PGHIMC - Pittsburgh Independent Media Center

Can you, the self-proclaimed pacifist, ignore the blatant violations of human rights?
by mankind Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2003 at 7:12 PM

Facts to consider when standing behind your buttons and signs, direct evidence of your liberties and freedoms. The die-in yields empathy for the �casualties of war,� but what will yield true understanding of the world of oppression and tyranny that you call Iraq?

U.N. Security Council Resolution 688 (5 April 1991) condemned Saddam Hussein�s repression of the Iraqi civilian population. The resolution also requires Saddam Hussein to end his repression of the Iraqi people and to allow immediate access to international humanitarian organizations to help those in need of assistance.

Saddam Hussein has repeatedly violated these provisions and has expanded his violence against women and children, continued his horrific torture and execution of innocent Iraqis.

Saddam has continued to violate the basic human rights of the Iraqi people and has continued to control all sources of information (including the killing of over 500 journalists in the past decade).

Saddam has also harassed humanitarian aid workers, expanded his crimes against Muslims, has withheld food from families that offer their children to his regime and has continued to subject Iraqis to unfair imprisonment.

The government of Iraq uses military force to repress civilian populations throughout the county, resulting in the deaths of thousands and the destruction of entire villages.

Iraq has refused to allow the U.N.�s special Rapporteur for human rights to return to Iraq since his first visit in 1992. It has also refused to allow the stationing of human rights monitors as required by the U.N. resolution.

In September 2001, the Iraqi government expelled six U.N. humanitarian relief workers, who until 1992 ensured the delivery of humanitarian relief services, without providing an explanation.

Iraqi authorities routinely practice extrajudicial summary or arbitrary executions throughout the country. The total number of prisoners that have been executed in the past five years runs into thousands, including hundreds of arbitrary executions in the last months of 1998 at Abu Gharib and Radwaniyah prisons near Baghdad.

In the 1970�s and 1980�s, the Iraqi regime destroyed over 300 Kurdish villages. The destruction of Kurdish and Turkomen homes is still going on in Iraqi-controlled areas of northern Iraq.

In northern Iraq the government is continuing its campaign of forcibly deporting Kurdish and Turkomen families to southern governments. As a result, approximately 900,000 citizens are internally displaced throughout Iraq.

Human rights organizations and opposition groups continue to receive reports of women who suffered from severe psychological trauma after being raped by Iraqi personnel while in custody. These personnel also videotape the rape of female relatives of suspected oppositionists and used the videotapes for blackmail purposes to ensure their future cooperation.

Iraqi security agents reportedly decapitated numerous women and men in front of their family members. According to Amnesty International, the victims� heads were displayed in front of their homes for several days.

Iraq�s 1988-1989 Anfal campaign subjected the Kurdish people in northern Iraq to the most widespread attack of chemical weapons ever used against a civilian population. In the town of Halabja alone, an estimated 5,000 civilians were killed and over 10,000 were injured.

In March 1999, the regime shot and killed grand Ayatollah al Sayid Muhammad SADIG AL Sadr, the most senior Shi�a religious leader in Iraq. Since 1991, dozens of senior Shi�a clerics and hundreds of their followers have been murdered or arrested, and their whereabouts remain unknown.

In 2000, the Iraqi authorities reportedly introduced tongue amputations as a form of punishment for persons who criticize Saddam Hussein or his family.

The Iraqi security services routinely torture detainees. According to former detainees, torture techniques include branding, electric shocks to the genitals, beating, burning with hot irons, suspension from rotating ceiling fans, dripping acid on the skin, rape, breaking of limbs, denial of food and water, and threats to rape or otherwise harm relatives.

There are widespread reports that food and medicine that could have been made available to the general public, including children, have been stockpiled in warehouses or diverted for the personal use of government officials.

Amnesty International reported that Iraq has the world�s worst record for numbers of persons who have disappeared or remain unaccounted for.

Saddam Hussein does not permit freedom of speech or of the press and does not tolerate political dissent in areas under his control. In November 2000, the U.N. General Assembly criticized Saddam Hussein�s �suppression of freedom of thought, expression, information, association, and assembly�.

The Special Rapporteur stated in October 1999, that citizens lived �in a climate of fear�, risking arrest and interrogation by the police or military intelligence. He noted that �the mere suggestion that someone is not a supporter of the president carries the prospect of the death penalty�.

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correct me if i'm wrong...
by pr0t3s7 Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2003 at 9:24 PM

I wasn't aware that the anti-war movement somehow also exists as a support network for Saddam Hussein. It's hilarious that you actually took the time to compose this article and, for whatever reason, found the reason to direct it at anti-war activists. Are you not aware of your own ignorance? Do you not understand that an all out WAR against Iraq will NOT simply be a war against Saddam Hussein, as the primary casualties will come from the civilian populace? Are you not aware that, during the Gulf War, our government mindlessly bombed the insurrectionist Iraqui troops who were well on their way to leading a succesful insurgency against Saddam's authoritarian Regime? Do you not understand that, while Saddam Hussein is a terrible man who commits atrocious acts against the civilians of his nation, the United States purchased chemical weapons for him with the $80 billion our government gave him during the 1980s (this was written in the Washington Post). Are you unaware that our g0vernment has imposed economic sanctions upon Iraq that ban the import of chlorine to purify water? It is estimated that 1.5 MILLION people have died as a result of these nefarious sanctions, of them, 500,000 have been children under the age of 5. If our government was concerned with the civilians of Iraq, it would not continue to kill them. I'm sure that everyone who pr0tested this weekend opposes Saddam Hussein and his fascist regime, however, we do NOT believe it is logical to kill tens of thousands of civilians in order to make their lives better. Our government cares not for the citizens of the world, it cares for capital.

- In opposition to both Bush AND HUSSEIN (I will NOT accept George Bush's claims of "you're either with us our with the terrorists", as I believe that there is still room for free thought in our world)

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What about Turkey?
by Daniel Papasian Thursday, Jan. 30, 2003 at 6:16 AM

Turkey has killed at least 30,000 Kurds in their fight against the "Kurdish uprising."

The US is promising Turkey more aid in their struggle against "dissidents" (i.e. Kurds) should they join the coalition against Iraq- because Turkey knows full well that a Kurdish state in what's now northern Iraq would "incite" their Kurdish minority.

Do you think we care about the Kurds?

Now, let me ask you a couple questions:

1. How many people have died under UN sanctions?
-How many children under 5?
-With sanctions, the only oil out is under the oil-for-food program. Who gets to control this revenue on behalf of the UN? Which Iraqis actually get to export this oil? (read: destruction of free trade empowers Saddam)

2. The last time we went to war with Iraq, and in every war since, we've been using depleted uranium (DU) munitions.
-How many cases of cancer can be attributed to these munitions?
-Among Iraqis? Among Americans?
-How many birth defects can be attributed to these munitions?
-Among Iraqis? Among Americans?
-Where did we put all of these radioactive waste-sites (i.e. DU-destroyed tanks) when we cleaned up Iraq? (Hint: We didn't clean up Iraq. They're still out there)

3. How many refugees are aid agencies preparing to receive?

4. You listed some impressive statistics regarding internally displaced people. Are there any other countries that have similar- or worse- problems? Is there a country that has millions of refugees living within their land (defining land as the realm of military control), and maintains their army largely through US aid? There is, and we've been deploying missiles to protect them and undergoing joint exercises with them in the event of war with Iraq...



The one thing you should not try to do is attempt to portray this war as having humanitarian goals. That's a disgusting thing to do, considering the biggest threat to Kurds worldwide is Turkey (which is eligible for all sorts of UN and NATO aid in their fight). The biggest threat to Iraqis is the US and Britain. Not Saddam.

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Yes, but...
by Sam Friday, Jan. 31, 2003 at 4:24 AM

There's no doubt that terrible human rights violations occur under the Hussein regime. However, according to Amnesty International, the condition of human rights in Iraq would only get worse in the event of a U.S. invasion.

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human rights
by mighty85 Wednesday, Feb. 05, 2003 at 6:50 AM
mighty85@hotmail.com

Amnesty International's position on Iraq:

*"Human rights must not be used as an instrument in the rhetoric of war. Claims that military action in Iraq is justified in the name of human rights raise questions of selectivity and double standards; the states that claim force is now justified to protect human rights are the very states who supported Saddam Hussein's government during the Iran-Iraq war."

*"Military intervention will inevitably exacerbate the already precarious situation of the Iraqi civilian population and result in grave violations of their human rights."

*"The economic sanctions imposed by the UN Security Council have resulted in grave violations of the most basic human rights of Iraq's civilian population -- the right to life, health, education and an adequate standard of living, including food, housing and medical care."

Basically they're saying that you can't commit human right abuses in the name of human rights.

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