BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Islamic militants threatened to kill him for it, but Abu Mustafa says it was the only way he knew to make a living in the chaos that is Baghdad today.

The pornographic video salesman is among many traders caught between two faces of the new Iraq, one liberated from the state censorship of Saddam Hussein, the other gripped by religious zeal.

“I am scared but what else can I do? I tried lots of other jobs. I worked in a factory, but you just can’t make any money in Iraq. It’s the only way to support my son,” he said on Wednesday.

“There is no way I am going to join the police or army because the insurgents are killing many of them every day.”

Relentless guerrilla violence has killed thousands of Iraqis, ravaged the economy and pushed up unemployment, forcing people like Abu Mustafa to scramble for a job.

But like the tens of thousands signing up for the new, U.S. -trained police and army, selling pornography has become an especially high-risk profession in Iraq, where a religious Shi’ite-led government swept to power in January, raising fears in some quarters of an Islamic state modeled after Iran.

As Iraqi leaders drafting a constitution this month debate the role of Islam in the state, alarming liberals and women’s groups, Abu Mustafa and others complain they live in fear.

MILITANT VICE SQUAD

He accused the Badr Brigades, the Iranian-trained militia associated with the leading Shi’ite party, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, of targeting colleagues in the pornography business and threatening many others.

“They shot my friend Haider and then they burned him,” said Abu Mustafa, who identified himself by a nickname for fear of being identified.

“They have issued me written death threats in notes telling me to stop selling sex movies.”

Muhammad al-Turaifi, a spokesman for the Badr Brigades, denied that the militia takes the law into its own hands.

“We don’t interfere in these matters personally. We go through official procedures and raise the issue with the police. To suggest we go and beat up these people is absurd,” he said.

After Saddam Hussein’s fall, pornography salesmen openly set up shops in Baghdad’s Bab al-Sharjee (East Gate) market, a once bustling marketplace Iraqis say is now dominated by criminal gangs, thieves, pimps and guerrilla informants.

Pornography salesmen don’t dare show their faces, secretly arranging by telephone the sale of American, European and Arab porn films hidden in music video or cartoon cases from the back seats of cars.

“The Badr Brigades left notes on our kiosks saying ‘We will kill you and burn your shops’,” said Ahmed Saad, 32, a father of two with a degree in fine arts.

“The police have arrested us and demanded money from our families to free us.”

The governmant says it is fighting police corruption. On Tuesday, porn video dealers attended the 40-day mourning ceremony for their slain 21-year-old colleague Amir. Gunmen killed him in broad daylight as he headed home, they said.

But it was business as usual on Wednesday in Bab al-Sharjee, where Abu Mustafa said 30 other dealers operate, despite the risks.

He sells about 50 DVD videos a day, fetching a total of $10. But the goods are only offered to friends or long-time customers.

“Sex movies from Lebanon and other Arab countries are the most popular. But we have all kinds of movies,” he said.

“We just have to work secretly.”