Two Montreal peace activists, Lisa Ndejuru and Zehira Houfani, with the Iraq Peace Team left Baghdad early yesterday morning and crossed the border into Jordan safely.

Their road from Baghdad to Amman was fraught with danger. Reuters reported that two buses of peace activists travelling from Jordan into Iraq were attacked by U.S. warplanes. The wounded were being treated in a hospital near the Jordanian border. Reports of Iraqi civilians being attacked by U.S. forces as they flee Baghdad are starting to emerge. Iraq Peace Team members who made the journey from Baghdad to Amman one day earlier had a car accident, and were rescued and treated by Iraqi civilians,before arriving in Jordan.

Montrealers Lisa Ndejuru and Zehira Houfani were in Baghdad before theU.S./British invasion began. They experienced the bombings and are eyewitnesses to the devastation that is taking place in the city. After the bombing campaign started, theirdaily routine consisted of visits to hospitals, home visits, and tours of bombing sites. They were sending frequent reports back to Canada by e-mail before U.S. forcesdestroyed communications facilities in Baghdad last Thursday, effectivelycutting off their links to the outside world.

The two peace activists were in Baghdad as members of the Iraq Peace Team,an initiative of the Chicago-based Voices in the Wilderness. Their objectivein staying in Baghdad during the war was to show solidarity with the peopleof Iraq and bear witness to the impact of the war on people there. A thirdQuebec member of the team, Robert Turcotte, remains in Baghdad tocontinue this work, together with eleven other members of the Iraq PeaceTeam.