Les terroristes kurdes distribuent des tracts menaçant de mort les Turkmènes irakiens et en particulier les représentants du Front turkmène irakien.
Ces tracts ont été distribués à Kerkuk, Erbil, Tal Afer, Mosul, Tuz Hurmatu et Altinköpru.
Voir:
http://turkmenfriendship.blogspot.com/2007/11/sie-werden-uns-ermorden.html
Dans un communiqué les terroristes kurdes menacent d’assassiner des Turkmènes en cas d’intervention turque contre les bases du PKK situées dans le nord de l’Irak.
voir:
http://turkmenfriendship.blogspot.com/2007/10/kurds-threatening-turkmens-in-kerkuk.html
Ces terroristes kurdes font preuve d’une grande lâcheté en s’attaquant à la communauté turkmène qui ne possède pas de milices armées pour se défendre.
Malgré les plaintes des représentants turkmènes auprès des autorités américaines et auprès du gouvernement central irakien aucune mesure de sécurité n’a été prise pour protéger leur communauté.
La communauté turkmène est de plus en plus vulnérable face aux milices armées kurdes et arabes.
Quant aux militaires américains ils n'hésitent pas à tuer des civils turkmènes innocents.
Voir l'assassinat de trois frères turkmènes dans leur jardin:
http://turkmenfriendship.blogspot.com/2007/11/abd-askerleri-3-trkmeni-katletti-us.html
vendredi 16 novembre 2007
Turkey's Chief Prosecutor launches case to closedown pro-Kurdish party
The New Anatolian / Ankara
16 November 2007
The chief prosecutor of the supreme court on Friday launched a court case for the closure of the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP).
There have been claims that the DTP is linked to the PKK terrorist organization.
The DTP entered the parliament after the July 22 elections when 20 independent deputies elected from the provinces with predominantly Kurdish populations joined the party.
The case comes as pressures built up against the authorities to lift the parliamentary immunities of the DTP deputies and open the way for their prosecution.
16 November 2007
The chief prosecutor of the supreme court on Friday launched a court case for the closure of the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP).
There have been claims that the DTP is linked to the PKK terrorist organization.
The DTP entered the parliament after the July 22 elections when 20 independent deputies elected from the provinces with predominantly Kurdish populations joined the party.
The case comes as pressures built up against the authorities to lift the parliamentary immunities of the DTP deputies and open the way for their prosecution.
Middle East expert Rubin: Barzani and peshmerge fingerprints on PKK attack in Turkey
Hürriyet
http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/english/7697790.asp?gid=74&sz=47906
Middle East expert Michael Rubin of Washington, DC conservative think-tank, the American Enterprise Institute, has said that if it came down to the US choosing between "Ankara" and "Erbil," that Washington would choose Ankara as an ally.
Rubin criticized the Bush administration for its stance up until now on the PKK terror group, noting "....Since we have had all this intelligence, why weren't we sharing it with our NATO ally Turkey?" Rubin did add after that comment that he didn't believe Washington had much in the way of military intelligence regarding the northern Iraqi region.
Asked by reporters what he thought about why northern Iraqi leader Massoud Barzani had not taken action against PKK forces sheltered in northern Iraq, Rubin replied:
"I think Barzani is playing the Yassar Arafat card. He is both speaking with diplomats and ignoring terror. In the attack which took place on October 21 in Turkey, we see a very different tactical strategy being used by the PKK. The tactics in this attack appear to resemble some of the tactics being taught to the peshmerge in northern Iraq by US forces. Thus this big question emerges here: are the peshmerge playing a role in these PKK attacks? I think that there are definitely some ties here. Barzani ignored these attacks. And something must be done on this matter."
15 Kasım 2007
http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/english/7697790.asp?gid=74&sz=47906
Middle East expert Michael Rubin of Washington, DC conservative think-tank, the American Enterprise Institute, has said that if it came down to the US choosing between "Ankara" and "Erbil," that Washington would choose Ankara as an ally.
Rubin criticized the Bush administration for its stance up until now on the PKK terror group, noting "....Since we have had all this intelligence, why weren't we sharing it with our NATO ally Turkey?" Rubin did add after that comment that he didn't believe Washington had much in the way of military intelligence regarding the northern Iraqi region.
Asked by reporters what he thought about why northern Iraqi leader Massoud Barzani had not taken action against PKK forces sheltered in northern Iraq, Rubin replied:
"I think Barzani is playing the Yassar Arafat card. He is both speaking with diplomats and ignoring terror. In the attack which took place on October 21 in Turkey, we see a very different tactical strategy being used by the PKK. The tactics in this attack appear to resemble some of the tactics being taught to the peshmerge in northern Iraq by US forces. Thus this big question emerges here: are the peshmerge playing a role in these PKK attacks? I think that there are definitely some ties here. Barzani ignored these attacks. And something must be done on this matter."
15 Kasım 2007
Sie werden uns ermorden
16 November 2007
http://www.kerkuk.net/haberler/haber.aspx?dil=1031&metin=200711161
"Saadettin Ergeç gab eine Erklärung im Zentrum der Irakisch Türkmenen Front ITF in Kirkuk ab."
Saadettin Ergeç, Vorsitzender der Irakisch Türkmenen Front und Mitglied des irakischen Parlaments, erklärte, daß die Unterdrückungspolitiken von Tag zu Tag zunehmen. Er sagte: "Hier möchte ich der ganzen Welt v.a.der Türkei zurufen:
Es ist eine Lage entstanden, die dem Blutbad in 1959 ähnelt. Es ist durchaus möglich, daß die Türkmenen dem Völkermord ausgesetzt werden. Jeder, der sich verantwortlich sieht, sollte dagegen was tun. Ergeç, der erklärt hat, daß sie daran glauben, daß die Angriffe auf die Türkmenen, die während des Saddam-Regimes stattfanden, ab 2003 aufhören würden, sagte: "Die Erlebnisse heute sind viel schlimmer als früher. Wir sind ungerechten Verhalten ausgesetzt, obwohl wir einen demokratischen Prozeß erwartet haben.
600.000 Kurden sind gekommen
Ergeç, der darauf hinwies, daß Menschen gibt, die während des Saddam-Regimes zum Auswandern gezwungen und nach dem Regierungswechsel zurückgekommen sind, sagte folgendes:
"Man hat begonnen, die Menschen unter dem angeblichen Normalisierungsprozeß in Kirkuk zurückzuholen. Das ist jedoch keine Rückkehr, sondern Rückstrom. Hier wurden die Türkmenen, Araber und Kurden zum Auswandern gezwungen. Das ist richtig. Wenn wir aber diejenigen, die zurückkehren, uns ansehen, stellen wir fest, daß 600.000 Kurden zurückgekehrt sind. Viele davon sind nicht hier geboren. Warum holt man sie hierher? Ihr Ziel ist ziemlich offen ersichtlich. Sie sind ein Teil des seit 2003 erstellten Plans. Die Kurden, die ein Teil der Besetzung waren, planten in jener Zeit in einem bestimmten Prozeß ein Referendum. Da aber das Referendum natürlich von Menschen durchgeführt wird, war das der Fall, daß die Demographie der Stadt gestört wurde, so daß die Stadt in die Hände bestimmter Menschen fiel. Leider hat man sehr schlimme Pläne erstellt. Man hat sehr viel Unterstützung geleistet. Deutlich gesagt, man hat ein Spiel gespielt. Es kann die Wiederholung von 1953 sein.
Ergeç, der darauf hinwies, daß sie bemüht sind, als irakischen Türkmenen und als Irakisch Türkmenen Front ihre Stimmen vor die Welt zu bringen, sagte, daß nur wenige Menschen ihre Stimmen gehört haben. Er erklärte, daß es in Kirkuk und Erbil einen unangenehmen Zustand gibt. Demzufolge müssen die Staaten, die Menschenrechte beachten, an dieser Sache Interesse zeigen. Ergeç sagte folgendes:
"Dieser Fehler muß schnellstens beseitigt werden. Sonst wird es sehr schlimm sein. Es ist eine Lage entstanden, die dem Blutbad 1959 ähnelt. Man will Völkermord an uns begehen. Es gibt sehr viele bewaffnete Kräfte. Irakische Türkmenen sind eine Kraft, die keine Waffen besitzt. Die kurdischen Gruppen haben sich hier bewaffnet, um Kirkuk an sich zu reißen. Sie haben schwere Waffen. Wir wissen nicht, was in kommenden Tagen kommen wird. Wir sind besorgt. Diejenigen Staaten, die ihre Hände in diesem Land haben, sollten sich an dieser Sache denken."
"Wir lehnen das Referendum ab"
Ergeç wies darauf hin, daß das Referendum über den Artikel 140, welcher entscheiden wird, ob Kirkuk im kurdischen Gebiet oder in der Zentralverwaltung bleibt, nicht stattfindet. Wir lehnen dieses Referendum strikt ab. Denn in einer Region, deren demographischer Aufbau geändert worden ist, wo man über keine Demokratie reden kann, wo der Druck der bewaffneten Kräfte herrscht sowie deren Gleichgewicht gestört wurde, kann kein Referendum stattfinden. Wenn en Referendum stattfindet, kann nicht gesund sein.
Diejenigen, die zurückgekehrt sind, müssen wieder gehen
Der türkmenische Führer, der der Ansicht ist, daß die Grundstücke ihren eigentlichen Besitzern zurückgegeben werden müssen, sagte, daß nun 20 % der Anträge der über 43.000 Bewerbern realistisch erfolgt ist und daß 90 % der Grundstücke der Türkmenen nicht zurückgegeben worden sind. Ergeç, der darauf hinwies, daß in Kirkuk kein Referendum durchgeführt werden kann und daß man in Kirkuk vom normalen Zustand nicht sprechen kann, bevor die Grundstücke ihren eigentlichen Besitzern nicht zurückgegeben werden, erklärte folgendes: "Wenn die Normalisierung tatsächlich stattfinden soll, müssen die 600.000 Kurden sofort wieder zurückgehen."
Die Türkei muß sich einschalten
Ergeç, der erklärt hat, daß die Türkei Verantwortung für dieses Gebiet hat, sagte: "Die Türkei muß sich hier unbedingt einschalten, wo die Geographie geändert wird. Das bedeutet nicht, daß sie mit ihren Waffen kommen sollen. Sie muß die Rechte der Menschen schützen, die hier leben. " Zudem sagte Ergeç, daß man den Türkmenen in Erbil viel Druck ausübt. Er meinte: "Hier existiert ein Druck. Hier lebten über 350.000 Türkmenen. Die Türkmenen sind heute leider bemüht, ihre Existenz zu bewahren."
Bedrohung mit Flugblättern
Dadurch, daß die Möglichkeit einer militärischen Operation der Türkei entstanden ist, werden auch die Drohungen gegen Türkmenen fortgesetzt. In den von der PKK in Erbil und Kirkuk in arabischer Sprache verteilten Flugblättern wurden die Türkmenen mit Tod gedroht. In den Flugblättern stand: "Wenn das türkische Militär uns angreift, werden wir euch töten." Ergeç, der erklärt hat, daß sie das den Türkmenen in arabischer Sprache verteilte Flugblatt übersetzt haben, sagte:
"Wir haben die Flugblätter übersetzt und an alle v.a. an die Koalitionskräfte geschickt. Die Koalitionskräfte haben hier Verantwortung dafür. Ich habe mit den Amerikanern selbst gesprochen. Sie haben zugegeben, daß sie Verantwortung dafür haben.
Türkiye Gazetesi
http://www.kerkuk.net/haberler/haber.aspx?dil=1031&metin=200711161
"Saadettin Ergeç gab eine Erklärung im Zentrum der Irakisch Türkmenen Front ITF in Kirkuk ab."
Saadettin Ergeç, Vorsitzender der Irakisch Türkmenen Front und Mitglied des irakischen Parlaments, erklärte, daß die Unterdrückungspolitiken von Tag zu Tag zunehmen. Er sagte: "Hier möchte ich der ganzen Welt v.a.der Türkei zurufen:
Es ist eine Lage entstanden, die dem Blutbad in 1959 ähnelt. Es ist durchaus möglich, daß die Türkmenen dem Völkermord ausgesetzt werden. Jeder, der sich verantwortlich sieht, sollte dagegen was tun. Ergeç, der erklärt hat, daß sie daran glauben, daß die Angriffe auf die Türkmenen, die während des Saddam-Regimes stattfanden, ab 2003 aufhören würden, sagte: "Die Erlebnisse heute sind viel schlimmer als früher. Wir sind ungerechten Verhalten ausgesetzt, obwohl wir einen demokratischen Prozeß erwartet haben.
600.000 Kurden sind gekommen
Ergeç, der darauf hinwies, daß Menschen gibt, die während des Saddam-Regimes zum Auswandern gezwungen und nach dem Regierungswechsel zurückgekommen sind, sagte folgendes:
"Man hat begonnen, die Menschen unter dem angeblichen Normalisierungsprozeß in Kirkuk zurückzuholen. Das ist jedoch keine Rückkehr, sondern Rückstrom. Hier wurden die Türkmenen, Araber und Kurden zum Auswandern gezwungen. Das ist richtig. Wenn wir aber diejenigen, die zurückkehren, uns ansehen, stellen wir fest, daß 600.000 Kurden zurückgekehrt sind. Viele davon sind nicht hier geboren. Warum holt man sie hierher? Ihr Ziel ist ziemlich offen ersichtlich. Sie sind ein Teil des seit 2003 erstellten Plans. Die Kurden, die ein Teil der Besetzung waren, planten in jener Zeit in einem bestimmten Prozeß ein Referendum. Da aber das Referendum natürlich von Menschen durchgeführt wird, war das der Fall, daß die Demographie der Stadt gestört wurde, so daß die Stadt in die Hände bestimmter Menschen fiel. Leider hat man sehr schlimme Pläne erstellt. Man hat sehr viel Unterstützung geleistet. Deutlich gesagt, man hat ein Spiel gespielt. Es kann die Wiederholung von 1953 sein.
Ergeç, der darauf hinwies, daß sie bemüht sind, als irakischen Türkmenen und als Irakisch Türkmenen Front ihre Stimmen vor die Welt zu bringen, sagte, daß nur wenige Menschen ihre Stimmen gehört haben. Er erklärte, daß es in Kirkuk und Erbil einen unangenehmen Zustand gibt. Demzufolge müssen die Staaten, die Menschenrechte beachten, an dieser Sache Interesse zeigen. Ergeç sagte folgendes:
"Dieser Fehler muß schnellstens beseitigt werden. Sonst wird es sehr schlimm sein. Es ist eine Lage entstanden, die dem Blutbad 1959 ähnelt. Man will Völkermord an uns begehen. Es gibt sehr viele bewaffnete Kräfte. Irakische Türkmenen sind eine Kraft, die keine Waffen besitzt. Die kurdischen Gruppen haben sich hier bewaffnet, um Kirkuk an sich zu reißen. Sie haben schwere Waffen. Wir wissen nicht, was in kommenden Tagen kommen wird. Wir sind besorgt. Diejenigen Staaten, die ihre Hände in diesem Land haben, sollten sich an dieser Sache denken."
"Wir lehnen das Referendum ab"
Ergeç wies darauf hin, daß das Referendum über den Artikel 140, welcher entscheiden wird, ob Kirkuk im kurdischen Gebiet oder in der Zentralverwaltung bleibt, nicht stattfindet. Wir lehnen dieses Referendum strikt ab. Denn in einer Region, deren demographischer Aufbau geändert worden ist, wo man über keine Demokratie reden kann, wo der Druck der bewaffneten Kräfte herrscht sowie deren Gleichgewicht gestört wurde, kann kein Referendum stattfinden. Wenn en Referendum stattfindet, kann nicht gesund sein.
Diejenigen, die zurückgekehrt sind, müssen wieder gehen
Der türkmenische Führer, der der Ansicht ist, daß die Grundstücke ihren eigentlichen Besitzern zurückgegeben werden müssen, sagte, daß nun 20 % der Anträge der über 43.000 Bewerbern realistisch erfolgt ist und daß 90 % der Grundstücke der Türkmenen nicht zurückgegeben worden sind. Ergeç, der darauf hinwies, daß in Kirkuk kein Referendum durchgeführt werden kann und daß man in Kirkuk vom normalen Zustand nicht sprechen kann, bevor die Grundstücke ihren eigentlichen Besitzern nicht zurückgegeben werden, erklärte folgendes: "Wenn die Normalisierung tatsächlich stattfinden soll, müssen die 600.000 Kurden sofort wieder zurückgehen."
Die Türkei muß sich einschalten
Ergeç, der erklärt hat, daß die Türkei Verantwortung für dieses Gebiet hat, sagte: "Die Türkei muß sich hier unbedingt einschalten, wo die Geographie geändert wird. Das bedeutet nicht, daß sie mit ihren Waffen kommen sollen. Sie muß die Rechte der Menschen schützen, die hier leben. " Zudem sagte Ergeç, daß man den Türkmenen in Erbil viel Druck ausübt. Er meinte: "Hier existiert ein Druck. Hier lebten über 350.000 Türkmenen. Die Türkmenen sind heute leider bemüht, ihre Existenz zu bewahren."
Bedrohung mit Flugblättern
Dadurch, daß die Möglichkeit einer militärischen Operation der Türkei entstanden ist, werden auch die Drohungen gegen Türkmenen fortgesetzt. In den von der PKK in Erbil und Kirkuk in arabischer Sprache verteilten Flugblättern wurden die Türkmenen mit Tod gedroht. In den Flugblättern stand: "Wenn das türkische Militär uns angreift, werden wir euch töten." Ergeç, der erklärt hat, daß sie das den Türkmenen in arabischer Sprache verteilte Flugblatt übersetzt haben, sagte:
"Wir haben die Flugblätter übersetzt und an alle v.a. an die Koalitionskräfte geschickt. Die Koalitionskräfte haben hier Verantwortung dafür. Ich habe mit den Amerikanern selbst gesprochen. Sie haben zugegeben, daß sie Verantwortung dafür haben.
Türkiye Gazetesi
BAGHDAD SLAMS KRG OIL DEALS
15 Nov 2007
Oil firms which have signed contracts with the Kurdistan regional government (KRG) will be barred from deals with Baghdad. "We are considering that and we are writing to some of the companies about the consequences of their actions," Hussain al Shahristani said on Wednesday when asked if Baghdad would exclude those firms. Shahristani, who is in Riyadh to attend an OPEC heads of state summit on Nov. 17-18, declined to name the companies, saying, "You will hear."
The comments come as the autonomous Kurdistan in northern Iraq has stepped up efforts to lure foreign oil forms to sign new oil production contracts. Kurdish officials have clashed with Baghdad over Kurdistan's oil deals and the content of the national oil law. Iraq's oil law will determine how oil contracts are awarded and how revenues are distributed from the world's third-largest proven oil reserves.
MGH/RA
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=31090§ionid=351020201
Oil firms which have signed contracts with the Kurdistan regional government (KRG) will be barred from deals with Baghdad. "We are considering that and we are writing to some of the companies about the consequences of their actions," Hussain al Shahristani said on Wednesday when asked if Baghdad would exclude those firms. Shahristani, who is in Riyadh to attend an OPEC heads of state summit on Nov. 17-18, declined to name the companies, saying, "You will hear."
The comments come as the autonomous Kurdistan in northern Iraq has stepped up efforts to lure foreign oil forms to sign new oil production contracts. Kurdish officials have clashed with Baghdad over Kurdistan's oil deals and the content of the national oil law. Iraq's oil law will determine how oil contracts are awarded and how revenues are distributed from the world's third-largest proven oil reserves.
MGH/RA
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=31090§ionid=351020201
Gougings and killings, by Nermeen Al-Mufti
Published in Al-Ahram Weekly
While US-supported political forces in Iraq make a new compact, bodies are still appearing everywhere in Baghdad, reports Nermeen Al-Mufti
November 15, 2007
In a surprise move, Nuri Al-Maliki decided to integrate 18,000 militiamen into the army and security services. Iraqi sources say that the militiamen are from Al-Maliki's Daawa Party and the Badr Brigade of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). The militiamen have been given posts at the interior, defence, and national security ministries with ranks ranging between lieutenant and major.
The move followed a four-way agreement signed recently by the Daawa Party, SCIRI, the Democratic Party of Kurdistan and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.Several political parties and blocs, including the Iraqi Accordance Front (IAF) of Adnan Al-Duleimi and the Iraqi List of Iyad Allawi voiced their opposition to the integration of militiamen into military and security institutions, noting their previous involvement in criminal atrocities.
A former senior police officer said that he resigned in protest against frequent violations committed by militiamen integrated into the security services. He added that most security personnel accused of corruption and torture originally came from the militia.
In Karbala, 110 kilometres south of Baghdad, tensions worsened between two armed groups, the Daawa Party's militia and the Mahdi Army of Moqtada Al-Sadr. Al-Sharqiya television ran a report on members of a family affiliated with the Mahdi Army claiming that they were tortured by policemen affiliated with Daawa. One of the victims, an eight-year-old girl, had her eyes gouged.
Meanwhile, the Karbala police distributed pictures of the bodies of individuals believed to have been killed by the Mahdi Army. The Interior Ministry, as usual, promised to investigate the claims.
American and Iraqi officials met near the Dead Sea in Jordan a few days ago. The meeting, attended by representatives from the opposition, armed groups, and the disbanded Baath Party, discussed ways to achieve national reconciliation in the country. Soon afterwards, Al-Maliki accepted the resignation of five ministers of the IAF. The move, analysts say, could undermine current reconciliation efforts.
Speaking at a news conference Sunday, the prime minister defended his decision to accept the resignations of the five ministers and a deputy prime minister. "When an official resigns he should remain in his post until the resignation is accepted. If that official fails to report to duty for more than 10 consecutive days, he must be dismissed." Al-Maliki promised to fill the posts with individuals sharing the same political background as the sacked ministers; namely, Sunni Arabs.Attempts to mend the rift between Al-Maliki and the IAF are still underway.
The IAF pulled out its ministers from the government to protest against Al-Maliki's failure to declare a general amnesty, release non-convicted detainees, and enlarge the scope of political participation.
Al-Maliki disclosed that President Jalal Talabani asked him to wait before accepting the ministers' resignations, so as to allow time for political reconciliation. "We wanted the brothers to return to government, but we finally realised that they had no intention of doing so. Therefore, we accepted the resignation." The prime minister said that although resigned ministers were not entitled by law to receive financial compensation, he would make an exception in their case.
During the same news conference, Al-Maliki said the US Embassy in Iraq refused to hand over some of those convicted in Al-Anfal trial to the government to carry out the death sentence against them. The prime minister accused the Iraqi Presidential Council of violating the constitution by failing to ratify the death sentences passed against Ali Hassan Al-Maguid and Sultan Hashem.
Vice-President Tareq Al-Hashimi called for a stay of the execution against former defence minister Sultan Hashem, saying that the ruling would not be valid until ratified by the Presidential Council. Last month, Al-Hashimi called on the US Embassy not to deliver the convicted men into the hands of the government before contention over their execution is resolved.
Meanwhile, Talabani expressed his strong opposition to the execution of Sultan Hashem. "This man doesn't deserve execution. He was a capable Iraqi officer who carried out Saddam's orders. As a military man, he couldn't possibly oppose orders." The IAF also called for a stay of Hashem's execution, calling on the government to show respect for capable and patriotic Iraqi officers.
As Operation Iron Hammer got underway in Kirkuk and Mosul, the Presidential Council began drafting a new security agreement extending the presence of US forces in the country. Sources close to the council say that the government intends to ask the UN Security Council to extend the mission of US-led multinational forces until the end of 2008, after which date, Iraqis and Americans would sign a long-term agreement defining the manner of US troop deployment in the country.
Talks between the US, Iraq and Iran are expected to resume within the next few days, although the Iranians want all their detainees held by the US forces to be released first. Deputy Foreign Minister Lobeid Abbawi said, "the US and Iran would resume talks upon the invitation of the Iraqi government. The talks would address the security situation in the country and the revival of the security committee that was formed last July."
The Americans released nine Iranian detainees on Friday in what Abbawi described as a "clear and positive signal" to the Iranians. The Americans still hold 11 Iranian detainees. Abdul-Aziz Al-Hakim, leader of SCIRI, said the American ambassador in Baghdad promised to release the remaining Iranian detainees.
US forces accuse the Iranians of being members of the Al-Quds Brigade sent to Iraq to train local militia. A senior US officer said the Iranian component of Iraqi explosives is increasing despite the drop in the number of attacks. Major General Rick Lynch, who is in charge of operations in southern Baghdad, Najaf and Karbala, said Iran's extensive influence in Baghdad is still visible despite signs that tensions between Washington and Tehran are ebbing. He added that his troops are chasing 20 Iraqi Shias who work for Al-Quds Brigade of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Last August, Lynch stated that 50 Iranian Revolutionary Guard members were in south Iraq, giving military training to Shia militia.
Judge Wael Abdul-Latif, a parliamentarian for the Iraqi National List, said the security situation was improving in Baghdad and Al-Anbar, but deteriorating in the central and southern parts of the country. The deterioration, he said, was due to power struggle among Islamic parties. Everyone is interfering in Iraq, Abdul-Latif stated, from the UAE to Palestinian intelligence, "but the worst interference is the Iranian".
Although 250 surveillance cameras have been set up in Baghdad, the police still find unidentified bodies in the city streets. Teachers remain prime targets of assassination. Within the past two weeks, three teachers were killed in Baghdad, one of them in front of her students. In Kirkuk an armed group abducted a school principal. The group commandeered a school bus, released everyone inside, except the principal who was led to an unidentified destination. A university professor was abducted and killed in Kirkuk, allegedly by a Kurdish group.
A recent UN study says that attacks on students and professors around the world have grown dramatically over the past three years, a trend that is nowhere more visible than in Iraq. The Iraqi educational system is "on the verge of collapse," the study notes.
Al-Ahram Weekly
weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/871/re72.htm
While US-supported political forces in Iraq make a new compact, bodies are still appearing everywhere in Baghdad, reports Nermeen Al-Mufti
November 15, 2007
In a surprise move, Nuri Al-Maliki decided to integrate 18,000 militiamen into the army and security services. Iraqi sources say that the militiamen are from Al-Maliki's Daawa Party and the Badr Brigade of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). The militiamen have been given posts at the interior, defence, and national security ministries with ranks ranging between lieutenant and major.
The move followed a four-way agreement signed recently by the Daawa Party, SCIRI, the Democratic Party of Kurdistan and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.Several political parties and blocs, including the Iraqi Accordance Front (IAF) of Adnan Al-Duleimi and the Iraqi List of Iyad Allawi voiced their opposition to the integration of militiamen into military and security institutions, noting their previous involvement in criminal atrocities.
A former senior police officer said that he resigned in protest against frequent violations committed by militiamen integrated into the security services. He added that most security personnel accused of corruption and torture originally came from the militia.
In Karbala, 110 kilometres south of Baghdad, tensions worsened between two armed groups, the Daawa Party's militia and the Mahdi Army of Moqtada Al-Sadr. Al-Sharqiya television ran a report on members of a family affiliated with the Mahdi Army claiming that they were tortured by policemen affiliated with Daawa. One of the victims, an eight-year-old girl, had her eyes gouged.
Meanwhile, the Karbala police distributed pictures of the bodies of individuals believed to have been killed by the Mahdi Army. The Interior Ministry, as usual, promised to investigate the claims.
American and Iraqi officials met near the Dead Sea in Jordan a few days ago. The meeting, attended by representatives from the opposition, armed groups, and the disbanded Baath Party, discussed ways to achieve national reconciliation in the country. Soon afterwards, Al-Maliki accepted the resignation of five ministers of the IAF. The move, analysts say, could undermine current reconciliation efforts.
Speaking at a news conference Sunday, the prime minister defended his decision to accept the resignations of the five ministers and a deputy prime minister. "When an official resigns he should remain in his post until the resignation is accepted. If that official fails to report to duty for more than 10 consecutive days, he must be dismissed." Al-Maliki promised to fill the posts with individuals sharing the same political background as the sacked ministers; namely, Sunni Arabs.Attempts to mend the rift between Al-Maliki and the IAF are still underway.
The IAF pulled out its ministers from the government to protest against Al-Maliki's failure to declare a general amnesty, release non-convicted detainees, and enlarge the scope of political participation.
Al-Maliki disclosed that President Jalal Talabani asked him to wait before accepting the ministers' resignations, so as to allow time for political reconciliation. "We wanted the brothers to return to government, but we finally realised that they had no intention of doing so. Therefore, we accepted the resignation." The prime minister said that although resigned ministers were not entitled by law to receive financial compensation, he would make an exception in their case.
During the same news conference, Al-Maliki said the US Embassy in Iraq refused to hand over some of those convicted in Al-Anfal trial to the government to carry out the death sentence against them. The prime minister accused the Iraqi Presidential Council of violating the constitution by failing to ratify the death sentences passed against Ali Hassan Al-Maguid and Sultan Hashem.
Vice-President Tareq Al-Hashimi called for a stay of the execution against former defence minister Sultan Hashem, saying that the ruling would not be valid until ratified by the Presidential Council. Last month, Al-Hashimi called on the US Embassy not to deliver the convicted men into the hands of the government before contention over their execution is resolved.
Meanwhile, Talabani expressed his strong opposition to the execution of Sultan Hashem. "This man doesn't deserve execution. He was a capable Iraqi officer who carried out Saddam's orders. As a military man, he couldn't possibly oppose orders." The IAF also called for a stay of Hashem's execution, calling on the government to show respect for capable and patriotic Iraqi officers.
As Operation Iron Hammer got underway in Kirkuk and Mosul, the Presidential Council began drafting a new security agreement extending the presence of US forces in the country. Sources close to the council say that the government intends to ask the UN Security Council to extend the mission of US-led multinational forces until the end of 2008, after which date, Iraqis and Americans would sign a long-term agreement defining the manner of US troop deployment in the country.
Talks between the US, Iraq and Iran are expected to resume within the next few days, although the Iranians want all their detainees held by the US forces to be released first. Deputy Foreign Minister Lobeid Abbawi said, "the US and Iran would resume talks upon the invitation of the Iraqi government. The talks would address the security situation in the country and the revival of the security committee that was formed last July."
The Americans released nine Iranian detainees on Friday in what Abbawi described as a "clear and positive signal" to the Iranians. The Americans still hold 11 Iranian detainees. Abdul-Aziz Al-Hakim, leader of SCIRI, said the American ambassador in Baghdad promised to release the remaining Iranian detainees.
US forces accuse the Iranians of being members of the Al-Quds Brigade sent to Iraq to train local militia. A senior US officer said the Iranian component of Iraqi explosives is increasing despite the drop in the number of attacks. Major General Rick Lynch, who is in charge of operations in southern Baghdad, Najaf and Karbala, said Iran's extensive influence in Baghdad is still visible despite signs that tensions between Washington and Tehran are ebbing. He added that his troops are chasing 20 Iraqi Shias who work for Al-Quds Brigade of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Last August, Lynch stated that 50 Iranian Revolutionary Guard members were in south Iraq, giving military training to Shia militia.
Judge Wael Abdul-Latif, a parliamentarian for the Iraqi National List, said the security situation was improving in Baghdad and Al-Anbar, but deteriorating in the central and southern parts of the country. The deterioration, he said, was due to power struggle among Islamic parties. Everyone is interfering in Iraq, Abdul-Latif stated, from the UAE to Palestinian intelligence, "but the worst interference is the Iranian".
Although 250 surveillance cameras have been set up in Baghdad, the police still find unidentified bodies in the city streets. Teachers remain prime targets of assassination. Within the past two weeks, three teachers were killed in Baghdad, one of them in front of her students. In Kirkuk an armed group abducted a school principal. The group commandeered a school bus, released everyone inside, except the principal who was led to an unidentified destination. A university professor was abducted and killed in Kirkuk, allegedly by a Kurdish group.
A recent UN study says that attacks on students and professors around the world have grown dramatically over the past three years, a trend that is nowhere more visible than in Iraq. The Iraqi educational system is "on the verge of collapse," the study notes.
Al-Ahram Weekly
weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/871/re72.htm
jeudi 15 novembre 2007
No Remembrance, No Remorse for the Fallen of Iraq
November 15, 2007
by John Pilger
On Remembrance Day 2007 – Veterans Day in America – the great and the good bowed their heads at the Cenotaph. Generals, politicians, newsreaders, football managers and stock-market traders wore their poppies. Hypocrisy was a presence. No one mentioned Iraq. No one uttered the slightest remorse for the fallen of that country. No one read the forbidden list.
The forbidden list documents, without favor, the part the British state and its court have played in the destruction of Iraq. Here it is:
Holocaust denial
On 25 October, Dai Davies MP asked Gordon Brown about civilian deaths in Iraq. Brown passed the question to the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, who passed it to his junior minister, Kim Howells, who replied: "We continue to believe that there are no comprehensive or reliable figures for deaths since March 2003." This was a deception.
In October 2006, the Lancet published research by Johns Hopkins University in the US and al-Mustansiriya University in Baghdad which calculated that 655,000 Iraqis had died as a result of the Anglo-American invasion.
A Freedom of Information search revealed that the government, while publicly dismissing the study, secretly backed it as comprehensive and reliable. The chief scientific adviser to the Ministry of Defense, Sir Roy Anderson, called its methods "robust" and "close to best practice." Other senior governments officials secretly acknowledged the survey's "tried and tested way of measuring mortality in conflict zones."
Since then, the British research polling agency, Opinion Research Business, has extrapolated a figure of 1.2 million deaths in Iraq. Thus, the scale of death caused by the British and US governments may well have surpassed that of the Rwanda genocide, making it the biggest single act of mass murder of the late 20th century and the 21st century.
Looting
The undeclared reason for the invasion of Iraq was the convergent ambitions of the neocons, or neo-fascists, in Washington and the far-right regimes of Israel. Both groups had long wanted Iraq crushed and the Middle East colonized to US and Israeli designs. The initial blueprint for this was the 1992 "Defense Planning Guidance," which outlined America's post-Cold War plans to dominate the Middle East and beyond. Its authors included Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz and Colin Powell, architects of the 2003 invasion.
Following the invasion, Paul Bremer, a neocon fanatic, was given absolute civil authority in Baghdad and in a series of decrees turned the entire future Iraqi economy over to US corporations. As this was lawless, the corporate plunderers were given immunity from all forms of prosecution.
The Blair government was fully complicit and even objected when it looked as if UK companies might be excluded from the most profitable looting. British officials were awarded functionary colonial posts. A petroleum "law" will allow, in effect, foreign oil companies to approve their own contracts over Iraq's vast energy resources. This will complete the greatest theft since Hitler stripped his European conquests.
Destroying a nation's health
In 1999, I interviewed Dr. Jawad Al-Ali, a cancer specialist at Basra city hospital. "Before the Gulf War," he said, "we had only three or four deaths in a month from cancer. Now it's 30 to 35 patients dying every month. Our studies indicate that 40 to 48 per cent of the population in this area will get cancer."
Iraq was then in the grip of an economic and humanitarian siege, initiated and driven by the US and Britain. The result, wrote Hans von Sponeck, the then chief UN humanitarian official in Baghdad, was "genocidal ... practically an entire nation was subjected to poverty, death and destruction of its physical and mental foundations."
Most of southern Iraq remains polluted with the toxic debris of British and American explosives, including uranium-238 shells. Iraqi doctors pleaded in vain for help, citing the levels of leukemia among children as the highest seen since Hiroshima.
Professor Karol Sikora, chief of the World Health Organization's cancer program, wrote in the BMJ: "Requested radiotherapy equipment, chemotherapy drugs and analgesics are consistently blocked by United States and British advisers [to the Sanctions Committee]."
In 1999, Kim Howells, then trade minister, effectively banned the export to Iraq of vaccines that would protect mostly children from diphtheria, tetanus and yellow fever, which, he said, "are capable of being used in weapons of mass destruction."
Since 2003, apart from PR exercises for the embedded media, the British occupiers have made no attempt to re-equip and resupply hospitals that, prior to 1991, were regarded as the best in the Middle East. In July, Oxfam reported that 43 per cent of Iraqis were living in "absolute poverty."
Under the occupation, malnutrition rates among children have spiraled to 28 per cent. A secret Defense Intelligence Agency document, "Iraq Water Treatment Vulnerabilities," reveals that the civilian water supply was deliberately targeted. As a result, the great majority of the population has neither access to running water nor sanitation – in a country where such basic services were once as universal as in Britain.
"The mortality of children in Basra has increased by nearly 30 per cent compared to the Saddam Hussein era," said Dr. Haydar Salah, a pediatrician at Basra children's hospital. "Children are dying daily and no one is doing anything to help them."
In January this year, nearly 100 leading British doctors wrote to Hilary Benn, then international development secretary, describing how children were dying because Britain had not fulfilled its obligations as an occupying power under UN Security Council Resolution 1483. Hilary Benn refused to see them.
Destroying a society
The UN estimates that 100,000 Iraqis are fleeing the country every month. The refugee crisis has now overtaken that of Darfur as the most catastrophic on earth. Half of Iraq's doctors have gone, along with engineers and teachers. The most literate society in the Middle East is being dismantled, piece by piece.
Out of more than four million displaced people, Britain last year refused the majority of more than 1,000 Iraqis who applied to come here, while removing more "illegal" Iraqi refugees than any other European country. Thanks to tabloid-inspired legislation, Iraqis in Britain are often destitute, with no right to work and no support. They sleep and scavenge in parks. The government, says Amnesty, "is trying to starve them out of the country."
Propaganda
"See in my line of work," said George W. Bush, "you got to keep repeating things over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda."
Standing outside 10 Downing Street on 9 April 2003, the BBC's then political editor, Andrew Marr, reported the fall of Baghdad as a victory speech. Tony Blair, he told viewers, "said they would be able to take Baghdad without a bloodbath, and that in the end the Iraqis would be celebrating. And on both of those points he has been proved conclusively right. And it would be entirely ungracious, even for his critics, not to acknowledge that tonight he stands as a larger man and a stronger prime minister as a result."
In the United States, similar travesties passed as journalism. The difference was that leading American journalists began to consider the consequences of the role they had played in the buildup to the invasion. Several told me they believed that had the media challenged and investigated Bush's and Blair's lies, instead of echoing and amplifying them, the invasion might not have happened.
A European study found that, of the major western television networks, the BBC permitted less coverage of dissent than all of them. A second study found that the BBC consistently gave credence to government propaganda that weapons of mass destruction existed. Unlike the Sun, the BBC has credibility – as does, or did, the Observer.
On 14 October 2001, the London Observer's front page said: "US hawks accuse Iraq over anthrax." This was entirely false. Supplied by US intelligence, it was part of the Observer's staunchly pro-war coverage, which included claiming a link between Iraq and al-Qaeda, for which there was no credible evidence and which betrayed the paper's honorable past. One report over two pages was headlined: "The Iraqi connection." It, too, came from "intelligence sources" and was rubbish. The reporter, David Rose, concluded his barren inquiry with a heartfelt plea for an invasion. "There are occasions in history," he wrote, "when the use of force is both right and sensible." Rose has since written his mea culpa, including in these pages, confessing how he was used.
Other journalists have still to admit how they were manipulated by their own credulous relationship with established power.
These days, Iraq is reported as if it is exclusively a civil war, with a US military "surge" aimed at bringing peace to the scrapping natives. The perversity of this is breathtaking.
That sectarian violence is the product of a vicious divide-and-conquer policy is beyond doubt. As for the largely media myth of al-Qaeda, "most of the [American] pros will tell you," wrote Seymour Hersh, "that the foreign fighters are a couple per cent, and then they're sort of leaderless." That a poorly armed, audacious resistance has not only pinned down the world's most powerful army but has agreed to an anti-sectarian, anti-al-Qaeda agenda, which opposes attacks on civilians and calls for free elections, is not news.
The next blood letting
In the 1960s and 1970s, British governments secretly expelled the population of Diego Garcia, an island in the Indian Ocean whose people have British nationality. Women and children were loaded on to vessels resembling slave ships and dumped in the slums of Mauritius, after their homeland was given to the Americans for a military base. Three times, the High Court has found this atrocity illegal, calling it a defiance of the Magna Carta and the Blair government's refusal to allow the people to go home "outrageous" and "repugnant."
The government continues to use endless recourse to appeal, at the taxpayers' expense, to prevent upsetting Bush. The cruelty of this matches the fact that not only has the US repeatedly bombed Iraq from Diego Garcia, but at "Camp Justice," on the island, "al-Qaeda suspects" are "rendered" and "tortured," according to the Washington Post.
Now the US Air Force is rushing to upgrade hangar facilities on the island so that stealth bombers can carry 14-ton"bunker busting" bombs in an attack on Iran. Orchestrated propaganda in the media is critical to the success of this act of international piracy.
On 22 May, the front page of the London Guardian carried the banner headline: "Iran's secret plan for summer offensive to force US out of Iraq." This was a tract of unalloyed propaganda based entirely on anonymous US official sources. Throughout the media, other drums have taken up the beat. "Iran's nuclear ambitions" slips effortlessly from newsreaders' lips, no matter that the International Atomic Energy Agency refuted Washington's lies, no matter the echo of "Saddam's weapons of mass destruction," no matter that another bloodbath beckons.
Lest we forget.
Find this article at: http://www.antiwar.com/pilger/?articleid=11910
by John Pilger
On Remembrance Day 2007 – Veterans Day in America – the great and the good bowed their heads at the Cenotaph. Generals, politicians, newsreaders, football managers and stock-market traders wore their poppies. Hypocrisy was a presence. No one mentioned Iraq. No one uttered the slightest remorse for the fallen of that country. No one read the forbidden list.
The forbidden list documents, without favor, the part the British state and its court have played in the destruction of Iraq. Here it is:
Holocaust denial
On 25 October, Dai Davies MP asked Gordon Brown about civilian deaths in Iraq. Brown passed the question to the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, who passed it to his junior minister, Kim Howells, who replied: "We continue to believe that there are no comprehensive or reliable figures for deaths since March 2003." This was a deception.
In October 2006, the Lancet published research by Johns Hopkins University in the US and al-Mustansiriya University in Baghdad which calculated that 655,000 Iraqis had died as a result of the Anglo-American invasion.
A Freedom of Information search revealed that the government, while publicly dismissing the study, secretly backed it as comprehensive and reliable. The chief scientific adviser to the Ministry of Defense, Sir Roy Anderson, called its methods "robust" and "close to best practice." Other senior governments officials secretly acknowledged the survey's "tried and tested way of measuring mortality in conflict zones."
Since then, the British research polling agency, Opinion Research Business, has extrapolated a figure of 1.2 million deaths in Iraq. Thus, the scale of death caused by the British and US governments may well have surpassed that of the Rwanda genocide, making it the biggest single act of mass murder of the late 20th century and the 21st century.
Looting
The undeclared reason for the invasion of Iraq was the convergent ambitions of the neocons, or neo-fascists, in Washington and the far-right regimes of Israel. Both groups had long wanted Iraq crushed and the Middle East colonized to US and Israeli designs. The initial blueprint for this was the 1992 "Defense Planning Guidance," which outlined America's post-Cold War plans to dominate the Middle East and beyond. Its authors included Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz and Colin Powell, architects of the 2003 invasion.
Following the invasion, Paul Bremer, a neocon fanatic, was given absolute civil authority in Baghdad and in a series of decrees turned the entire future Iraqi economy over to US corporations. As this was lawless, the corporate plunderers were given immunity from all forms of prosecution.
The Blair government was fully complicit and even objected when it looked as if UK companies might be excluded from the most profitable looting. British officials were awarded functionary colonial posts. A petroleum "law" will allow, in effect, foreign oil companies to approve their own contracts over Iraq's vast energy resources. This will complete the greatest theft since Hitler stripped his European conquests.
Destroying a nation's health
In 1999, I interviewed Dr. Jawad Al-Ali, a cancer specialist at Basra city hospital. "Before the Gulf War," he said, "we had only three or four deaths in a month from cancer. Now it's 30 to 35 patients dying every month. Our studies indicate that 40 to 48 per cent of the population in this area will get cancer."
Iraq was then in the grip of an economic and humanitarian siege, initiated and driven by the US and Britain. The result, wrote Hans von Sponeck, the then chief UN humanitarian official in Baghdad, was "genocidal ... practically an entire nation was subjected to poverty, death and destruction of its physical and mental foundations."
Most of southern Iraq remains polluted with the toxic debris of British and American explosives, including uranium-238 shells. Iraqi doctors pleaded in vain for help, citing the levels of leukemia among children as the highest seen since Hiroshima.
Professor Karol Sikora, chief of the World Health Organization's cancer program, wrote in the BMJ: "Requested radiotherapy equipment, chemotherapy drugs and analgesics are consistently blocked by United States and British advisers [to the Sanctions Committee]."
In 1999, Kim Howells, then trade minister, effectively banned the export to Iraq of vaccines that would protect mostly children from diphtheria, tetanus and yellow fever, which, he said, "are capable of being used in weapons of mass destruction."
Since 2003, apart from PR exercises for the embedded media, the British occupiers have made no attempt to re-equip and resupply hospitals that, prior to 1991, were regarded as the best in the Middle East. In July, Oxfam reported that 43 per cent of Iraqis were living in "absolute poverty."
Under the occupation, malnutrition rates among children have spiraled to 28 per cent. A secret Defense Intelligence Agency document, "Iraq Water Treatment Vulnerabilities," reveals that the civilian water supply was deliberately targeted. As a result, the great majority of the population has neither access to running water nor sanitation – in a country where such basic services were once as universal as in Britain.
"The mortality of children in Basra has increased by nearly 30 per cent compared to the Saddam Hussein era," said Dr. Haydar Salah, a pediatrician at Basra children's hospital. "Children are dying daily and no one is doing anything to help them."
In January this year, nearly 100 leading British doctors wrote to Hilary Benn, then international development secretary, describing how children were dying because Britain had not fulfilled its obligations as an occupying power under UN Security Council Resolution 1483. Hilary Benn refused to see them.
Destroying a society
The UN estimates that 100,000 Iraqis are fleeing the country every month. The refugee crisis has now overtaken that of Darfur as the most catastrophic on earth. Half of Iraq's doctors have gone, along with engineers and teachers. The most literate society in the Middle East is being dismantled, piece by piece.
Out of more than four million displaced people, Britain last year refused the majority of more than 1,000 Iraqis who applied to come here, while removing more "illegal" Iraqi refugees than any other European country. Thanks to tabloid-inspired legislation, Iraqis in Britain are often destitute, with no right to work and no support. They sleep and scavenge in parks. The government, says Amnesty, "is trying to starve them out of the country."
Propaganda
"See in my line of work," said George W. Bush, "you got to keep repeating things over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda."
Standing outside 10 Downing Street on 9 April 2003, the BBC's then political editor, Andrew Marr, reported the fall of Baghdad as a victory speech. Tony Blair, he told viewers, "said they would be able to take Baghdad without a bloodbath, and that in the end the Iraqis would be celebrating. And on both of those points he has been proved conclusively right. And it would be entirely ungracious, even for his critics, not to acknowledge that tonight he stands as a larger man and a stronger prime minister as a result."
In the United States, similar travesties passed as journalism. The difference was that leading American journalists began to consider the consequences of the role they had played in the buildup to the invasion. Several told me they believed that had the media challenged and investigated Bush's and Blair's lies, instead of echoing and amplifying them, the invasion might not have happened.
A European study found that, of the major western television networks, the BBC permitted less coverage of dissent than all of them. A second study found that the BBC consistently gave credence to government propaganda that weapons of mass destruction existed. Unlike the Sun, the BBC has credibility – as does, or did, the Observer.
On 14 October 2001, the London Observer's front page said: "US hawks accuse Iraq over anthrax." This was entirely false. Supplied by US intelligence, it was part of the Observer's staunchly pro-war coverage, which included claiming a link between Iraq and al-Qaeda, for which there was no credible evidence and which betrayed the paper's honorable past. One report over two pages was headlined: "The Iraqi connection." It, too, came from "intelligence sources" and was rubbish. The reporter, David Rose, concluded his barren inquiry with a heartfelt plea for an invasion. "There are occasions in history," he wrote, "when the use of force is both right and sensible." Rose has since written his mea culpa, including in these pages, confessing how he was used.
Other journalists have still to admit how they were manipulated by their own credulous relationship with established power.
These days, Iraq is reported as if it is exclusively a civil war, with a US military "surge" aimed at bringing peace to the scrapping natives. The perversity of this is breathtaking.
That sectarian violence is the product of a vicious divide-and-conquer policy is beyond doubt. As for the largely media myth of al-Qaeda, "most of the [American] pros will tell you," wrote Seymour Hersh, "that the foreign fighters are a couple per cent, and then they're sort of leaderless." That a poorly armed, audacious resistance has not only pinned down the world's most powerful army but has agreed to an anti-sectarian, anti-al-Qaeda agenda, which opposes attacks on civilians and calls for free elections, is not news.
The next blood letting
In the 1960s and 1970s, British governments secretly expelled the population of Diego Garcia, an island in the Indian Ocean whose people have British nationality. Women and children were loaded on to vessels resembling slave ships and dumped in the slums of Mauritius, after their homeland was given to the Americans for a military base. Three times, the High Court has found this atrocity illegal, calling it a defiance of the Magna Carta and the Blair government's refusal to allow the people to go home "outrageous" and "repugnant."
The government continues to use endless recourse to appeal, at the taxpayers' expense, to prevent upsetting Bush. The cruelty of this matches the fact that not only has the US repeatedly bombed Iraq from Diego Garcia, but at "Camp Justice," on the island, "al-Qaeda suspects" are "rendered" and "tortured," according to the Washington Post.
Now the US Air Force is rushing to upgrade hangar facilities on the island so that stealth bombers can carry 14-ton"bunker busting" bombs in an attack on Iran. Orchestrated propaganda in the media is critical to the success of this act of international piracy.
On 22 May, the front page of the London Guardian carried the banner headline: "Iran's secret plan for summer offensive to force US out of Iraq." This was a tract of unalloyed propaganda based entirely on anonymous US official sources. Throughout the media, other drums have taken up the beat. "Iran's nuclear ambitions" slips effortlessly from newsreaders' lips, no matter that the International Atomic Energy Agency refuted Washington's lies, no matter the echo of "Saddam's weapons of mass destruction," no matter that another bloodbath beckons.
Lest we forget.
Find this article at: http://www.antiwar.com/pilger/?articleid=11910
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