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France Ready for Postwar Role in Iraq By KIM HOUSEGO .c The Associated Press PARIS (AP) - France is ready to join the reconstruction of Iraq and help ensure self-rule is quickly restored despite U.S. resistance to a prominent French role, the foreign minister said Wednesday. ``France wants to be present at the side of the Iraqi people,'' Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin said, adding the reconstruction effort should be supervised by the United Nations. A French diplomat, whom de Villepin did not identify, is in Baghdad to begin discussions with the various political and religious factions vying for power...

Thatcher was right. Sarandon is wrong. O welche Lust! ell, the war has been over for ages and ages — it seems so yesterday — and the press has been consumed with griping and sniping and pouting. But I'm still grateful. Still grateful and amazed at what U.S. forces accomplished. The country, with its allies, committed a great act. A noble and humane and necessary act: Don't let "them" make you forget that. According to Warren Hoge in the New York Times, Tony Blair has "avoided victory talk . . ." Far be it from me to advise the PM...

We all saw the scenes. The utter joy, the scenes of uncensored jubilation. Indeed, watching the euphoria did wonders for the soul. So you might have thought that the entire free world looked at the images of a liberated Baghdad with relief and with joy. After all, we hadn’t seen such a spectacle of repressive regime bashing since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Statues were pulled down, Saddam posters torn to shreds, finally, people were able to speak their minds. And what they have to tell us is horrifying and extraordinary. The London Times reported about the torture cells...

April 19, 2003Vigil During the Night of Easter Psalm: Saturday Week 18 Reading I Responsorial Psalm 1 Reading II Reading II Responsorial Psalm 2 Reading III Responsorial Psalm 3 Reading IV Responsorial Psalm 4 Reading V Responsorial Psalm 5 Reading VI Responsorial Psalm 6 Reading VII Responsorial Psalm 7 Reading VIII Responsorial Psalm 8 Epistle Responsorial Psalm 9 Gospel Reading IGn 1:1–2:2 or 1:1, 26-31a In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless wasteland, and darkness covered the abyss,while a mighty wind swept over the waters. Then God said,"Let there be light,"...

Families of Seven Rescued POWS Rejoice By CHRIS ROBERTS .c The Associated Press EL PASO, Texas (AP) - Just two days after Fort Bliss mourned nine soldiers from the 507th Maintenance Company, ``great rejoicing'' began with word that five other members of the unit who were taken prisoner in Iraq are now free. ``When it all started it was like a nightmare,'' Joel Hernandez told NBC's ``Today'' show Monday about the capture of his brother, Army Spc. Edgar Alan Hernandez. ``We were just waiting for good news and we got that good news, and now it's time to celebrate.'' Hernandez...

Mideast Diary: How the fall of Baghdad will forever change Arab politics "They are pulling it down!" said the Al-Jazeera announcer to millions of Arab viewers watching as U.S. Marines helped Iraqi youths destroy the Saddam monument in Al Rasheed Street. "This is the beginning of a new history that will affect the whole Arab world." Five short days ago, Arab TV networks had shown a Saddam speech urging Iraqis to fight, and images of the leader walking around the streets of Baghdad. Saddam's message was that he was still alive, still defending the Arab nation against the "mercenaries and...

<p>WEST FARGO, N.D. -- Portraits are mustered in the comfortable living room of Hussein Weled's West Fargo home like a squad of impatient but determined guerrilla fighters. The two largest are portraits of Mustafa Barzani, the legendary Kurdish leader who died in exile in Washington, D.C., in 1979. One is of Barzani's son, Massoud, now president of the Kurdish Democratic Party, political arm of the Peshmerga -- Kurdish for "those who face death."</p>

Pro-war parade By Alan Piñon, Press & Guide Newspapers DEARBORN — Hundreds of people spontaneously took to the streets in celebration of the apparent collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime Wednesday morning. "We are celebrating because Iraq is going to be free," said Tawfiq Almawala. American and Iraqi flags were waved together, as the elated crowd sang songs and danced in the street. "We thank the mothers and sisters of people who died for our liberation. Iraqi blood has mixed with American blood. We’re going to be all together now," said Mohammed Albodry, originally from Iraq. Police were able to move...

Ari Alani, an Iraqi Kurd, wishes he could say thank you to U.S. and British troops nonstop. "I don't know how to say it enough times," he said Saturday as more than 50 Iraqi Kurds gathered at a park in this south Denver suburb to show appreciation for the campaign that toppled Saddam Hussein. "To fight for others is very nice, and it's not normal that people would do this," Alani said. Kurdish women in colorful saris and gold necklaces linked arms to dance. Men in hand-woven moccasins and balloon pants made from fine wool sipped coffee. Plates of rice...

Iraqi jubilation has anti-warmongers flabbergasted ALAN DAWSON The worst nightmare has come true for the anti-war, anti-globalisation, anti-American mobs. The people of Iraq say they have been liberated. It will be interesting to see how those who supported keeping Saddam Hussein in power _ unwittingly or purposely _ will squirm out of the predicament. Certainly, none of them will admit they were wrong. But they were. The Iraqi people did not organise to resist the American-British coalition, although The Guardian of London said on March 30 they already had. ``Instead of rising up to welcome the invaders,'' the paper thundered...

April 11, 2003, 1:50 p.m. Two Dreams Iraqi Americans celebrate. By Henry Payne DEARBORN, MICH. — "USA! USA! USA!" They came to the U.S. to realize the American Dream, but this week hundreds of Iraqi-Americans celebrated the Iraqi Dream — the end of Saddam Hussein's barbaric regime. Dearborn's neat, working-class streets in southeast Michigan are home to America's largest concentration of Iraqi Americans, and today they were transformed into a festival of American flags, confetti, beating drums, and cars honking their horns in jubilation at the news that Baghdad had fallen to U.S. troops. For the Bush administration, the stated...

<p>April 12, 2003 -- WASHINGTON - President Bush yesterday said he'll never forget how Saddam Hussein's statue came tumbling down in Baghdad as he fought back tears after visiting wounded troops who helped make history and free Iraq.</p> <p>"I don't think I'll ever forget - I'm sure a lot of other people will never forget - the statue of Saddam Hussein falling in Baghdad," Bush said, blinking hard to control his emotions after he and wife Laura saw the troops.</p>

LACONIA — The American flag plastered on the face of a Saddam Hussein statue in Baghdad this week was carried to Iraq by a New Hampshire Marine. U.S. Marine 1st. Lt. Tim McLaughlin of Laconia was given the flag — which flew at the Pentagon on Sept. 11 — for helping rescuers the day of the terrorist attacks. On Wednesday, McLaughlin removed the flag from a sealed pouch and handed it to a fellow soldier. Then it was hoisted up the 20-foot bronze statue of the deposed Iraqi leader just before the statue was torn off its pedestal by a...

People around the world, and right here in southern Nevada, were glued to their TV sets as the dramatic events unfolded in Iraq today. One group that has been over come with emotion is Iraqi Americans living in our area. News 3's Ben Correa spoke to an Iraqi American who stayed up all night watching the coverage. Michael Mukhtar stayed up to 5 this morning. He says the images of Americans and Iraqis uniting to rip down a statue were amazing. Mukhtar says the time has come for the Iraqi people to experience freedom. It is history, a change of...

SANAA, April 11 (KUNA) -- Some Yemenis who had sentiments of admiration for the deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, now have different feelings toward the man, whose statues were downed and his posters were beaten with shoes in public places in the Iraqi war-stricken capital Baghdad. Saeed Abdullah, 40, who manages a popular cafe in the heart of the Yemeni capital, said the sudden disappearance of Saddam has become the main topic of daily debates among his customers, and protested that these discussions often heat up and turn into quarrels. Hamdi Ahmad, a government employee, said, "our sentiments toward...

Abbas Muhammed stood in front of the burned office of Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party today. On his left, children hurled bricks at a bullet-pocked, scribbled-on portrait of Saddam. “When we heard of the advancing coalition,” said Abbas, 25, “we rose up and walked out into the streets.” Then he and his neighbors led 500 Kurdish peshmerga fighters and a handful of U.S. special operations troops to Iraqi offices and military garrisons. In yet another dramatic day in Iraq, the northern oil center of Kirkuk, a city of 600,000, fell from Saddam’s grasp. Thousands of Kirkukis danced, sang and cried with...

<p>The world watched yesterday as ecstatic Iraqi people toppled statues of the brutal dictator who had been oppressing and murdering them for decades.</p> <p>They cheered American troops, and kissed pictures of George Bush, and behaved in many ways contrary to those who had mistakenly predicted disaster for this foreign adventure of the president. Those who had done so must have been embarrassed to watch the images on the television screen, or perhaps averted their eyes.</p>

Statue Toppling Conspiracy? Almost Seen as U.S. “Conquest” ABC made sure viewers understood that the Arab media see the U.S. as occupiers of Iraq, and why they do. In a prime time special, Jennings characterized Middle East TV coverage as seeking to learn: “Is this liberation or occupation?” Cynthia McFadden declared that “the pictures that play in America as liberation play in the Arab world as domination.” Soon after McFadden's story, Robert Krulwich saw the toppling of the Hussein statue as a parable for how Arabs see the U.S. action in Iraq. Krulwich provided a very strange blow-by-blow account of...

A moment that spoke for America April 10, 2003 3:50 pm Marine Cpl. Edward Chin didn’t roll into Baghdad with his armored unit expecting to help pull down a huge metal statue of Saddam Hussein. The city was still a dangerous place, as events over the next few hours would make clear. But for a few minutes, Cpl. Chin was a worldwide media event as he scampered up the hoist of a tank recovery vehicle and fastened a chain around the neck of the statue, taking time to briefly drape the soon-to-be decapitated head with Old Glory. It was a...

<p>The most evocative news photo to come out of the liberation of Baghdad may be one of a young Iraqi man, dressed in a denim jacket, holding a home made poster celebrating the "Hero of the Peace" — George W. Bush — and kissing the president's faintly smiling photo.</p>