The City of Baghdad held it 14th grand annual international celebration in the same spirit and tradition as it was first held since September 22nd 1987. 

Historically this tradition coincides with the new year in accordance with the Babylonian Calendar. The celebration used to be held during the first 5 days
of the year.

The main outstanding feature of the festival for this year was the variety of the international artist groups, who had taken the effort to contribute to this festivity, declaring their sympathy and their support for the Iraqi people despite the hardship that confronts the Iraqi society in their daily life as a result of the embargo, which was imposed on Iraq by the UN more than a decade ago.

In return the packed audience had responded objectively to the outstanding performance which took place on the four open air theatres, which were created in the historic City of Babylon. Thousands of people were applauding at the end of each performance and calling for encores to show their admiration and appreciation to the level of performance by guest artists of the festival.

Total number of artist group who contributed to the festival arrived at 46 in addition to 40 other local artists. The non-Iraqi groups came from neighbouring Arab countries such as Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Palestine, Jordan, Libya, and the UAE. From Europe, Italian, French, Romanian, Hungarian, Bulgarian, Finish and Swedish group. There was even a pop group from U.K. From Venezuela, a dancing group performed an outstanding show, which presented memorable moment of Latin American Music and folklore dancing, to be remembered by the Iraqi audience. In addition, there were groups from Armenia, Azerbaijan, India and China, whose folklore dancing added a special flavour to the spirit of the festival.

The opening ceremony of the festival was booked for the grand performance by the Iraqi Fashion House in a dazzling demonstration as to the classical fashions of the Babylonian Era, with the main theme as to how mankind had invented the methods of writing as a means of communication. This particular performance had a superb background, which was just perfect to suit the occasion.

During the ten nights of the festival, various activities took place including the four open-air theatres at which mainly folk dancing and singing was presented with the exception of the Algerian night, at which 40 members of the Algerian National Symphony Orchestra gave a profound performance of classic music composition of Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms. It was the only night of exclusive performance of classical music. It was televised by the Iraqi TV channel.

With all the hard work, which was needed to make such an event a success,
the results arrived at the anticipated expectations, and the Ministry of Culture intends to continue sponsoring future events such as the Babylon Festival 2003.

Saad D. Hassan
Sharoor Enterprise
Baghdad, Iraq