A Very British Killing: The Death of Baha Mousa

(Paperback)

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Winner of the Orwell Prize for Political Writing 2013 This is the true story of a murder that sums up the stink of invading Iraq and why the Iraq story is far from over. On 14 September 2003 Baha Mousa, a hotel receptionist, was arrested in Basra by British troops and taken to a military base for questioning. Less than forty-eight hours later he was dead. In A Very British Killing A.T. Williams tells the inside story of this crime and its aftermath, exposing the casual brutality, bureaucratic apathy, and instituional failure to hold people criminally responsible for Mousa's death. What it reveals about Britain and its political and military institutions is explosive.

Reviews

A deserving winner of the Orwell Prize * Independent *
[An] incendiary, eloquent account... A brilliantly researched indictment which argues that torture is endemic in the military -- Arifa Akbar * Independent *
For all its forensic detail, the book grips us emotionally, and has as keen a sense of storytelling as a horror story or courtroom drama. Ultimately, the greatest achievement of this incendiary, eloquent and angry book is that it humanises Mousa beyond the iconic and infamous figure he has become in his death * Judges of the Orwell Prize for Political Writing 2013 *
This is a landmark book. Fluently, meticulously, A. T. Williams allows us to understand both the murderous nature of colonial war and the insidious moral corruption behind its institutional facades -- John Pilger
What to do after reading it some might put this book away and try to forget about it, the way you would a bad dream. Others will feel changed by the awareness. A few will channel their feelings into action. There can't be any better definition of political writing at its most excellent * Independent *

Author Bio

A. T. Williams won the George Orwell Prize for Political Writing in 2013 for his book A Very British Killing- The Death of Baha Mousa. He lives in Warwickshire.