It is odd to have one play about Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, yet two now come along in quick succession. While Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, about the invasion of Iraq, plays at the Young Vic, a new play, Safe Haven, focusing on Hussein’s 1991 Kurdish persecution, and Britain’s role in protecting them, finds sanctuary at the Arcola Theatre.

This new work, penned by former diplomat Chris Bowers, charts the involvement of the UK, USA and France in launching Operation Safe Haven, a mission to protect the Kurdish people displaced and violently persecuted by Hussein’s Iraqi regime following his devastating attack on Kuwait. 

Bowers’ script weaves together the work of two British senior diplomats who push then-Prime Minister John Major to stand hard against Hussein’s brutality, alongside a narrative that focuses more closely on the harrowing experiences of two Kurdish women, desperately seeking to escape across a treacherous mountain route.  

The majority of the play is set within the small Whitehall offices of senior diplomat Clive (Richard Lynson) and his junior Catherine (Beth Burrows). Catherine, portrayed by a sublime Burrows, is left bitter by the British withdrawal from the region following Hussein’s Kuwait attack, imploring Clive, a stickler for the rules well developed into a compassionate yet serious portrayal by Lynson, to use his diplomatic powers to help push Britain, and the allied forces into action to stop the assault on fleeing Kurdish refugees. It does provide an interesting insight into the powermoves that go on behind the closed doors of Whitehall, with Clive and Catherine’s carefully planned, tactical planning of ‘Operation Safe Haven’, rapidly coming together.

That said, it is too bogged down in diplomatic dialogue to really get the piece going. The dialogue is somewhat bland, with conversations feeling forced or awkward (the stereotypically British Clive uses one too many cricket metaphors) and a touch too matter-of-fact. In truth, given Bowers’ diplomatic experiences, this is almost certainly what these conversations are like, and less like the Hollywood thrillers of SAS plots and rescue missions, but it does run the risk of being a little too safe. The portrayal of Stephen Cavanagh’s US General Brett as a narrow-minded man feels a little one-dimensional and helps to immediately position the British pair as the heroes, without much development, not helped by Mark Giesser’s direction presenting Brett as an arrogant, limelight-hogging brute, a little too much of a caricature.

Mazlum Gül portrays Dlawer, a Kurdish doctor desperate for Britain to act and save his fleeing sister, and as a political activist, he gains a surprising amount of access within the Foreign Office, which, while a necessary hook between the diplomats and the displaced, feels awkward. Gül does draw out some of the emotion his character’s pleas hint at, but the writer feels forced.

Interestingly, the most moving sections of the play are the gutwrenching shifts away from Whitehall to the awful mountain conditions where pregnant Najat (Dlawer’s sister) finds herself stranded in freezing temperatures, kept alive and warm by Lisa Zahra’s Zeyra. It is the sheer sense of resilience that is the most powerful, and both women are tremendous in demonstrating the horror the pair face. One exchange, with Zeyra singing to Najat, is devastatingly bleak, with Bowers’ writing faring far better in these poignant exchanges.

Jida Akil’s design, however, is well-crafted in aiding the transitions from the security of Whitehall to the bleak mountain range. The office spaces are quickly set up, as is Clive’s home, providing an ironic sense of security given the safety the diplomats are trying to carve for the Kurdish people. Meanwhile, the fractured backcloth, scattered dirt on the floor and effective use of projection allow for Zeyra and Najat’s bleak journey to take centre stage, and it is a neat touch to have this rocky flooring ever-present, a reminder of how these two worlds are interlinked.

As the piece meanders to its conclusion, everything feels too neatly tied up to really make a point, and while Operation Safe Haven was a success, did it really do anything in the long-term? While it is interesting to peek around the secretive curtains of the Foreign Office and quick deals between international leaders, Safe Haven struggles to make a memorable mark.

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