Nobel Winner Criticizes US Invasion of Iraq, Prison Abuse

Dow Jones | 5/10/05 | AP Staff

[BunnySlippers]

Nobel Winner Criticizes US Invasion of Iraq, Prison Abuse

SYRACUSE, N.Y. (AP)--In much of the world's view, the U.S. has replaced the former Soviet Union as the global bully by its invasion of Iraq and mistreatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison, 2003 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi said Monday.

Ebadi, the first Iranian and first Muslim woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, was unequivocal that the U.S. should withdraw its troops from Iraq immediately and let the Iraqis rule themselves.

"I believe this wasn't a justified war to begin with," Ebadi said in an interview with The Associated Press before the start of a visit hosted by Syracuse University's College of Law.

"In the U.S.," she said, "it is often proclaimed that democracy is the ultimate value. I understand democracy to be the people's right to decide their own government. I would like to ask the U.S. government whether democracy is only good for Americans?

"You can't liberate people through the use of an occupying force," said Ebadi, whose appearance in Syracuse was the start of a speaking tour on U.S. campuses.

The Nobel award committee honored Ebadi for her advocacy of human rights and democracy in her homeland. Now an author and professor at the University of Tehran, she was recently included on Time magazine's list of the world's 100 most influential people.

The 57-year-old Ebadi served as one of Iran's first female judges from 1975 until 1979, when she was forced to relinquish her position following the 1979 revolution that put more hardline Islamic forces in power.

The founder and leader of the Association for Support of Children's Rights in Iran, Ebadi has been the target of assassination attempts and spent time in prison. She has fought with conservative Muslim clerics over rights for women and children and has used her status as a lawyer to call for freedom of speech and equality under the law.

Ebadi criticized both the U.S. government and military for the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison that have drawn world outrage.

"I don't think the U.S. military has lost control, and yet if the U.S. really wanted, it could have prevented these abuses. I'm very sorry there wasn't a deeper commitment to preventing these atrocities," she said.

The Nobel laureate said President George W. Bush and the U.S. military had severely damaged the country's reputation abroad as a defender of human rights.

During her visit to the U.S., Ebadi will visit several other universities including Harvard and Stanford. She will speak at the U.N. later this month.

[muawiyah]

She's just saying that because here buddies, the ayatollahs, want to move in on Iraq the second we're gone!

[BunnySlippers]

I don't know how to produce a live link ... but it sure is a switch from earlier stories. Maybe her friends at Harvard and other American universities have gotten to her. But here's the URL:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1003146/posts

[vandykelastone]

ANyone who would accept a nobel prize is not anyone we need to be listening to - and a foreigner, no less! And a moslem into the bargain! And a woman! This just gets better and better.

[dead]

She wants freedom and democracy for Iranians, not Iraqis.

[Spotsy]

Arafat has a Nobel Peace Prize. Need I say more?

[edhammond]

Well, hell....who doesn't condemn it? It's not torture, but it sure as heck isn't what we train our soldiers to do, and it sure isn't in keeping with what we believe. We're better than they are---that's why we're America, for God's sake!

[edhammond]

Well, hell....who doesn't condemn it? It's not torture, but it sure as heck isn't what we train our soldiers to do, and it sure isn't in keeping with what we believe. We're better than they are---that's why we're America, for God's sake!

[G.Mason]

Wow!

Who wudda thunk?

Or in my best "Nobel" speech ... Why that is simply amazing. Who would have remotely considered that happening?

[edhammond]

Sorry for double post...got carried away! :)

[theDentist]

Dear Shirin,

How 'bout a nice cup of "Shut the **** Up"?

sincerely,

theDentist

[Reelect President Dubya]

The cycle of the bogus "torture" story is almost complete.

Soon even Al Franken and his wife Michael Moore won't be able to keep a straight face when they lie about it.

[Spok]

I quit reading after "Nobel Winner..."

[The Scourge of Yazid]

Arafat, Peres, that hippie chick who wanted to ban landmines. From Vermont, I think? This isn't exactly a badge of honor if you ask me.

If Stockholm wants to bestow an honor on some people who are really doing something to combat fanaticism, oppression and tyranny they should designate the thousands of political prisoners now rotting in jail as the next recipients of a Nobel Peace Prize.

[Red Badger]

I wonder what she thought of the Daniel Pearl Decapitation Video?............Just some guys having too much fun?..........

[fedupwithlibs]

The Nobel Peace award is turning into a joke. It should be the Nobel appeasement award.

Here is a list of past winners. This should put the award in perspective:

2002 Jimmy Carter
2001 United Nations, Kofi Annan
1994 Yasser Arafat, Shimon Peres, Yitzhak Rabin
1993 Nelson Mandela
1990 Mikhail Gorbachev
1988 United Nations

Nowhere on the list do I see Ronald Reagan. In fact, Gorbachev was the one recognized for his efforts in ending the cold war.

[OldFriend]

I thought the article was going to be by Jimmy Carter!

[lilylangtree]

Read in Sunday's Parade (May 9, 2004) Intelligence Report by Lyric Wallwork Winik entitled Afghani Women Still Struggle

Yes, life is better for many women in Afghanistan without the abuses of the Taliban. But they still face grievous threats. Human Rights Watch says soldiers and police frequently attack women. In some areas, women are afraid to leave their homes to do more than gather water because of widespread kidnapping and robbery. Armed bandits will rob a man driving a pregnant woman to the hospital. "They may be robbed even with the woman in labor--the gunmen are that uneducated," says residents of Paghman, outside Kabul. (Even without bandits, one in six Afghani women dies in childbirth, says UNICEF. Infant-mortality rates also are among the world's worst.) Human Rights Watch reports that women worry about the future and fear that the protections of their rights could worsen, since many of the warlords who ruled under the Taliban have returned to power.

Considering that she was honored by a questionable award for her advocacy of human rights and democracy in her homeland, Ebadi should concentrate her efforts to speak out for Afghani women instead of murderous islamics who would rather stick a knife or shoot a coalition member if given a chance.

[The Scourge of Yazid]

Not only Afghanistan of course, but it is one of the most volatile places in that region of the world. She could also put a spotlight on the purdah in neighboring Pakistan, the honor killings that still have not been banned in Jordan or better yet, the continuous denial of rights to women in her own backyard on a daily basis.

Why is it that she can accept the Peace prize with a bare head in Europe but has to wear a veil in her native country? Once she answers that question, I think that we'll have more respect for her point-of-view on these matters.

[LexBaird]

How 'bout a nice cup of "Shut the **** Up"?

sincerely,

theDentist

Comin' right up!