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Facade of Iraqi 'Sovereignty" crumbling Fraudulent Iraqi 'Sovereignty' exposed as threats, resignations, killings, chaos escalate Mid-East Realities - MER - www.MiddleEast.Org - 13 August 2004: The events are so fast-paced these days. One day pro-consul Paul Bremer limps and slinks out of Baghdad after a secret 'ceremony' to appoint long-time U.S. collaborators to be 'interim' Prime Minister, President, etc. of occupied 'sovereign' Iraq. Another day the appointees throw out of the country the largest Arab television network, Aljazeera, stepping up still further their threats and intimidation of everyone who won't comply with their dictates. Then CIA-guy, now 'interim Prime Minister', Iyad Allawi indicts one of his competitors, himself another fraudulent tough-guy type who Americans saw not long ago waving to them as he sat with the President's wife at the State of the Union speech. And soon thereafter the American army with all of its high-tech firepower is sent to attack another of Allawi's competitors, this one hold up in Najaf in the Imam Ali Mosque. Reports from Iraq this morning indicate that Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr may have been injured today while meeting with supporters, and what's to happen next has everyone on edge as rarely before. Other reports from Iraq are of a wave of protest resignations against the American occupation and puppet government, with increased threats against the U.S. and its regime now coming in public even from other Iraqi officials approved by the Americans. These three articles help put the whole situation in clearer focus, a major task these days. Najaf officials quit in protest
Friday 13 August 2004, 0:45 Makka Time, 21:45 GMT - Several Iraqi
officials working within the interim government have resigned in
protest of the US-led assault on Najaf and Kut. Sixteen
of Najaf's 30-member provincial council resigned in protest at the
US-led assault on the Najaf as fighting between the al-Mahdi Army loyal
to Muqtada al-Sadr and US occupation forces entered its eighth day. "We have decided to resign due to what has befallen Najaf and all of The council's resignations came several hours after the deputy governor of Najaf resigned in protest against the "I resign from my post denouncing all the On
Thursday evening, the director of tribal affairs at the Iraqi Interior
ministry announced his resignation through Aljazeera and said he could
no longer work with the interim government in good faith given the
"carnage and barbaric aggression of the US-led forces in Najaf". "I
am a part of this nation, I am a part of these people. My fellow
tribesmen are now fighting in Najaf and Sadr city," said Major-General
Marid Abd al-Hasan. Meanwhile, Some national guardsmen in Al-Maliky had warned that " Can't Blair see that this country is about to explode? Can't Bush? By Robert Fisk in Baghdad The Independent on Sunday (UK) - August 1, 2004 : The war is a fraud. I'm not talking about the weapons of mass destruction that didn't exist. Nor the links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida which didn't exist. Nor all the other lies upon which we went to war. I'm talking about the new lies. For just as, before the war, our governments warned us of threats that did not exist, now they hide from us the threats that do exist. Much of Iraq has fallen outside the control of America's puppet government in Baghdad but we are not told. Hundreds of attacks are made against US troops every month. But unless an American dies, we are not told. This month's death toll of Iraqis in Baghdad alone has now reached 700 - the worst month since the invasion ended. But we are not told. The stage management of this catastrophe in Iraq was all too evident at Saddam Hussein's "trial." Not only did the US military censor the tapes of the event. Not only did they effectively delete all sound of the 11 other defendants. But the Americans led Saddam Hussein to believe - until he reached the courtroom - that he was on his way to his execution. Indeed, when he entered the room he believed that the judge was there to condemn him to death. This, after all, was the way Saddam ran his own state security courts. No wonder he initially looked "disorientated" - CNNs helpful description - because, of course, he was meant to look that way. We had made sure of that. Which is why Saddam asked Judge Juhi: "Are you a lawyer? ..Is this a trial?" And swiftly, as he realised that this really was an initial court hearing - not a preliminary to his own hanging - he quickly adopted an attitude of belligerence. But don't think were going to learn much more about Saddam's future court appearances. Salem Chalabi, the brother of convicted fraudster Ahmad and the man entrusted by the Americans with the tribunal, told the Iraqi press two weeks ago that all media would be excluded from future court hearings. And I can see why. Because if Saddam does a Milosevic, he'll want to talk about the real intelligence and military connections of his regime - which were primarily with the United States. Living in Iraq these past few weeks is a weird as well as dangerous experience. I drive down to Najaf. Highway 8 is one of the worst in Iraq. Westerners are murdered there. It is littered with burnt-out police vehicles and American trucks. Every police post for 70 miles has been abandoned. Yet a few hours later, I am sitting in my room in Baghdad watching Tony Blair, grinning in the House of Commons as if he is the hero of a school debating competition; so much for the Butler report. Indeed, watching any Western television station in Baghdad these days is like tuning in to Planet Mars. Doesn't Blair realise that Iraq is about to implode? Doesn't Bush realise this? The American-appointed "government" controls only parts of Baghdad - and even there its ministers and civil servants are car-bombed and assassinated. Baquba, Samara, Kut, Mahmoudiya, Hilla, Fallujah, Ramadi, all are outside government authority. Iyad Allawi, the "Prime Minister," is little more than mayor of Baghdad. "Some journalists," Blair announces, "almost want there to be a disaster in Iraq." He doesn't get it. The disaster exists now. When suicide bombers ram their cars into hundreds of recruits outside police stations, how on earth can anyone hold an election next January? Even the National Conference to appoint those who will arrange elections has been twice postponed. And looking back through my notebooks over the past five weeks, I find that not a single Iraqi, not a single American soldier I have spoken to, not a single mercenary - be he American, British or South African - believes that there will be elections in January. All said that Iraq is deteriorating by the day. And most asked why we journalists weren't saying so. But in Baghdad, I turn on my television and watch Bush telling his Republican supporters that Iraq is improving, that Iraqis support the "coalition," that they support their new US-manufactured government, that the "war on terror" is being won, that Americans are safer. Then I go to an internet site and watch two hooded men hacking off the head of an American in Riyadh, tearing at the vertebrae of an American in Iraq with a knife. Each day, the papers here list another construction company pulling out of the country. And I go down to visit the friendly, tragically sad staff of the Baghdad mortuary and there, each day, are dozens of those Iraqis we supposedly came to liberate, screaming and weeping and cursing as they carry their loved ones on their shoulders in cheap coffins. I keep re-reading Tony Blair's statement. "I remain convinced it was right to go to war. It was the most difficult decision of my life." And I cannot understand it. It may be a terrible decision to go to war. Even Chamberlain thought that; but he didn't find it a difficult decision - because, after the Nazi invasion of Poland, it was the right thing to do. And driving the streets of Baghdad now, watching the terrified American patrols, hearing yet another thunderous explosion shaking my windows and doors after dawn, I realise what all this means. Going to war in Iraq, invading Iraq last year, was the most difficult decision Blair had to take because he thought - correctly - that it might be the wrong decision. I will always remember his remark to British troops in Basra, that the sacrifice of British soldiers was not Hollywood but "real flesh and blood." Yes, it was real flesh and blood that was shed - but for weapons of mass destruction that weren't real at all. "Deadly force is authorised," it says on checkpoints all over Baghdad. Authorised by whom? There is no accountability. Repeatedly, on the great highways out of the city US soldiers shriek at motorists and open fire at the least suspicion. "We had some Navy Seals down at our checkpoint the other day," a 1st Cavalry sergeant says to me. "They asked if we were having any trouble. I said, yes, they've been shooting at us from a house over there. One of them asked: That house? We said yes. So they have these three SUVs and a lot of weapons made of titanium and they drive off towards the house. And later they come back and say 'We've taken care of that.' And we didn't get shot at any more." What does this mean? The Americans are now bragging about their siege of Najaf. Lieutenant Colonel Garry Bishop of the 37th Armoured Divisions 1st Battalion believes it was an "ideal" battle (even though he failed to kill or capture Muqtada Sadr whose "Mehdi army" were fighting the US forces). It was "ideal," Bishop explained, because the Americans avoided damaging the holy shrines of the Imams Ali and Hussein. What are Iraqis to make of this? What if a Muslim army occupied Kent and bombarded Canterbury and then bragged that they hadnt damaged Canterbury Cathedral? Would we be grateful? What, indeed, are we to make of a war which is turned into a fantasy by those who started it? As foreign workers pour out of Iraq for fear of their lives, US Secretary of State Colin Powell tells a press conference that hostage-taking is having an "effect" on reconstruction. Effect! Oil pipeline explosions are now as regular as power cuts. In parts of Baghdad now, they have only four hours of electricity a day; the streets swarm with foreign mercenaries, guns poking from windows, shouting abusively at Iraqis who don't clear the way for them. This is the "safer" Iraq which Mr Blair was boasting of the other day. What world does the British Government exist in? Take the Saddam trial. The entire Arab press - including the Baghdad papers - prints the judge's name. Indeed, the same judge has given interviews about his charges of murder against Muqtada Sadr. He has posed for newspaper pictures. But when I mention his name in The Independent, I was solemnly censured by the British Government's spokesman. Salem Chalabi threatened to prosecute me. So let me get this right. We illegally invade Iraq. We kill up to 11,000 Iraqis. And Mr Chalabi, appointed by the Americans, says I'm guilty of "incitement to murder." That just about says it all. |
Iraq's sovereignty called into
question
by Ahmed Janabi
Aljazeera, 11 August 2004: The nature of the relationship between the interim Iraqi government and the US army in Iraq is deeply controversial. Some see it as cooperation, others label it collaboration.
Ordinary
Iraqis, who have been suffering for decades due
to the consequences of
wars and UN sanctions, were more than willing to give Allawi's
US-appointed government a chance to restore stability and end
military
occupation. The phrase "handing over sovereignty to Iraqis"
had
gained much support before the interim Iraqi government
took office on
28 June 2004, with a sizeable segment of the Iraqi
population looking
forward to a new life. However, given the fact that the US forces'
military
operations in Iraq have not substantially changed since the "handover
of sovereignty", many Iraqis have again raised the vital
question: Has
sovereignty really been restored and the occupation ended? Or were
Iraqis misled?
We
look to the day Corporal
Major TV Johnson, On the ground, US military deployment has not changed; the number of foreign troops is increasing and recent statements by US officials - since the so-called handover of authority on 28 June - that the US military is staying in Iraq for years to come, have led citizens to doubt whether a new life is on the horizon. Illegal process Iraqis opposed to the presence of foreign troops in the country argue that Iraqi sovereignty as of now is non-existent. Salah al-Mukhtar, a former Iraqi ambassador to India, says the whole process of Iraqi sovereignty is void according to the UN charter. "The UN charter is based on sovereignty; member states are sovereign countries and, according to that, it is illegal that an occupying force enjoys the right to steal the sovereignty of a country and return it back according to a UN resolution. "Therefore, any UN resolution granting sovereignty to Iraq is unlawful, because that means the UN is acknowledging the occupation," he adds. Iraqi government officials' regular statements that Iraq has become a sovereign state and that occupation has gone do not go down well with some in the country. A spokesman for the Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq (AMS), Muhammad Ayash al-Kubaisi, cited the recent arrest of the editor-in-chief of the association's mouthpiece newspaper al-Basaer (Insight) as an example of "absent" sovereignty. "How can a group of foreign soldiers stop an Iraqi citizen like Dr Muthana al-Dhari and arrest him if there is a sovereign government? What are those soldiers doing in the heart of Baghdad? Why did the Iraqi police not arrest him instead?" al-Kubaisi said. "Moreover, after two days of interrogations, they handed al-Dhari over to the Iraqi police, as if they are saying to them we are finished with him, take him if you like now." Iraqi detainees The status of Iraqi detainees, who are held without charge by the US army in Iraq, has not changed since the handover of responsibilities. "US occupation forces are still enjoying the
right of establishing prisons and the searching of houses,"
al-Mukhtar said. Al-Mukhtar
says the interim Iraq Al-Kubaisi said that last week US forces released two of his friends from prison, after months of detention, without charge. "Jamal and Kamal Shakir spent months in prison without charges, and they were released without being told why they were being released. "I talked to them; they do not know why they were arrested in the first place, and prison officials were unable to tell them anything about the motives which led to their arrest and subsequent release," he said. Less intimidation Aljazeera.net spoke to Corporal Major TV Johnson, spokesman for the First Marine Division in Anbar governorate in Iraq, who insists that US-led forces in Iraq coordinate everything with the Iraqi Government.
But he says US troops cannot afford to let the new Iraqi police operate alone at present. "Iraqi police are still in need of more personnel and equipment, and the situation right now means it will continue to need the help of the multinational forces," he said. Johnson blames the attacks on police stations for the slowness in the development of an Iraqi police force, saying they make young men and women less keen to join the police. He says the US-led forces in Iraq coordinate with Iraqi authorities when it comes to the arrest of those he describes as "bad actors" or when they need to search an Iraqi area or house, but sees a day when US forces will not be there. "We look to the day when Iraqi people are able to handle their issues themselves and we can go back home," he said. Decisions of sovereignty Salah al-Mukhtar described the relationship between US officials and the interim Iraqi government as remote-controlled. "The US-installed Iraqi president, Ghazi al-Yawir, announced last month that there would be a pardon for those Iraqis who carried guns before the formation of Iyad Allawi. "But the US ambassador to Iraq, John Negroponte, sent him the instructions through the media, when he said those who killed Americans would not be pardoned. "The following day all Iraqi officials announced in their media statements that the planned pardon would not include those who killed Americans in Iraq. Where is the sovereignty?" The interim Iraqi government offered a limited amnesty on 7 August 2004 pardoning those Iraqis who have committed minor crimes, and excluded those who have killed US soldiers and Iraqi police. Please forward MER articles to others in their entirety with proper attribution. We welcome your comments and information in the new MER FORUM. MID-EAST REALITIES - www.MiddleEast.Org Phone: (202) 362-5266 Fax: (815) 366-0800 Email: MER@MiddleEast.Org Copyright © 2004 Mid-East Realities, All rights reserved |
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