Managua, 11 June 2024

Dear Zaid,

I write to you with a heavy heart. You may not remember me, but we have spoken at least once or twice when my dear friend and brother Ramsey Clark put me on the phone with you.  That was a few years ago and now I am almost totally deaf and need to see the lips of people when they speak to hold a conversation.   That is why I am writing this e-mail at the very kind offering of Naji Haraj and Curtis Doebbler.

I am extremely sad, beyond my capacity to express in words, for I did (and do) love Tariq very much.  We were good friends and we both believed and worked for the Reign that it was Jesus’ mission to proclaim.

Your father, Zaid, was a great man and a rare example of a Christian in world where too many leaders are ready

to make compromises. He was the face of the great Iraqi Revolution and he was much loved and respected by decent people throughout the world.

We went to mass together in the outskirts of Baghdad in what I think was a very old church from Nestorian times.  I had the opportunity to meet all of its priests and have breakfast with them, together with your Dad. With dismay I later heard that the church, and all the priests in it, were destroyed by one of the “smart bombs” of the genocidal U.S. empire.

I hope you can take some comfort in knowing that Tariq willingly gave up his freedom, and ultimately his life, for the well-being of his family and know that your own ability to love others, in no small part, derives from the example and love he generously bestowed on you, your mother and siblings. Your ability to follow his example as a man of principle, a leader, husband and father is, I believe, the greatest tribute that any son can offer his parents.

Zaid, my love and condolences to you, your mother and all the family and we shall remain, as before, united in prayer until the day of our Resurrection, when once again you will be rejoined with your father and I with my dear friend Tariq.

Until then may you feel God’s grace and the loving presence of persons around the globe, Christians and Muslims, believers and non-believers, who share your suffering and feel your loss at this special moment.

Love and blessings,

Father Miguel

Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann

Managua

* Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann, M.M.,  Nicaraguan former Foreign Minister, President of the United Nations General Assembly from September 2024 to September 2024