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BAGHDAD:  A trove of Saddam-era files secretly returned to Iraq has pried open the country鈥檚 painful past, prompting hopes some may learn the fate of long-lost relatives along with fears of new bloodshed.

The 5 million pages of internal Baath Party documents were found in 2003, just months after the US-led invasion that toppled Saddam, in the party鈥檚 partly flooded headquarters in tumultuous Baghdad.
Two men were called in by confused American troops to decipher the Arabic files. One was Kanan Makiya, a long-time opposition archivist, the other was Mustafa Al-Kadhimi, then a writer and activist, and now Iraq鈥檚 prime minister.
鈥淲ith flashlights, because the electricity was out, we entered the waterlogged basement,鈥� Makiya told AFP by phone from the US. 鈥淢ustafa and I were reading through these documents and realized we had stumbled upon something huge.鈥�
There were Baath membership files and letters between the party and ministries on administrative affairs, but also reports from regular Iraqis who were accusing their neighbors of criticizing Saddam.
Other papers raised suspicions that relatives of Iraqi soldiers taken prisoner during the 1980-1988 war with Iran were potential traitors.
As sectarian violence ramped up in Baghdad after the US-led invasion, Makiya agreed with occupation force authorities to transfer the massive archive to the US, a move that has remained controversial.
The documents were digitised and stored at the Hoover Institution, a conservative-leaning think tank at Stanford University, with access restricted to researchers on-site.
But on Aug. 31, the full 48 tons of documents were quietly flown back to Baghdad and immediately tucked away in an undisclosed location, a top Iraqi official told AFP.
Neither government announced the transfer, and Baghdad is not planning to open the archive to the public, the official said.
This could disappoint the thousands of families who may have a personal stake in the archive鈥檚 contents.
鈥淪addam destroyed Iraq鈥檚 people 鈥� you can鈥檛 just keep quiet on something like that,鈥� said Ayyoub Al-Zaidy, 31, whose father Sabar went missing after being drafted for Iraq鈥檚 1991 invasion of Kuwait.
The family was never given notice of his death or capture and hopes the Baath archive could hold a clue.
鈥淢aybe these documents are the beginning of a thread that we can follow to know if he鈥檚 still alive,鈥� said Ayyoub鈥檚 51-year-old mother Hasina.
She spent the 1990s pleading with the Baath-dominated regime for information on her husband鈥檚 whereabouts, and holds little hope of more transparency now. 鈥淎t this rate, I鈥檒l be dead before they make them public.鈥�

Some argue the archive could help Iraq prevent its blood-stained history from repeating itself.
鈥淢any kids nowadays say 鈥楽addam was good,鈥欌€� Murtadha Faisal, an Iraqi filmmaker, told AFP.
Faisal was 12 days old when his father was arrested in the holy city of Najaf during a 1991 uprising. He has not been heard from since.
He wants the archives opened to end any rosy nostalgia or revisionism about Baath rule, which some have praised compared to today鈥檚 instability under a fragmented political class.
鈥淧eople should realize how not to create another dictator,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 already happening 鈥� we have a lot of small dictators today.鈥�
Divisions over the Baath鈥檚 legacy still run deep, and some of its defenders argue the archives would serve to exonerate Saddam鈥檚 rule.
鈥淢aking the archives public would prove the Baath party was patriotic,鈥� insisted a former low-ranking party member in comments to AFP.
Those fault lines are precisely what makes the archive鈥檚 return a 鈥渞eckless鈥� move, said Abbas Kadhim, the Iraq Initiative Director at the Atlantic Council.
鈥淚raq is not ready. It has not started a process of reconciliation that would allow this archive to play a role,鈥� said Kadhim, who pored over the documents to write several academic books on Iraqi history and society.
What he found even implicated current officials, he said.
鈥淏aathists documented everything, from a joke to an execution. Politicians, tribal leaders, people in the street will begin to use it against one another,鈥� he added.
Others say the files could be redacted to make them less inflammatory, but still accessible to local academics.
鈥淭he least we can do is have them available to Iraqi researchers the same way they were to American ones,鈥� said Marsin Alshamary, an incoming fellow at the US-based Brookings Institute who also used the archive for her PhD.
The US remains in possession of several archives seized after the 2003 invasion, including 鈥渆ven more dangerous government files,鈥� a second Iraqi official told AFP.
One day, Makiya hopes, all the blood-stained events retold in these documents will be part of Iraq鈥檚 distant past.
鈥淲e can鈥檛 remember the glories of 鈥榯he land between the two rivers鈥� and the Abbasid empire, and forget the 35 years of actual horror that modern Iraq lived through,鈥� he told AFP.
鈥淭hat is as much a part of what it means to be an Iraqi today as those romantic things.鈥�