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SUNTO IN ITALIANO

GROSSA IRREGOLARITA' A MOUSUL.
ESCLUSO DAL VOTO QUATTRO QUARTIERI KURDI PRO-KDP
(ALMENO 100,000 VOTANTI).

NOTA. SI SA CHE GLI AMERICANI NON VOLEVANO UNA SCHIACCIANTE VITTORIA CURDA NEL NORD. SI SA PURE CHE ESSI SOSTENEVONO COMUNQUE L'ALTRA FAZIONE CURDA, L'UPK. LA NOTIZIA E' TRAPELLATO PERCHE' LA STAMPA HA POTUTO CIRCOLARE A MOSUL E, INOLTRE, CHI SOVRAINTENDE LE ELEZIONI, IL GOVERNATORE REGIONALE, E' UN CURDO DEL KDP.

MA QUANTE IRREGOLARITA' SONO STATE COMMESE, NON DENUNCIATE, IN TUTTE LE ALTRE REGIONI DOVE COMANDANO GLI UOMINI DI ALLAWI E DOVE NON C'ERANO NE' GIORNALISTI NE' OSSERVATORI INTERNAZIONALI?

VEDI PARAGRAFO IN ROSSO.



NYTimes.com > International > Middle East

Mosul: Threats Fail, and Glitches for the Kurds

By CHRISTINE HAUSER

Published: January 30, 2005



MOSUL, Iraq, Jan. 30 - At 7 a.m., Khaled Kazar, an election official who had to be shipped in from Baghdad because the Mosul employees had resigned several weeks ago, was taking call after call from polling centers as they opened across the city today.

"The polling centers are open and the first one to call has reported it has 15 to 20 voters lined up," Kazar said.

But even before 8:30, he was already getting reports filtering in about roadside bomb attacks, mortars and small arms fire.

"They didn't hit," said Brig. Gen. Carter Ham, the American commander in Mosul, after he arrived at the election coordination center. "But that is what we think they were trying to do."

He said that early signs indicated a "good turnout" in Nineveh province. On Saturday he had said he was concerned about whether there would be good turnout at the voting booths in western Mosul, where the population is predominantly Sunni Arab.

By late afternoon, Maj. Anthony Cruz, the American liaison officer with the electoral commission in Mosul, said that there were thousands of voters appearing at each polling center "across the board."

Khasro Goran, deputy governor in Mosul, said he had reports of strong turnout and long lines from polling centers in the eastern side of the river that runs through the northern city, in predominantly Kurdish areas. But in Tahrir and the Arab neighborhoods of Zuhour and Saddam on the eastern side, "young gunmen are shooting from the streets and on the rooftops just to scare people away," he said.

"There was an imam there who called from the mosque on people not to vote," Mr. Goran said.

But Mr. Goran said that four Kurdish districts outside of Mosul - Shaikhan, Bartila, Bashika and Karakosh (also known as Hamdani) - did not receive ballot boxes or supplies, so Kurds were unable to vote there. A Kurdish Democratic Party spokesman, Mahdi Harki, said that the population in those areas was about 300,000, with at least 100,000 of those eligible to vote.

"I am afraid it was a dirty trick against the Kurdish vote," Mr. Harki said.

Mr. Goran met General Ham to discuss the problem. He said General Ham wanted to help but that it was the responsibility of the Independent Electoral Commission for Iraq to ask the military to transport the voting materials.

Mr. Kazar , the election official, said that he knew of the problem early in the morning and had asked the Americans to move the ballots.

Mr. Goran, who is a Kurd, said he believed the motivation behind the mixup was that the expected high turnout of Kurdish voters would tilt the results to heavily favor Kurds, and upset the political balance in the city. "The Kurds will have the whole percentage of the vote," he said. "There are some people here who do not want that," said Mr. Goran.

He said he was initially turned down in his request for an extension in those districts to allow Kurds to vote Monday morning. But later, the electoral commission did agree to extend voting in those areas until 10:00 on Monday. But Mr. Harki said this would still not help turnout because villagers from outlying areas could not go to the polling stations at night, leaving just a few hours in the morning.

In the town of Zuhur, an Arab voter, Fakher Fakhri, 31, said he voted for the ticket of Ayad Allawi, the interim prime minister. "We tried this man," he said. "We know him. He gave salary raises to government workers and wants a national army."

He said the voting went smoothly even amid tight security. "They were searching people with new machines, even women," Mr. Fakhri said. "They were asking us to turn our mobiles off."

Another resident of the area reported that he heard gunfire. "But that's normal here," the man said.

On Kurdish television, footage from the city of Suleimaniya showed women in colorful headscarves lined up to vote. "We didn't sleep last night we were so excited," said one.

At 6 p.m., Major Cruz said that about 60 percent of the centers had turned in results in Mosul, and there were more than 53,000 votes with more to come.

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SUNTO IN ITALIANO

VENGONO SEGNATE IN ROSSO LE 4 IRREGOLARITA' PIU' PLATEALI:

1. Il Centro Carter (dell'ex presidente Jimmy Carter), che ha creato principi per valutare la regolarità delle elezioni nel terzo mondo, ha bocciato la regolarità delle procedure adottate in Iraq.

2. Tranne nella provincia curda, i giornalisti non hanno potuto visitare nessun seggio elettorale, con l'eccezione di 5 appositamente scelti -- tutti a Baghdad e 4 dei quali nei quartieri sciiti più favorevoli al voto.

3. Nessun osservatore internazionale è stato autorizzato a visitare i seggi. La dichiarazione di regolarità sbandierata è stata rilasciata da un gruppo di osservatori internazionali rimasto nella Giordania durante l'intero scrutinio.

4. I dati forniti dagli americani si basano sul percentuale dei votanti tra coloro che hanno ritirato la scheda elettorale e non sul percentuale degli aventi diritto, come si fa normalmente. Pertanto, accettando per buone le cifre fornite dal governo Allawi, solo il 44% degli aventi diritto in Iraq ha votato e solo il 23% degli aventi diritto all'estero ha votato. Non si tratta di ampie maggioranze.



Reading the Elections

by Phyllis Bennis

Institute for Policy Studies

1 February 2005

The millions of Iraqis who came out for the elections were voting their hopes for an end to violence and occupation, and a better life; their hopes are not likely to be met.

The election, held under military occupation and not meeting international criteria, including those of the Carter Center , remains illegitimate; legitimacy is not determined by the number of people voting.

Millions of Iraqis participated in the election, but it is still unclear how many. International journalists were limited to five polling stations in Baghdad , four of which were in Shi'a districts with expected high turnout. The U.S.-backed election commission in Iraq originally announced a 72% participation immediately after the polls closed, then downscaled that to "near 60%" - actually claiming about 57% turn-out. But those figures are all still misleading. The Washington Post reported (two days after the vote, on page 7 of the Style section) that the 60% figure is based on the claim that 8 million out of 14 million eligible Iraqis turned out. But the 14 million figure itself is misleading, because it only includes those registered Iraqis, not the 18 million actually eligible voters. [Quindi, nella migliore delle ipotesi, senza tener conto delle frodi, solo il 44% degli aventi diritto ha votato.] Similarly, the claim of very high voter participation among Iraqi exiles is misleading, since only 280,000 or so Iraqis abroad even registered, out of about 1.2 million qualified to register and vote. [Di nuovo, tra gli iracheni all'estero, nella migliore delle ipotesi solo il 23% degli aventi diritto ha votato.] The participation of women, both as candidates (imposed by the U.S.-backed electoral law) and as voters, was significant, but key demands of Iraqi women, particularly involving economic and social rights disproportionately denied to women, are unlikely to be met through this electoral process.

The Iraqi election was not legitimate. It was held under conditions of a hostile military foreign occupation. The Hague Convention of 1907, to which the U.S. is a signatory, prohibits the occupying power from creating any permanent changes in the government of the occupied territory. These elections were arranged under an electoral law and by an electoral commission installed and backed by the occupying power. They took place in an environment so violent that voters could not even learn the names of candidates, and the three days surrounding the vote included a complete lock-down of the country, including shoot-to-kill curfews in many areas, closure of the airport and borders, and closure of roads. There were no international monitors in the country - unlike Afghanistan (with 122 monitors) and Palestine (with 800) during difficult elections held under occupation, Iraq was deemed too dangerous for international election monitors. The Canadian-led team of international election "assessors," who made an early claim that the elections met international standards, were in fact based outside the country, in Jordan .

The U.S.-based Carter Center , which has monitored elections around the world for more than a decade, declined to participate in Iraq . But they did identify key criteria for determining the legitimacy of elections, and their spokesman noted the day before the elections that none had been met. Those criteria included the ability of voters to vote in a free and secure environment, the ability of candidates to have access to voters for campaigning, a freely chosen and independent election commission, and voters able to vote without fear or intimidation.

U.S. domination of Iraq remains unchanged with this election. The U.S.-imposed Transitional Administrative Law, imposed by the U.S. occupation, remains the law of the land even with the new election. Amending that law requires super-majorities of the assembly as well as a unanimous agreement by the presidency council, almost impossible given the range of constituencies that must be satisfied. Chiefs of key control commissions, including Iraq's Inspector General, the Commission on Public Integrity, the Communication and Media Commission and others, were appointed by Bremer with five-year terms, can only be dismissed "for cause." The Council of Judges, as well as individual judges and prosecutors, were selected, vetted and trained by the U.S. occupation, and are dominated by long-time U.S.-backed exiles.

The U.S.-backed privatization schemes imposed by former U.S. pro-consul Paul Bremer remain in place. The current interim finance minister, Adel Abdul Mahdi, touted by the Los Angeles Times as a potential candidate for deputy president or prime minister, recently announced his support for the complete privatization of Iraq 's oil industry.

A New York Times article of September 4, 1967 , is entitled "U.S. Encouraged by Vietnam Vote : Officials Cite 83% Turnout Despite Vietcong Terror." It reads, " United States officials were surprised and heartened today at the size of turnout in South Vietnam 's presidential election despite a Vietcong terrorist campaign to disrupt the voting. According to reports from Saigon , 83 per cent of the 5.85 million registered voters cast their ballots yesterday. Many of them risked reprisals threatened by the Vietcong. A successful election has long been seen as the keystone in President Johnson's policy of encouraging the growth of constitutional processes in South Vietnam … The purpose of the voting was to give legitimacy to the Saigon Government …"

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SUNTO IN ITALIANO

I DISERTORI DALL'ESERCITO USA SUPERANO ORMAI QUOTA 5.000.
CENTINAIA DI CITTADINI AMERICANI HANNO COSTITUITO UNA "FERROVIA SOTTERANEA" (UNDERGROUND RAILWAY) PER CONSENTIRE AI DISERTORI DI RAGGIUNGERE IL CANADA, COME AI TEMPI DI VIETNAM.

(IL TERMINE "FERROVIA SOTTERANEA" E' STATA CONIATA PRIMA DELLA GUERRA CIVILE AMERICANA DAI GRUPPI ANTI-SCHIAVISTI CHE AIUTAVANO GLI SCHIAVI NEL SUD A FUGGIRE VERSO IL NORD LUNGO UN PERCORSO DI "STAZIONI", OSSIA DI CASE PRIVATE CHE OFFRIVANO OSPITALITA' PER UNA NOTTE.)



 U.S. Soldiers Flee to Canada to Avoid Service in Iraq

  By Charles Laurence

  The Telegragh U.K.

  Sunday 09 January 2004

  American Army soldiers are deserting and fleeing to Canada rather than fight in Iraq, rekindling memories of the thousands of draft-dodgers who flooded north to avoid service in Vietnam.

  An estimated 5,500 men and women have deserted since the invasion of Iraq, reflecting Washington's growing problems with troop morale.

  Jeremy Hinzman, 26, from South Dakota, who deserted from the 82nd Airborne, is among those who - to the disgust of Pentagon officials - have applied for refugee status in Canada.

  The United States Army treats deserters as common criminals, posting them on "wanted" lists with the FBI, state police forces and the Department of Home Security border patrols.

  Hinzman said last week: "This is a criminal war and any act of violence in an unjustified conflict is an atrocity. I signed a contract for four years, and I was totally willing to fulfil it. Just not in combat arms jobs."

  Hinzman, who served as a cook in Afghanistan, was due to join a fighting unit in Iraq after being refused status as a conscientious objector.   He realised that he had made the "wrong career choice" as he marched with his platoon of recruits all chanting, "Train to kill, kill we will".  He said: "At that point a light went off in my head. I was told in basic training that if I'm given an illegal or immoral order, it is my duty to disobey it. I feel that invading and occupying Iraq is an illegal and immoral thing to do.''

  Pte Brandon Hughey, 19, who deserted from the 1st Cavalry Division at Fort Hood, Texas, said that he had volunteered because the army offered to pay his college fees. He began training soon after the invasion of Iraq but became disillusioned when no weapons of mass destruction were found.   "I had been willing to die to make America safe," he said. "I found out, basically, that they found no weapons of mass destruction and the claim that they made about ties to al-Qaeda was coming up short. It made me angry. I felt our lives as soldiers were being thrown away."   When he was ordered to deploy to Iraq, Hughey searched the internet for an "underground railroad" operation, through which deserting troops are helped to escape to Canada.   He was put in touch with a Quaker pacifist couple who had helped Vietnam draft-dodgers and was driven from Texas to Ontario.

  The Pentagon says that the level of desertion is no higher than usual and denies that it is having difficulty persuading troops to fight. The flight to Canada is, however, an embarrassment for the military, which is suffering from a recruiting shortfall for the National Guard and the Army Reserves.

  The deaths of 18 American soldiers in a suicide bomb attack in Mosul, northern Iraq, last month, was a further blow to morale. Soon after, the number of American soldiers killed since President Bush declared that large-scale combat operations were at an end passed the 1,000 mark.

  Lt Col Joe Richard, a Pentagon spokesman, said that the US government wanted the deserters to be returned from Canada. "If you don't want to fight, don't join," he said.   "The men in Canada have an obligation to fulfil their military contracts and do their duty. If and when they return to this country, they will be prosecuted."

  The penalty for desertion in wartime can be death. Most deserters, however, serve up to five years in a military prison before receiving a dishonourable discharge.

  In order to stay in Canada, deserters must convince an immigration board that they would face not just prosecution but also "persecution" if they returned to America. Hinzman's hearing has begun in Toronto and a decision is expected next month.

  During the Vietnam war an estimated 55,000 deserters or draft-dodgers fled to Canada. There were amnesties for both groups in the late 1970s under President Jimmy Carter, but many stayed.

  One who did so is Jeffrey House, a Toronto-based lawyer, who represents some of the deserters. He said that at least 25 had reached Canada in recent months with the help of "railroad" organisations, and believed that the immigration board would back his clients.

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SUNTO IN ITALIANO

VENGONO ADDESTRATI SQUADRONI AMERICANI PER ATTI DI ASSASSINIO DI CIVILI SOSPETTATI DI AIUTARE LA RESISTENZA IRACHENA.



Israel trains US assassination squads in Iraq

Julian Borger in Washington

Tuesday December 9, 2003

The Guardian, Manchester

Israeli advisers are helping train US special forces in aggressive counter-insurgency operations in Iraq, including the use of assassination squads against guerrilla leaders, US intelligence and military sources said yesterday.

The Israeli Defence Force (IDF) has sent urban warfare specialists to Fort Bragg in North Carolina, the home of US special forces, and according to two sources, Israeli military "consultants" have also visited Iraq.

US forces in Iraq's Sunni triangle have already begun to use tactics that echo Israeli operations in the occupied territories, sealing off centres of resistance with razor wire and razing buildings from where attacks have been launched against US troops.

But the secret war in Iraq is about to get much tougher, in the hope of suppressing the Ba'athist-led insurgency ahead of next November's presidential elections.

US special forces teams are already behind the lines inside Syria attempting to kill foreign jihadists before they cross the border, and a group focused on the "neutralisation" of guerrilla leaders is being set up, according to sources familiar with the operations.

"This is basically an assassination programme. That is what is being conceptualised here. This is a hunter-killer team," said a former senior US intelligence official, who added that he feared the new tactics and enhanced cooperation with Israel would only inflame a volatile situation in the Middle East. "It is bonkers, insane. Here we are - we're already being compared to Sharon in the Arab world, and we've just confirmed it by bringing in the Israelis and setting up assassination teams."

"They are being trained by Israelis in Fort Bragg," a well-informed intelligence source in Washington said. "Some Israelis went to Iraq as well, not to do training, but for providing consultations."

The consultants' visit to Iraq was confirmed by another US source who was in contact with American officials there. The Pentagon did not return calls seeking comment, but a military planner, Brigadier General Michael Vane, mentioned the cooperation with Israel in a letter to Army magazine in July about the Iraq counter-insurgency campaign.

"We recently travelled to Israel to glean lessons learned from their counterterrorist operations in urban areas," wrote General Vane, deputy chief of staff at the army's training and doctrine command. An Israeli official said the IDF regularly shared its experience in the West Bank and Gaza with the US armed forces, but said he could not comment about cooperation in Iraq.

"When we do activities, the US military attaches in Tel Aviv are interested. I assume it's the same as the British. That's the way allies work. The special forces come to our people and say, do debrief on an operation we have done," the official said.

"Does it affect Iraq? It's not in our interest or the American interest or in anyone's interest to go into that. It would just fit in with jihadist prejudices."

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SECONDO ARTICOLO (RECENTE):

ORA IL PENTAGONO AMMETTE DI CONTEMPLARE L'USO DI TRUPPE AMERICANE PER CONDURRE UNA "SPORCA GUERRA" FUORI I CONFINI DELL'IRAQ, SEGNATAMENTE PER ASSASSINARE CHI IN SIRIA E' SOSPETTATO DI AIUTARE GLI INSORTI IRACHENI.

INOLTRE L'ESERCITO POTREBBE DARE L'ORDINE AGLI SQUADRONI DELLA MORTE DENTRO L'IRAQ (QUESTI SONO ADDESTRATI DALLE FORZE SPECIALI AMERICANE MA COMPOSTI DI IRACHENI) DI PASSARE DAGLI ASSASSINI DI BERSAGLI POLITICI ALL'USO DEL TERRORE GENERALIZZATO CONTRO LA POPOLAZIONE CIVILE, PER "CONVINCERLA" DI FARE IL VUOTO INTORNO AGLI INSORTI.

ALLAWI SAREBBE UNO DEI FAUTORI DI QUESTO USO DEGLI SQUADRONI.

SI TRATTA DI UNA ARTICOLO "TRIAL BALLOON" PER TESTARE LE REAZIONI DELLA POPOLAZIONE.



   The Salvador Option
   The Pentagon may put Special-Forces-led assassination or kidnapping teams in Iraq.

    By Michael Hirsh and John Barry

    Newsweek

    Saturday 08 January 2005


    What to do about the deepening quagmire of Iraq? The Pentagon's latest approach is being called "the Salvador option" and the fact that it is being discussed at all is a measure of just how worried Donald Rumsfeld really is.

  "What everyone agrees is that we can't just go on as we are," one senior military officer told Newsweek. "We have to find a way to take the offensive against the insurgents. Right now, we are playing defense.  And we are losing." Last November's operation in Fallujah, most analysts agree, succeeded less in breaking "the back" of the insurgency-as Marine Gen. John Sattler optimistically declared at the time-than in spreading it out.

    Now, Newsweek has learned, the Pentagon is intensively debating an option that dates back to a still-secret strategy in the Reagan administration's battle against the leftist guerrilla insurgency in El Salvador in the early 1980s. Then, faced with a losing war against Salvadoran rebels, the U.S. government funded or supported "nationalist" forces that allegedly included so-called death squads directed to hunt down and kill rebel leaders and sympathizers. Eventually the insurgency was quelled, and many U.S. conservatives consider the policy to have been a success-despite the deaths of innocent civilians and the subsequent Iran-Contra arms-for-hostages scandal. (Among the current administration officials who dealt with Central America back then is John Negroponte, who is today the U.S. ambassador to Iraq. Under Reagan, he was ambassador to Honduras.)

    Following that model, one Pentagon proposal would send Special Forces teams to advise, support and possibly train Iraqi squads, most likely hand-picked Kurdish Peshmerga fighters and Shiite militiamen, to target Sunni insurgents and their sympathizers, even across the border into Syria, according to military insiders familiar with the discussions.  It remains unclear, however, whether this would be a policy of assassination or so-called "snatch" operations, in which the targets are sent to secret facilities for interrogation.  The current thinking is that while U.S. Special Forces would lead operations in, say, Syria, activities inside Iraq itself would be carried out by Iraqi paramilitaries, officials tell Newsweek.

    Also being debated is which agency within the U.S. government - the Defense department or CIA - would take responsibility for such an operation. Rumsfeld's Pentagon has aggressively sought to build up its own intelligence-gathering and clandestine capability with an operation run by Defense Undersecretary Stephen Cambone. But since the Abu Ghraib interrogations scandal, some military officials are ultra-wary of any operations that could run afoul of the ethics codified in the Uniform Code of Military Justice. That, they argue, is the reason why such covert operations have always been run by the CIA and authorized by a special presidential finding. (In "covert" activity, U.S. personnel operate under cover and the U.S. government will not confirm that it instigated or ordered them into action if they are captured or killed.)

    Meanwhile, intensive discussions are taking place inside the Senate Intelligence Committee over the Defense department's efforts to expand the involvement of U.S. Special Forces personnel in intelligence-gathering missions. Historically, Special Forces' intelligence gathering has been limited to objectives directly related to upcoming military operations-"preparation of the battlefield," in military lingo. But, according to intelligence and defense officials, some Pentagon civilians for years have sought to expand the use of Special Forces for other intelligence missions.

    Pentagon civilians and some Special Forces personnel believe CIA civilian managers have traditionally been too conservative in planning and executing the kind of undercover missions that Special Forces soldiers believe they can effectively conduct. CIA traditionalists are believed to be adamantly opposed to ceding any authority to the Pentagon. Until now, Pentagon proposals for a capability to send soldiers out on intelligence missions without direct CIA approval or participation have been shot down. But counter-terrorist strike squads, even operating covertly, could be deemed to fall within the Defense department's orbit.

    The interim government of Prime Minister Ayad Allawi is said to be among the most forthright proponents of the Salvador option. Maj. Gen.Muhammad Abdallah al-Shahwani, director of Iraq's National Intelligence Service, may have been laying the groundwork for the idea with a series of interviews during the past ten days. Shahwani told the London-based Arabic daily Al-Sharq al-Awsat that the insurgent leadership-he named three former senior figures in the Saddam regime, including Saddam Hussein's half-brother-were essentially safe across the border in a Syrian sanctuary. "We are certain that they are in Syria and move easily between Syrian and Iraqi territories," he said, adding that efforts to extradite them "have not borne fruit so far."

    Shahwani also said that the U.S. occupation has failed to crack the problem of broad support for the insurgency. The insurgents, he said, "are mostly in the Sunni areas where the population there, almost 200,000, is sympathetic to them." He said most Iraqi people do not actively support the insurgents or provide them with material or logistical help, but at the same time they won't turn them in. One military source involved in the Pentagon debate agrees that this is the crux of the problem, and he suggests that new offensive operations are needed that would create a fear of aiding the insurgency. "The Sunni population is paying no price for the support it is giving to the terrorists," he said. "From their point of view, it is cost-free. We have to change that equation."

    Pentagon sources emphasize there has been no decision yet to launch the Salvador option. Last week, Rumsfeld decided to send a retired four-star general, Gary Luck, to Iraq on an open-ended mission to review the entire military strategy there. But with the U.S. Army strained to the breaking point, military strategists note that a dramatic new approach might be needed-perhaps one as potentially explosive as the Salvador option.

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SUNTO IN ITALIANO

IL CONTEGGIO DEI CIVILI MORTI IN IRAQ E' DIFFICILE PERCHE' I MILITARI AMERICANI PROFESSANO DI "NON OCCUPARSI DEL NUMERO DEI MORTI" MENTRE AI GIORNALISTI, AI MEDICI E AI CLERICI VIENE IMPEDITO DI FARE IL CONTEGGIO.

VIENE DESCRITTO IL MECCANISMO DI CENSURA PREVENTIVA MESSO IN ATTO DALL'ESERCITO U.S.A.



    In Iraq, the U.S. Does Eliminate Those Who Dare to Count the Dead -- You asked for my evidence, Mr. Ambassador. Here it is.

    By Naomi Klein

    The Guardian U.K.

    Saturday 04 December 2004



    To: David T. Johnson, Acting ambassador, US Embassy, London

    Dear Mr. Johnson,

    On November 26, your press counsellor sent a letter to the Guardian taking strong exception to a sentence in my column of the same day. The sentence read: "In Iraq, US forces and their Iraqi surrogates are no longer bothering to conceal attacks on civilian targets and are openly eliminating anyone - doctors, clerics, journalists - who dares to count the bodies." Of particular concern was the word "eliminating".

    The letter suggested that my charge was "baseless" and asked the Guardian either to withdraw it, or provide "evidence of this extremely grave accusation". It is quite rare for US embassy officials to openly involve themselves in the free press of a foreign country, so I took the letter extremely seriously. But while I agree that the accusation is grave, I have no intention of withdrawing it. Here, instead, is the evidence you requested.

    In April, US forces laid siege to Falluja in retaliation for the gruesome killings of four Blackwater employees. The operation was a failure, with US troops eventually handing the city back to resistance forces. The reason for the withdrawal was that the siege had sparked uprisings across the country, triggered by reports that hundreds of civilians had been killed. This information came from three main sources:

1) Doctors. USA Today reported on April 11 that "Statistics and names of the dead were gathered from four main clinics around the city and from Falluja general hospital".

2) Arab TV journalists. While doctors reported the numbers of dead, it was al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya that put a human face on those statistics. With unembedded camera crews in Falluja, both networks beamed footage of mutilated women and children throughout Iraq and the Arab-speaking world.

3) Clerics. The reports of high civilian casualties coming from journalists and doctors were seized upon by prominent clerics in Iraq. Many delivered fiery sermons condemning the attack, turning their congregants against US forces and igniting the uprising that forced US troops to withdraw.

    US authorities have denied that hundreds of civilians were killed during last April's siege, and have lashed out at the sources of these reports. For instance, an unnamed "senior American officer", speaking to the New York Times last month, labelled Falluja general hospital "a centre of propaganda". But the strongest words were reserved for Arab TV networks.  When asked about al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya's reports that hundreds of civilians had been killed in Falluja, Donald Rumsfeld, the US secretary of defence, replied that "what al-Jazeera is doing is vicious, inaccurate and inexcusable ... " Last month, US troops once again laid siege to Falluja - but this time the attack included a new tactic: eliminating the doctors, journalists and clerics who focused public attention on civilian casualties last time around.

    Eliminating Doctors

    The first major operation by US marines and Iraqi soldiers was to storm Falluja general hospital, arresting doctors and placing the facility under military control. The New York Times reported that "the hospital was selected as an early target because the American military believed that it was the source of rumours about heavy casualties", noting that "this time around, the American military intends to fight its own information war, countering or squelching what has been one of the insurgents' most potent weapons". The Los Angeles Times quoted a doctor as saying that the soldiers "stole the mobile phones" at the hospital - preventing doctors from communicating with the outside world.

    But this was not the worst of the attacks on health workers. Two days earlier, a crucial emergency health clinic was bombed to rubble, as well as a medical supplies dispensary next door. Dr Sami al-Jumaili, who was working in the clinic, says the bombs took the lives of 15 medics, four nurses and 35 patients. The Los Angeles Times reported that the manager of Falluja general hospital "had told a US general the location of the downtown makeshift medical centre" before it was hit.

    Whether the clinic was targeted or destroyed accidentally, the effect was the same: to eliminate many of Falluja's doctors from the war zone. As Dr Jumaili told the Independent on November 14: "There is not a single surgeon in Falluja." When fighting moved to Mosul, a similar tactic was used: on entering the city, US and Iraqi forces immediately seized control of the al-Zaharawi hospital.

    Eliminating Journalists

    The images from last month's siege on Falluja came almost exclusively from reporters embedded with US troops. This is because Arab journalists who had covered April's siege from the civilian perspective had effectively been eliminated. Al-Jazeera had no cameras on the ground because it has been banned from reporting in Iraq indefinitely. Al-Arabiya did have an unembedded reporter, Abdel Kader Al-Saadi, in Falluja, but on November 11 US forces arrested him and held him for the length of the siege. Al-Saadi's detention has been condemned by Reporters Without Borders and the International Federation of Journalists. "We cannot ignore the possibility that he is being intimidated for just trying to do his job," the IFJ stated..

    It's not the first time journalists in Iraq have faced this kind of intimidation. When US forces invaded Baghdad in April 2003, US Central Command urged all unembedded journalists to leave the city. Some insisted on staying and at least three paid with their lives. On April 8, a US aircraft bombed al-Jazeera's Baghdad offices, killing reporter Tareq Ayyoub. Al-Jazeera has documentation proving it gave the coordinates of its location to US forces.

    On the same day, a US tank fired on the Palestine hotel, killing José Couso, of the Spanish network Telecinco, and Taras Protsiuk, of Reuters. Three US soldiers are facing a criminal lawsuit from Couso's family, which alleges that US forces were well aware that journalists were in the Palestine hotel and that they committed a war crime.

    Eliminating Clerics

    Just as doctors and journalists have been targeted, so too have many of the clerics who have spoken out forcefully against the killings in Falluja. On November 11, Sheik Mahdi al-Sumaidaei, the head of the Supreme Association for Guidance and Daawa, was arrested. According to Associated Press, "Al-Sumaidaei has called on the country's Sunni minority to launch a civil disobedience campaign if the Iraqi government does not halt the attack on Falluja". On November 19, AP reported that US and Iraqi forces stormed a prominent Sunni mosque, the Abu Hanifa, in Aadhamiya, killing three people and arresting 40, including the chief cleric - another opponent of the Falluja siege. On the same day, Fox News reported that "US troops also raided a Sunni mosque in Qaim, near the Syrian border". The report described the arrests as "retaliation for opposing the Falluja offensive". Two Shia clerics associated with Moqtada al-Sadr have also been arrested in recent weeks; according to AP, "both had spoken out against the Falluja attack".

    "We don't do body counts," said General Tommy Franks of US Central Command. The question is: what happens to the people who insist on counting the bodies - the doctors who must pronounce their patients dead, the journalists who document these losses, the clerics who denounce them? In Iraq, evidence is mounting that these voices are being systematically silenced through a variety of means, from mass arrests, to raids on hospitals, media bans, and overt and unexplained physical attacks.

    Mr. Ambassador, I believe that your government and its Iraqi surrogates are waging two wars in Iraq. One war is against the Iraqi people, and it has claimed an estimated 100,000 lives. The other is a war on witnesses.

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