at a studio. But the insurgents threatened her as well.

HANAN ALANSARI (Translation): My home has become my personal exhibition and gallery where friends come to view my paintings and see my aspirations and ideas in the painting.

This painting was done after her girlfriend's two children, aged two and four, were killed when a shell hit their house.

HANAN ALANSARI (Translation): Her two year old son was blown to bits nothing was left of his body except his hand. They said that his father only found his hand - he found nothing of his body except his hand, so I expressed that in this painting. This also is a caricature – I put eyes of the former president inside a frame of blood like someone who has drowned in a sea of blood.

Hanan once loved to go outdoors. But now she feels like a prisoner in her own home.

HANAN ALANSARI (Translation): Karrada was really safe before, I used to go there to eat, for a change, but not now. I go out thinking there’s a car bomb, an explosive devise or some gang will confront me....it’s scary. When I was young I never heard of any discrimination between Sunnis and Shias, I never heard my parents differentiate between Sunni and Shia. These sectarian wars did not exist, they appeared after the fall of Iraq and were brought about by a group that wanted to create this atmosphere, applying the principle of divide and rule.

Some say things are getting better in Baghdad. But after two weeks in Karrada I'm not so sure. In my short visit I have seen many broken lives, so many children without fathers. I wonder what will become of my country.