Diamond Bar Engineer Who Fled Kuwait Says 30 Others Hesitated

A chemical engineer for an Alhambra oil-drilling firm who escaped this week from Iraqi-occupied Kuwait said about 30 Westerners in his residential compound could easily have fled into Saudi Arabia during the first few days after the Iraqi invasion but decided to stay put on the advice of U.S. Embassy officials.

Sangarapillai Sivapathasundaram, a Sri Lankan national who has applied for U.S. citizenship, said embassy officials counseled Americans to remain in their apartment complex in Ahmadi, 15 miles from the Saudi border, and await instructions.

“The embassy said, ‘Stay put--we’ll make evacuation plans for you when the time comes,’ ” Sivapathasundaram said Friday as he sat with wife and three children in the living room of their Diamond Bar apartment.

A State Department spokesman confirmed that Americans were told to stay at home because “at that time, we didn’t know where the Iraqis were or where this would all lead.”

Today, an estimated 12,000 Westerners have been detained in Iraq and Kuwait, including about 3,000 Americans, and there is widespread fear that they could be used as human shields in the event of attack.

“It’s easy to predict in hindsight,” the State Department spokesman said. “Ten days ago, we expected the Iraqis to roll right into Saudi Arabia.”

As stories from the front trickle in from escapees, they shed light on events and decisions made during those early, confusing days and how the consequences of those actions continue to reverberate across the world.

Although Iraq first invaded Kuwait on Aug. 2, Sivapathasundaram said it took troops two days to reach Ahmadi and to mass enough soldiers at the Saudi border to seal off the southern escape route. Unlike the capital of Kuwait city, which was ransacked by invading Iraqi troops, Ahmadi suffered little destruction, and Sivapathasundaram said he witnessed no violence by Iraqi troops.

One exception occurred at a Safeway supermarket, which was looted and burned to the ground by Iraqis venting their anger at a symbol of American consumerism, the engineer said.

Sivapathasundaram, 43, who worked for the Alhambra-based Santa Fe International Corp. in Kuwait for five years, said he shared the foreign compound with American, British, Australian, Indian and Taiwanese nationals who worked for Western and Kuwaiti oil firms. The group defied Iraqi orders to assemble at a nearby hotel on Aug. 16 and were still at the compound when Sivapathasundaram left Aug. 18, abandoning all his possessions.

At the time of his departure, the group had stockpiled enough food for about two months and was attempting to obtain medicine from nearby hospitals to counteract the effects of possible chemical attack.

The engineer, who has a green card allowing him to live and work permanently in the United States, said he decided to make an independent break for freedom despite U.S. assurances that he would be part of any evacuation of American residents.

Sivapathasundaram was turned back on his first escape attempt 12 miles from the Saudi border. A second attempt failed when he was unable to connect with a Bedouin guide who charged $100 to ferry foreigners across the border by way of obscure desert trails.

He finally succeeded by traveling under his Sri Lankan passport as part of a convoy of Indian nationals led by a Palestinian guide. The convoy drove 680 miles across Kuwait and through Iraq, including Baghdad, before reaching freedom in Jordan. At roadblocks every 50 miles, the Iraqis stopped and searched their cars for weapons before waving them on.

The engineer said Iraqi soldiers held up a convoy of Hungarians for hours at the border, examining their passports assiduously to make sure they were not Americans attempting to sneak out with false papers.

Sivapathasundaram said the roads were littered with the shells of cars that the Iraqis had stripped of their engines and tires. The group also passed massive convoys of advancing Iraqi troops and tanks that snaked for up to three miles along the highway.

Before his escape, Sivapathasundaram said he and the other residents of the compound--including seven women--spent their days watching Cable News Network and listening to the British Broadcasting Corp. and Voice of America. For diversion, they played games, and two men even took to indoor jogging to keep up morale.

The Americans never left the compound for fear of attack by Iraqi soldiers, relying instead on Sivapathasundaram and several other non-Western colleagues to make trips into town for provisions. As of Aug. 18, about 5% of the food stores were still open, selling canned food, biscuits and Arabic bread, Sivapathasundaram said.

He said the Americans in his compound were in daily contact with the U.S. Embassy via telex and fax machines. The group learned of the invasion early Aug. 2, when friends called them from Kuwait city and told them that the Iraqis were swarming over northern Kuwait.

At first, Sivapathasundaram said he and his colleagues were nonplussed, believing that Iraqi soldiers would loot Kuwait city, seize some of the rich oil-producing fields along the county’s Persian Gulf coast and then beat a retreat.

“All of us could have gotten out easily, especially on the first day,” Sivapathasundaram said. “But we thought, ‘OK, we’ll sit tight; they’ll loot, and then they’ll go back.’ ”