Fallujah Revisited

by HAIFA ZANGANA

It took the British government five weeks to take note of the mass demonstrations in Iraq.  These started last week of 2012 and are comparable in size, energy, and peaceful nature to the protests that toppled other Arab regimes, albeit expanding mainly in the capitals of the four central Iraqi provinces.

Minister for Middle East, Alistair Burt, finally commented on 28 January 2013, about clashes between protesters and the Iraqi army. At least the Minister did separate the death of the unarmed protesters from the subsequent attack hours later on an army unit few miles away from the protest site.  The events centre on Fallujah, west of Baghdad, one of the main cities where mass protest is mounting by the day.

The first shooting, resulted in 5 death and about 40 injured is clearly video-recorded. The second ended with 2 soldiers killed and 3 abducted. In the chaos of claims by an ever changing official narrative and statements by a committee of investigators these two incidents are often deliberately handled together with potential for escalations. Now the withdrawal of army and federal police units from Fallujah, and the assigning of security to local police announced by the Defence  Ministry spokesman immediately after the shooting on Friday 25 January may well not be implemented as a result of the chaotic political and security breakdown  in the country maintain  the dominant the total mistrust amongst all the players taking part in the “ political process” on one hand and among them and the people on the other.

The Iraqi city of Falluja, which 9 years ago became a symbol of heroic Iraqi resistance against the brutalities of the US/UK occupation, is now at the forefront of another battle.

Young Omar Ali Al Ani, a father of a three-year-old girl, was one of the five people killed on Friday 25^th January and his picture was the first placed on the web sites.  The names of  the victims were listed on the banners during the mass funerals on Saturday 26^th.

The victims were on their way to join the vigil in Sahet al Karama “ Dignity  square “ and to take part in a communal Friday prayer carried on in many Iraqi cities since 25^th Dec 2012. The communal prayer of both Sunni and Shi’a Muslims is a practice Iraqis often resort to at times of crisis and colonial threats, most famously during the 1920 revolution against British occupation, practiced widely in the first year of the US/UK occupation in 2003,   and once more It has been embraced recently in cities in the provinces of Baghdad Nineveh, Salahuddin, Diyala, Kirkuk and Anbar to assert the unity of Iraqis in defiance of the party-sectarian policy of Nouri Al Maliki’s regime.

The demonstrations began with a few hundred people in both Anbar, west of Iraq, and Nineveh in the North, arising in anger at the news of rape of women detainees at the hands of the Iraqi security forces under Maliki’s command as Commander in Chief. Maliki’s rivals and partners in government and in the parliamentary ‘political process’ established by the US occupation and despised by the public, tried to use this issue to avoid being steadily marginalised by him through imprisonment of their body guards accused with charges of terrorism, and with an eye on municipal elections in a few months time.   Within few days the protests morphed into a genuine mass movement and a vigil, not unlike what happened in the Arab spring.   In fact the Anbar demonstrators adopted a resolution to disallow any minister or Member of the parliament from mounting the podium.

The demand for the release of women detainees gained a wide support, igniting a gradual escalation.  Some of the women have been tortured, raped or threatened with rape according to reports by the committee of human rights in the parliament . The regime’s various spokesmen gave out contradictory responses: from denying the existence of women detainees arrested as hostages to force the surrender of their male relatives, admitting that some “terrorist” women were arrested, promising swift release, denying rape, to finally setting up a panel of religious personalities and officials to investigate.  Other demands focused on release of prisoners and the repeal of section 4 in the Terrorism Act which allows the arrest of anyone without a warrant and without submitting him/ her to courts: The Iraqi version of Guantanamo.  In different provinces lists of a dozen demands were approved by mass acclamation in the protest squires, with very similar wordings. Coordination grew within and between the provinces but no central body emerged.

Most observers and politicians, including people till recently allies to Maliki,  could only regard these demands rather basic in essence, calling for government reforms, respect human rights, implement justice according to international laws and end the endemic sectarianism and corruption.  There have been several Iraqi parliamentarian and international reports on such human rights abuses calling for an end to the systematic torture practised in various detention facilities. Commonly reported methods of torture are “suspension by the limbs for long periods, beatings with cables and hosepipes, electric shocks, breaking of limbs, partial asphyxiation with plastic bags, and rape or threats of rape. Torture was used to extract information from detainees and “confessions” that could be used as evidence against them in courts.”

Another demand is to abolish or suspend the Justice and Accountability Law which have been used to target political dissidents labelling them Ba’athist, i.e. belonging to the Saddam Hussein regime before the occupation in 2003. Protesters say this law is used for sectarian purposes since many high levels Baathist who have switched alliance to the ruling Shii political groups are in prominent positions now while even low-level state employees whose jobs under that regime depended on some form of affiliation to the ruling party, are targeted and deprived of liberty or work or pension, mainly because they do not support Maliki.

Al Maliki’s initial response to the demands was no less than late Qadafi’s response. He described the demonstrators as “bubbles” whose demands are “stinking sectarian”, threatening them that they have to “end their protests or they would witness their own end”.

When Adnan Pachachi , former foreign minister and a member of  Iraqi Governing Council (IGC) which was installed by US occupation, was asked by  Sky News Arabia ( 10 January, 2013) about the possibility of erupting violence at  demonstrations, he said : “if that’s happen,  the source of it will be the government itself, because it is the party that has the capacity”.

Haifa Zangana is an Iraqi novelist, artist and activist. Her recent books are “Dreaming of Baghdad” and “City of Widows: An Iraqi woman’s account of war and resistance” and co authored “ The Torturer in the Mirror” with Ramsey Clark and Thomas Ehrlich Reifer. Haifa is co-founder of Tadhamun: Iraqi Women Solidarity, founding member of the International Association of Contemporary Iraqi Studies (IACIS) and advisor for UNDP on “Towards the Rise of women in the Arab world”. Currently she is a consultant at ESCWA.

Desperate al-Maliki Resorts to Violence Against Peaceful Protests

BRussells Tribunal reports (January 26^th): It was reported that in Fallujah at least 10people were killed and more than 100 were injured, among them many children and a journalist. The number of the deaths continues to increase as some of the injured die. The shooters, identified as army troops, were called in from Baghdad to prevent delegations from other parts of Iraq from joining the massive demonstrations.

http://www.brussellstribunal.org/article_view.asp?ID=732#

Is Britain guilty of systemic torture in Iraq?

In the Lebanese capital of Beirut, far from the theatre of war in Iraq and his office in Birmingham, one of Britain's leading civil rights lawyers has gathered some of the most damning allegations ever levelled against this country's armed forces – certainly since the worst days of Northern Ireland's Troubles.

As Britain's invasion of Iraq approaches its 10th anniversary in March, Phil Shiner – who founded the Public Interest Lawyers group – and members of his team have held face-to-face meetings with survivors of alleged abuse and torture by British soldiers and intelligence officers and with relatives of those unlawfully killed during and after the war that defined the premiership of Tony Blair.

The statements – 180 of them, with 871 to follow – go before a judicial review hearing at the high court in London next week in a claim seeking to demonstrate that Britain broke international laws of war by pursuing a policy of systematic torture.

The testimony is shocking, such as from "Khalid", a detained Iraqi civilian: "[A British soldier] then grabbed my penis and dragged me around the floor while holding it. He also made me squat up and down whilst naked and inserted his finger into my anus. I would have preferred to have been killed than subjected to this."

A prisoner called Halim claims he was told: "Fuck you and fuck Islam!" by a soldier who then "opened the belt of my trousers and said 'now jiggy jiggy'. The soldier put his boot in my chest and pulled my trousers down … The soldier put his foot on my chest … lifted me in the air and turned me on to my front … He started rubbing his penis on my back while the other soldiers watched. I felt him ejaculate on my back … I was so upset but he spat in my face. He kicked me and started slapping me."

A man called "Asif" claims that when soldiers came to arrest his elderly father, he said: "So you are the British people?" He testifies that the soldiers paralysed the old man with the blow of a rifle butt and stamped on Asif's young son's head when the boy tried to help his grandfather. "What I know of the British people is the opposite of what you are doing," said Asif.

And so it goes on, witness after witness, in papers and videos before the court on 29 January, calling for a public inquiry into what is presented as an orgy of sadism, outlawed interrogation methods and unlawful killings by soldiers and intelligence officers against Iraqi civilians and prisoners of war between 2003 and 2008. Iraqi soldiers who surrendered – supposedly protected by the Geneva Conventions – allege that they were forced to sit for hours in harsh sun, kicked, beaten and photographed going to the toilet.

Civilians say they were subjected to hooding, beating, threats of rape and execution, forced nakedness and maintaining stress positions, violence against wives and children, ritual humiliation. And they claim that others, like Baha Mousa, were beaten to death. They say walls of noise were used to drive the prisoners mad and cover the sounds of abuse and pain.

The British government will argue in court that this apparent litany of abuse by troops it sent to "liberate" the Iraqis does not warrant a public inquiry, since it was not "systemic".

But the high court will be asked to rule that this position is untenable given the weight and range of the allegations. Shiner and lawyers for the families of those killed and survivors of the abuse say the inquiry is a fundamental requirement of articles 2 and 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights, on the right to life and prohibition of torture.

According to Shiner and his supporters, the decision of the high court will signal whether, 10 years after the invasion, Britain is prepared to reckon with its own legacy in Iraq.

"This is the crucial moment of decision," says Professor Andrew Williams, author of a book on the most infamous single case to date, the torture to death in custody of an innocent hotel receptionist, Baha Mousa. "This is our last chance to get to the truth and find out what went on. It's the last chance to see who is responsible."

The legal issue at stake is whether the other abuses were isolated incidents of which commanders were unaware, as the government insists, or systemic and authorised as policy. With these cases comes the contention that the violations were systemic and thereby illegal – with responsibility reaching senior command level – which would put the state in breach of international law and necessitate an independent public inquiry. The victims' claim before the court says: "No Iraqi appeared to be exempt from ill-treatment from arrest onwards."

The MoD says the Baha Mousa inquiry, which investigated the killing of Mr Mousa and torture of several other civilians, dealt with any general problems of detention and interrogation. That inquiry reported last year and condemned the use of hooding and stress positions, supposedly outlawed by the UK government in the 1970s.

The MoD also points to its own Iraq Historic Allegations Team, established in 2010, which it says is a sufficient response to the allegations. The team was made up of Royal Military Police officers appointed to internally investigate unlawful killing and torture. But the appeal court ruled in November 2011 that the RMP had been "substantially compromised", its members having been involved in the system of detention itself.

Williams's book, A Very British Killing: the Death of Baha Mousa, details the killing and flawed investigation and prosecutions which followed, and exposes what he calls "a culture of callous indifference that infected a whole battalion and permeated far up the command chain, both military and governmental. What happened to Baha Mousa, and how the army and the government responded to his death, is emblematic of a whole system in operation."

Moreover, says Williams, who teaches law at the University of Warwick: "The international principle in criminal law is that you look at the connection between commanders and what happens on the ground. Responsibility is supposed to rest with those at the top. It's no excuse for ministers and officials to say they didn't know what was happening.

"These are international obligations. This is what we demand of others, but we do not demand it of ourselves. What kind of message does that give to the world about who we are?"

Shiner's case is built in part on the conviction of the UK at the European court in Strasbourg in 1977 of "inhuman and degrading treatment" of detainees in a case brought by the Irish Republic.

Trial lawyers, led by Michael Fordham QC, will argue that while the Baha Mousa inquiry "may have shone a torch into a dark corner", what is now before the court is more like "a stadium in which we will switch on the floodlights".

Shiner's files are disturbing: page after page, case after case offers detailed gruesome particulars. The worst abuses took place in facilities named by the British as Battlecamp Main, Camp Stephen, Camp Bucca and Camp Breadbasket; also at Shaibah logistics base, a contingency operations base, and holding facilities including one soldiers called "the guest house". But many also occur in people's homes and at street demonstrations.

Shiner argues that five illegal "state practices" are established by the evidence, which includes videotaped interrogations. "We've got the training materials, we've got the policy documents," says Shiner. "Violence was endemic to the state practices and part of the state practices."

One "state practice" is "the use of trained coercive interrogation techniques, as a matter of policy ... They knew full well that what was happening was unlawful, right to the top," says Shiner. "It was all being trained at a facility in Britain called Chicksands" – an army intelligence base 50 miles north of London in Bedfordshire.

His argument is borne out in a history of British torture by Guardianjournalist Ian Cobain – Cruel Britannia – which tracks permissions required to enact specific techniques of abuse up to ministerial level. Cobain also reveals an interrogators' Powerpoint tutorial called "Any Questions" which trains in the use of forced nakedness and sensory deprivation, including such instructions as: "pull back foreskin, spread buttocks".

The second "state practice", claims Shiner, is "an unlawful detention and internment regime which did not meet international obligations", with regard to tribunals, combatant status for PoWs and obligations to civilian suspects during arrest and detention.

Third was a "rolling programme of strike operations" to apprehend civilians –"blowing doors off so that 20 soldiers can run into houses at one or two in the morning while women and children are sleeping, men dragged from bed and rifle-butted – one man was simply shot in bed – women and children abused".

There is also unlawful use of lethal force – using illegal rules of engagement after the wartime phase has ended. "The rules change during an occupation, but the practices did not, and a lot of people were killed. The judges are going to hear about a grandmother who was abused and a few hours later found in a body bag," Shiner says.

"What we're dealing with are the widespread abuses," he says. "We say to the ministry and government: 'Don't say you didn't know – what you can do is explain why you failed to do anything about it'."

Sexual depravity is a recurrent theme. Apart from routine sexual assaults, prisoners' faces are superimposed on to pornographic videos in order to blackmail them; female interrogators strip and feign seduction of prisoners in return for "information".

Abuse of Islam is another regular feature. One prisoner says he "could not believe" what he was seeing when a British soldier pretended to defecate on the Qur'an. "It's all carefully thought through," says Shiner. "It's as though the army took a manual on Muslim culture and reverse-engineered it. Things were done that are calculated to make them go mental."

In his own arguments to court, Shiner says: "All of these allegations involve circumstances in which it can be said that the UK state knew, or ought to have known" about breaches of international law. "Its response, or lack of one, is highly pertinent," says the claim.

"Military facilities at which abuse occurred were under the command of the relevant commanding officer" and "each detainee was medically examined at various points by doctors ... It is inconceivable that senior officers did not witness what was happening, or otherwise be aware of these incidents and practices."

Case studies

Radhi Nama was a teacher in his early 50s who was taken into detention at a unit holding facility.

He was hooded, his hands tied behind his back, and – as witnessed by his son — pushed by a soldier so that he "fell forward" and was thrown into a vehicle. During the subsequent interrogation, Nama's son said that his father had been "made to squat on the floor with his hands on his head".

Radhi Nama died on 8 May 2003 and was said, following a Royal Military Police investigation, to have died of "natural causes" involving a heart attack. There was no postmortem examination carried out, nor was a death certificate issued.

Kh M was one of the first two serving Iraqi soldiers to surrender to the British as prisoners of war, thereby placing themselves under stringent laws of war that protect PoWs.

He testifies: "A very muscular soldier … hooded both of us. We were left to kneel in the sun for hours. If I moved position or bent my head forward at all, a soldier would come and kick me hard – shouting 'shut up!' and 'fuck you'. I was kicked many times.

"During this time, one of the soldiers kicked me hard in the mouth, which caused three of my teeth to fall out later that day … I could see through the hoods a soldier taking photographs of me when I went to the toilet."

"Large military dogs" were also used to terrorise him during his time held in captivity.

JST was placed under arrest while at home

"The soldiers started throwing me to each other as though I were a doll … As each soldier caught me they would punch me … I could hear the soldiers laughing … I was thrown to the ground … I felt a soldier's boot on my head pushing my head to the ground.

"[In detention] a soldier started hitting me and pinching me on the buttocks … He then grabbed my penis and dragged me around the room while holding it … He also made me squat up and down while naked and inserted his finger into my anus … This was a serious affront to my religion."

Baha Mousa

Baha Mousa was one of 10 Iraqis detained in Basra in September 2003 by members of the 1st Battalion The Queen Lancashire Regiment on suspicion of being an insurgent.

The 26-year-old died two days after his arrest and a post-mortem examination found he had suffered asphyxiation and at least 93 injuries to his body, including fractured ribs and a broken nose.

Seven British soldiers from the Queen's Lancashire Regiment were charged in connection with Mousa's death and abuse of Iraqi prisoners and a court of appeal ordered an independent inquiry.

Corporal Donald Payne was jailed for a year and dismissed from the army after pleading guilty to inhumane treatment of Mousa. The six others either had the charges dropped or were acquitted.

Defence Secretary Des Browne announced a public inquiry into Mousa's death and the Ministry of Defence agreed to pay £2.83m compensation to mistreated detainees.

The inquiry concluded that Mousa's death was the result of a combination of his weakened physical state - caused by factors including lack of food and water, heat, exhaustion, fear, previous injuries and the hooding and stress positions used by British troops - and a final struggle with his guards.

The report also concluded that British soldiers had inflicted "violent and cowardly" assaults on Iraqi civilians, subjecting them to "gratuitous" kickings and beatings and included 73 recommendations to prevent a repeat of the failings.

Cass Jones

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/jan/19/britain-guilty-systemic-torture-iraq

British troops face fresh charges of Iraq war torture and killings

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/jan/19/british-troops-accused-iraq-torture

The Observer reports (January 19^th): Britain will face fresh charges of breaching international law over the alleged torture and killing of prisoners during the war in Iraq, which began almost exactly 10 years ago. The allegations will be unveiled in the high court, when Britain will stand accused of a "systemic" policy of abuse committed over five years, from 2003 to 2008.

At a hearing scheduled over three days from 29 January, lawyers for 180 Iraqis who claim they are victims of abuse, or that their family members were unlawfully killed, will place a file of statements before two judges presiding over the court in London accusing British soldiers and intelligence officers of unlawful interrogation practices. These include hooding and the use of "stress positions", sexual abuse, beating and religious abuse of illegally detained prisoners. In some cases, the testimonies allege, the torture led to the death of the prisoner.

The uprisings continue

Souad Al-Azzawi writes (January 7^th): With all the rage, strikes, and civil disobedience going on in major Iraqi cities, people around the world are wondering what’s happening in Iraq these days. The answer to this question is that the people in Iraq cannot bear any longer to be the victims of this government assigned by the Anglo-American occupation. During the ten years of violent occupation more than 1.5 million Iraqi have been killed, eight hundred thousand are missing, four million were forced to migrate outside Iraq and two million inside Iraq.  In ten years and spending more than 700 billion USD, a one day rain storm flooded the capital Baghdad and other major cities in the country. The American occupation imported corrupt politicians, or better: maffiosi, who decided to commit further crimes to end their political opponents through their corrupt judicial system, while getting wealthy and rich.

http://www.brussellstribunal.org/article_view.asp?id=664#.UPKfwCc3Yut

Iraqis win $5.8m from US firm in Abu Ghraib torture lawsuit

The Independent reports (January 9th):

Iraqi prisoners who allege they were tortured in Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq are being paid $5.8m by the subsidiary of a US defence contractor accused of complicity in their mistreatment.

The money will be paid to 71 former detainees of Abu Ghraib and other US-controlled detention centres in Iraq, and is the first time that prisoners have received money from a US defence contractor active in Iraq.

The claims were made against L-3 Services Inc, which provided linguists and interrogators to the US military in Iraq, many of whom were used at Abu Ghraib. L-3 Services is a subsidiary of Virginia-based Engility Holdings, which was spun off from L-3 Communications, a major government contractor and Fortune 500 company which employs more than 50,000 people and had a turnover of more than $15bn in 2011.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/iraqis-win-58m-from-us-firm-in-abu-ghraib-torture-lawsuit-8444907.html

a delegation from the PMSI joins Anbar protesters

Press Release by the Popular movement to Save Iraq, led by Oday Al Zaidy, brother of the journalist Muntadhar Al Zaidy

 These Images and banners below  raised in Anbar governante  terrorized the Maliki government and prompted her to put her head in the sand

After that fabricated claim in their disreputable media showing an image of a young man said to be from Anbar crush a banner with the name of Imam Hussein (peace be upon him ) 'The Pilgrims of Abu AlAhrar'; a delegation of the Popular Movement to save Iraq, which includes dozens of pilgrims from Karbala arrived to join the protesters of Anbar. It had in its   possession tens of banners bearing the name and picture of Imam Hussein (peace be upon him).

As soon as we arrived, we were given a very warm welcome by the Champions rebels, valiant sons of Anbar who took up our banners and raised them high. They raised us on their shoulders and began singing (God is greatest oh (imam)Ali we do not want Safavid commander). This stance made the blood freeze in the veins of the ANWAR sectarian TV channel and all the other sectarian media with sinister agenda of spreading discord and strife. It made them a joke among other channels.

We salute the Anbari heroes and God bless visitors ABU ALAHRAR and the Curse of the sectarian and came out of customers. U.S. and Iran
These images will move with the delegation to coalesce the prophet's grandson Hussain followers with Saladin in Mosul and shame on the true descendants of Rustam and Chosroes ...

and may God support the believers
Uday al-Zaidi
Popular Movement to save Iraq
Rebellious Anbar 3/01/2013

Best Regards
Tahrir Swift

From: عدي مهدي

                             بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم 

 هذه الصور واللافتات التي رفعت في الانبار ارعبت الحكومة وجعلتها تضع رئسها في

 التراب فبعد ان فبرك اعلامهم  الاصفر صورة لشاب قيل انه من الانبار  يسحق على لافتة كتب عليها اسم الحسين عليه السلام توجه وفد من الحركة الشعبية لإنقاذ العراق والذي يضم العشرات من الزوار من كربلاء  الى المظاهرة وبحوزته عشرات الصورواللافتات التي  تحمل اسم ورسم الحسين عليه السلام وحال وصولنا الى الاعتصام تلاقف الابطال الثوار ابناء الانبار الباسلة اللافتات  والصور ورفعوها على الاكتاف وبدأوا ينشدون ( الله واكبر يا علي منريد قائد صفوي ) وهذه الوقفة جمدت الدماء بوجوه القائمين على قناة الانوار الطائفية وغيرها من قنوات الشر والفتنة وجعلتهم اضحوكة بين القنوات الاخرى فحيا الله اهل الانبار الابطال وبارك الله بزوار ابي الاحرار وتبا للطائفية ومن جاء بها من عملاء .امريكا وايران 

وستنتقل هذه الصور مع الوفد لتلتحم مع احفاد الحسين ع في صلاح الدين والموصل وليمت احفاد رستم وكسرى بغيظهم ...والله ناصر المؤمنين 

عدي الزيدي 

الحركة الشعبية لإنقاذ العراق 

الانبار الثائرة 3/1/2013

Illegal Occupation of Iraq: US-UK Crimes against Humanity Open Letter to Foreign Secretary William Hague, M.P.

January 4, 2013

The Foreign Secretary,
The Rt. Hon., William Hague, M.P.,

And: To Whom it May Concern,
Foreign and Commonwealth Office,
London SW1.

Greetings,

In the light of the fact that it transpires that twenty seven Foreign Office lawyers concluded unanimously that the invasion of Iraq was illegal  I write to draw your attention to just a few of the the chilling events currently taking place in Iraq under the US-UK’s despotic, imposed, puppet Prime Minister.

Firstly, here is a list of prisons, detention facilities, interrogation centres and numbers of those held in each, as far as can be ascertained in the circumstances. As you will surely know people are routinely arbitrarily detained for weeks, months, even years, often without trial, and with one, usually under a totally inadequate or corrupt legal system. 

On 3rd January 2013, Nuri al-Maliki carried out the death sentence on Ahmed al-Samarrai and two other men from Mosul, on charges of his resisting the U.S. and Iran occupation. Resisting an unlawful occupation is, of course, a legal right. His body was not delivered to his family; a funeral will take place in his honor, in gatherings, in Anbar and elsewhere in Iraq. (Should you question the US occupation since they "pulled out" last December, just see the Vatican City size US embassy and its thousands of mercenaries, intelligence operators and nefarious other spooks and enforcers.)

Early this morning (4th January) al-Maliki’s  forces – wearing all black clothing – entered Taji Prison and took one hundred prisoners from the western city of Ramadi to an unidentified place. Death squads come to mind – again.

Al-Maliki has also ordered an on sight shoot-to-kill policy toward protesters.

By August 31st there had been ninety six executions in 2012, with twenty six people reportedly being executed on both the 27th and 29th August. Few details of those executed or their identities were released. They are simply the disappeared in the the tradition of all despots. Iraq: "… has a huge problem with torture and unfair trials …", Human Rights Watch, who produced the Report, pointed out.

Thousands of women are detained and subject to near routine torture and rape. They are often held with their children and even with infants.

Britain as co-architect, and liar-in-chief on the reasons for the invasion has an absolute duty, with America, to bring to heel their out of control, tyrannical government. Both countries have large embassies and the wherewithal to exert such pressure.

"Maliki is heading towards an incredibly destructive dictatorship, and it looks to me as though the Obama administration is waving him across the finishing line," Toby Dodge, Iraq expert at the London School of Economics said earlier this year.

"The Foreign and Commonwealth Office works to promote the interests of the United Kingdom and to contribute to a strong world community", states your website. All it is contributing to at the moment is murder, mayhem and destruction, also making a potential target of every British passport holder where ever they travel.

Which ever party is in power, or coalition, the UK’s actions and duplicity are beyond shame. Is it too much to hope that Iraq’s human rights tragedy might be addressed with urgency – a new leaf, New Year’s Resolution for 2013?

It was six years on 30th December that Saddam Hussein, whose country’s "sovereignty and territorial integrity" was guaranteed by the United Nations, was lynched under US-UK stewardship. The horror was the spectre of the years to come – ongoing.

And in the event minds in the Foreign Office should turn to Iraq’s governmental depravities and Britain’s part in creating them, please remember a frail, ill, dignified patriot in his seventies, former Foreign Minister Tareq Aziz and his colleagues, lost to all humanity in the "New Iraq." It is surely past time he and they were reunited with their families and able to spend their remaining days, months or  waning years with them. Bearing in mind the views of the Foreign Office’s own Lawyers, in paragraph 1.

Yours in very fragile hope,

Felicity Arbuthnot 

http://www.globalresearch.ca/illegal-occupation-of-iraq-us-uk-crimes-against-humanity/5317723?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=illegal-occupation-of-iraq-us-uk-crimes-against-humanity