Ansam Imad Ahmed is just 25 and a war widow. Like tens of thousands of others her husband was killed. In November of 2006 men in a vehicle with tinted windows shot him from their car. Under the mask of black glass they stole away a husband and father of three.

At just 23 Ansam was left alone. She had no skills and no money. At first she lived in one small room in her husband's family home with her three children. The place they had lived together when her husband was alive.

But five months after her breadwinner's death the family grew tired of the burden. They contributed nothing to the household and her eldest brother-in-law told her she and the children had to leave.

Ansam packed up her children and went to the only place she knew _ home. But there her five brothers refused to help and once again she was alone.

"I was desperate," she said. "My children's five uncles abandoned them and I had nothing."

But unlike so many women Ansam got help.

At a small center in Arrasat in central Baghdad run by Salma Jabou, the advisor to the President of Iraq on women's affairs, she learned skills. They teach simple things here, sewing, basic computer skills and nursing.

As Ansam recounts her tale this week, the tale of so many women, she smiles and sews the petals of a flower onto a blue sheet.  She works here now for about $200 a month.  She learned basic skills and stayed on at the center.

She also found support. She met other women who'd lost their husbands to the violence and they to found themselves alone, broke and desperate to feed their children.

"I can feed my daughters now," she said.  She smiled and looked up to continue her conversation with another widow.

Ansam is one of tens of thousands. It is unclear how many widows there are in Iraq. Numbers vary from 700,000 to as many as five million.

"It is a terrible situation," Jabou said. "The woman goes back to the fold of the family with no skills and she is open to the violence of family members. She will have no option but to bear the violence or take her children to the streets."

Many turn to prostitution or begging and the children suffer as well, Jabou said. Most often they are forced to work and cannot go to school.

Jabou hopes that her center can alleviate some of the problem. But every two months only 50 women are trained _ a small fraction of the number of women who need help.

So many are forgotten.