See men shredded, then say you don't back war (MUST, MUST READ!)

The Times ^ | March 18, 2003 | Ann Clwyd

[MadIvan]

“There was a machine designed for shredding plastic. Men were dropped into it and we were again made to watch. Sometimes they went in head first and died quickly. Sometimes they went in feet first and died screaming. It was horrible. I saw 30 people die like this. Their remains would be placed in plastic bags and we were told they would be used as fish food . . . on one occasion, I saw Qusay [President Saddam Hussein’s youngest son] personally supervise these murders.”

This is one of the many witness statements that were taken by researchers from Indict — the organisation I chair — to provide evidence for legal cases against specific Iraqi individuals for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. This account was taken in the past two weeks.

Another witness told us about practices of the security services towards women: “Women were suspended by their hair as their families watched; men were forced to watch as their wives were raped . . . women were suspended by their legs while they were menstruating until their periods were over, a procedure designed to cause humiliation.”

The accounts Indict has heard over the past six years are disgusting and horrifying. Our task is not merely passively to record what we are told but to challenge it as well, so that the evidence we produce is of the highest quality. All witnesses swear that their statements are true and sign them.

For these humanitarian reasons alone, it is essential to liberate the people of Iraq from the regime of Saddam. The 17 UN resolutions passed since 1991 on Iraq include Resolution 688, which calls for an end to repression of Iraqi civilians. It has been ignored. Torture, execution and ethnic-cleansing are everyday life in Saddam’s Iraq.

Were it not for the no-fly zones in the south and north of Iraq — which some people still claim are illegal — the Kurds and the Shia would no doubt still be attacked by Iraqi helicopter gunships.

For more than 20 years, senior Iraqi officials have committed genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. This list includes far more than the gassing of 5,000 in Halabja and other villages in 1988. It includes serial war crimes during the Iran-Iraq war; the genocidal Anfal campaign against the Iraqi Kurds in 1987-88; the invasion of Kuwait and the killing of more than 1,000 Kuwaiti civilians; the violent suppression, which I witnessed, of the 1991 Kurdish uprising that led to 30,000 or more civilian deaths; the draining of the Southern Marshes during the 1990s, which ethnically cleansed thousands of Shias; and the summary executions of thousands of political opponents.

Many Iraqis wonder why the world applauded the military intervention that eventually rescued the Cambodians from Pol Pot and the Ugandans from Idi Amin when these took place without UN help. They ask why the world has ignored the crimes against them?

All these crimes have been recorded in detail by the UN, the US, Kuwaiti, British, Iranian and other Governments and groups such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty and Indict. Yet the Security Council has failed to set up a war crimes tribunal on Iraq because of opposition from France, China and Russia. As a result, no Iraqi official has ever been indicted for some of the worst crimes of the 20th century. I have said incessantly that I would have preferred such a tribunal to war. But the time for offering Saddam incentives and more time is over.

I do not have a monopoly on wisdom or morality. But I know one thing. This evil, fascist regime must come to an end. With or without the help of the Security Council, and with or without the backing of the Labour Party in the House of Commons tonight.

The author is Labour MP for Cynon Valley.

[Humidston]

Have you read his homepage lately? Obscene!

[Alberta's Child]

And 99.99% of Kuwaitis had no interest in fighting off those invaders. In fact, wealthy Kuwaitis remain among the most despised people in the Islamic world because of the way they passed their time away in the nightclubs of Cairo and London while someone else came and "liberated" their country for them.

[wtc911]

Sobibor, Treblinka, Auschwitz are proven facts of history. This article proves nothing. And btw, we did not go to war with the Nazis because of the camps. If we were the kind of nation that did so then what kept us out of Stalin's USSR, Pol Pot's Cambodia, Idi Amin's Uganda, East Timor, Rwanda?

Alberta's child is right.

[tomahawk]

I don't know any Kuwaitis, but I suspect the vast majority of them disagree with you 100%.

[ez]

These atrocities though are not a cause for war. If they were then we would have to invade half of Africa, half of South America, Turkey, Iran, any other country where similar (as yet unproven) allegations have been made.

If you truly believe in inalienable rights, due process and freedom from cruel and unusual punishment, then you will agree with me that the moral position is to advocate and enable the overthrow of tyrants who abuse their power.

It is the American ideal, in it's pure form...that when a government becomes destructive of those ends, it is the right, no, the duty of the people to throw off such government.

Since we cannot invade all those countries you listed unprovoked, we should , rather , await opportunities such as Saddam has afforded us to move against them.

It may take decades, but the principle endures.

[goodnesswins]

YES! What YOU said! (Sheesh....we can't do EVERYTHING in the World, all at once!)

[Alberta's Child]

I ran into a few Kuwaitis in school here in the U.S. back at that time. They were very honest about what they were doing in the U.S.

And they were despised by the one Palestinian kid who served as a "spy" of sorts for the PLO in Israel a few years earlier.

[appalachian_dweller]

>> Yeah, sure they were. Just like those babies in Kuwaiti hospitals were thrown from their incubators to die on the cold, hard floor. I'm all weepy now. I just love being lied to in order to demonize an entire country.

What kind of sick, base, demented, M.F. sits around and thinks this stuff up? <<

How 'bout this....why don't you go on a fact-finding mission? Please, head on over to Iraq.

[ez]

And 99.99% of Kuwaitis had no interest in fighting off those invaders. In fact, wealthy Kuwaitis remain among the most despised people in the Islamic world because of the way they passed their time away in the nightclubs of Cairo and London while someone else came and "liberated" their country for them.

Non-Germane Agitprop. So Kuwaiti's are hated, now what?

[CroftonFreeper]

I am hoping Saddam and family do not choose exile. If they do, I hope we have them in sights and use high powered ordinace on there getaway bus,train or plane. I want to see these folks DEAD. Just like Osama. The hell with a trial.

[angkor]

What kind of sick, base, demented, M.F. sits around and thinks this stuff up?

You haven't been out and about in the world, have you?

I'm not going to work through the worldwide catalog of brutality that's been seen and documented in even the last 10 years, so suffice it to say that brutality is real (can you spell R-W-A-N-D-A?).

Saddam seems to have an inordinate hand in state-sponsored brutality, and it doesn't really matter whether you will or will not admit to that fact.

[headsonpikes]

The U.N. is the greatest protector of illegitimate regimes in the world.

The U.N. has essentially become the global forum for tyrants of all kinds, and France is their leading advocate now.

The worst enemy of most people is their own government.

[Alberta's Child]

Go back and look at the posts -- I'm simply trying to make a point.

[Jane_N]

hang a woman upside down by thier hair.

Seeing I have long hair and am female, I kinda got hung up on this...after several considerations i still can't work out how it is possible. How do you hang someone upside down by their hair? :)

[wtc911]

As you said, it is the right (duty) of the people to throw off such an oppressive government....the duty of those people living under that government...not our duty as America. Your ideals are noble and shared but our country has never and I'll wager will never go to war for this reason. If we have a more global cause and the targeted country is offensive to mankind in this manner as well then we will use this offensiveness to our advantage in the propaganda wars. That's the way it has always been....or do you think that we went to war with Japan because of the Rape of Nanking? I know that you don't. The point is that to argue that this article presents a reason to commit US troops to war without commiting the same to a dozen other countries ignores both history and current world real politik.

[diamond6]

This makes me want to cry. I can not believe there are so many evil people in this world.

[Amelia]

Ivan, can you email articles from the TIMES website? If so, I sure wish you'd send a copy of this to atc@npr.org to the attention of commentator Daniel Schorr....(All Things Considered at National Public Radio; yeah, I do listen to it in the car during my commute.)

He had a commentary this afternoon to the effect that Bush was warmongering and setting all sorts of unfortunate precendents, including empire-building...frosted my butt...

I'd link to the commentary, but they don't have the link up until the entire show has finished broadcasting. I can't get to the TIMES website anymore.

[MadIvan]

This article points out the duplicity of the Left. They are so very willing to paint Bush and Rumsfeld and Blair as warmongers, yet take so little care in discovering anything about who is the beneficiary of their activities. It is one part of a large tapestry of evidence which shows that Saddam is evil and by their actions, the peaceniks have chosen to stand in defence of this evil.

Regards, Ivan

[walden]

Blair's government should hire you and pay you to do what you've been doing on FR-- you're a GREAT liason keeping the alliance strong and promoting understanding between America, Britain & Europe. I'm serious-- you should look into it.