Piper Christopher "Muz" Muzvuru was the first black piper in the Irish Guards. [1]
Muzvuru was born in Gweru, Zimbabwe, and joined the Irish Guards in 2001. He was killed by sniper fire, along with fellow Irish Guardsman Ian Malone, while serving in Iraq in 2003. [2] [3]
He was given a military funeral at RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire after his body was flown out from Iraq. In his native Zimbabwe, however, he was called a "traitor" by the state-controlled media. He was therefore buried in Gweru in an unmarked grave to prevent desecration of his grave. [4]
Lance Corporal Ian Malone from Dublin, Ireland, was a member of the British Army's Irish Guards. He was the first person born in Ireland to be killed in the Iraq War. Malone's funeral in Dublin was the first funeral with a uniformed British military presence in the Republic of Ireland.
The Air Force of Zimbabwe (AFZ) is the air force of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces. It was known as the Rhodesian Air Force until 1980. The Air Force of Zimbabwe saw service in the Mozambican Civil War in 1985 and the Second Congo War of 1998–2001.
Baqubah is the capital of Iraq's Diyala Governorate. The city is located some 50 km (31 mi) to the northeast of Baghdad, on the Diyala River. In 2003 it had an estimated population of some 280,000 people.
The Royal Scots Dragoon Guards (Carabiniers and Greys) is a cavalry regiment of the British Army, and the senior Scottish regiment. The regiment, through the Royal Scots Greys, is the oldest surviving Cavalry Regiment of the Line in the British Army. The regiment is based at Waterloo Lines, Leuchars Station, as part of 51st Infantry Brigade and Headquarters Scotland, a light adaptable force brigade.
The Irish Guards (IG) is one of the Foot Guards regiments of the British Army and is part of the Guards Division. Together with the Royal Irish Regiment, it is one of the two Irish infantry regiments in the British Army. The regiment has participated in campaigns in the First World War, the Second World War, the Iraq War and the War in Afghanistan as well as numerous other operations throughout its history. The Irish Guards claim six Victoria Cross recipients, four from the First World War and two from the Second World War.
Academi, formerly known as Blackwater and Blackwater Worldwide, is an American private military contractor founded on December 26, 1997, by former Navy SEAL officer Erik Prince. It was renamed Xe Services in 2009, and was again renamed to Academi in 2011, after it was acquired by a group of private investors. In 2014, Academi merged with Triple Canopy to form Constellis Holdings.
Chenjerai Hove, was a Zimbabwean poet, novelist and essayist who wrote in both English and Shona. "Modernist in their formal construction, but making extensive use of oral conventions, Hove's novels offer an intense examination of the psychic and social costs - to the rural population, especially, of the war of liberation in Zimbabwe." He died on 12 July 2015 while living in exile in Norway, with his death attributed to liver failure.
During the early stages of the Iraq War, members of the United States Army and the Central Intelligence Agency committed a series of human rights violations and war crimes against detainees in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. These abuses included physical abuse, sexual humiliation, physical and psychological torture, and rape, as well as the killing of Manadel al-Jamadi and the desecration of his body. The abuses came to public attention with the publication of photographs by CBS News in April 2004, causing shock and outrage and receiving widespread condemnation within the United States and internationally.
Gweru, originally known as Gwelo, is a city in central Zimbabwe. It is on the centre of Midlands Province. Originally an area known to the Ndebele as "The Steep Place" because of the Gweru River's high banks, in 1894 it became the site of a military outpost established by Leander Starr Jameson. In 1914 it attained municipal status, and in 1971 it became a city.
The Imam al Husayn shrine is the mosque and burial site of Husayn ibn Ali, in the holy city of Karbala, Iraq. It stands on the site of the Mausoleum of Husayn, who was a grandson of Muhammad, near the place where he embraced martyrdom during the Battle of Karbala in 680 CE. The tomb of Husayn is one of the holiest sites in Shia Islam, outside of Mecca and Medina, and many make pilgrimages to the site. Every year, millions of pilgrims visit the city to observe Ashura, which marks the commemoration of Husayn's death for all Muslims.
Protais Mpiranya, also known as Sambao Ndume, was a Rwandan military officer and war criminal who was internationally wanted for his alleged role in the Rwandan genocide. Regarded as Rwanda's most wanted fugitive, he was described in 2022 as "one of the world’s most brutal killers", and was internationally recognised as the most sought génocidaire.
The Multi-National Force – Iraq (MNF–I), often referred to as the Coalition forces, was a U.S.-led military command during the Iraq War from 2004 to 2009.
Toby Harnden is a British-American author and journalist who was awarded the Orwell Prize for Books in 2012. He is the author of First Casualty: The Untold Story of the CIA Mission to Avenge 9/11, published by Little, Brown in September, 2021. He spent almost 25 years working for British newspapers, mainly as a foreign correspondent. From 2013 until 2018, he was Washington bureau chief of The Sunday Times. He previously spent 17 years at The Daily Telegraph, based in London, Belfast, Washington, Jerusalem and Baghdad, finishing as US Editor from 2006 to 2011. The book's title is a reference to paramilitary officer Johnny Micheal Spann, a member of the CIA's Team Alpha, whose eight members became the first Americans behind enemy lines in Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks of 2001. He is the author of two previous books: Bandit Country: The IRA & South Armagh (1999) and Dead Men Risen: The Welsh Guards and the Defining Story of Britain's War in Afghanistan (2011). He was reporter and presenter of the BBC Panorama Special programme Broken by Battle about suicide and PTSD among British soldiers, broadcast in 2013.
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Gweru is a suffragan diocese in the city of Gweru in the ecclesiastical province of Bulawayo in Zimbabwe.
Patrick Kombayi was a Zimbabwean businessman, a former mayor of Gweru and an active member of the Movement for Democratic Change-Tsvangirai faction in the Midlands Province. He served in the Senate of Zimbabwe for the Chirumhanzu-Gweru senatorial constituency. Kombayi, a student of Robert Mugabe, was the first black train driver in Zimbabwe. He joined Rhodesia Railways after pursuing an unsatisfying career as a schoolteacher. Posted to Zambia, Kombayi became involved with the Zimbabwe African National Union.
Nathan B. "Nate" Bruckenthal was a United States coast guardsman who was killed in the Iraq War, becoming the first to die in wartime action since the Vietnam War. Bruckenthal and two U.S. Navy sailors were killed while intercepting a waterborne suicide attack on an offshore oil terminal off the coast of Iraq in the northern Persian Gulf in 2004.
Gweru District is a district in the Midlands Province of Zimbabwe.
Beira-Bulawayo railway, also called Machipanda railway, Beira-Harare-Bulawayo railway and Beira railway, is a railway that connects the city of Beira, Mozambique, to the city of Bulawayo, in Zimbabwe. It is 850 km long, in a 1067 mm gauge.
George Payne Kahari was a Zimbabwean diplomat, educator, arts administrator and writer. He served as an ambassador to Germany, Italy and Czechoslovakia. He has been Visiting Professor of Modern African Literature at a number of American universities. After his stint as a diplomat, Professor Kahari was the first black director at the National Gallery of Zimbabwe. He was one of the founders of the Catholic University of Zimbabwe, which was established in 1999.