[UrukNet] - [Daily Information from Occupied Iraq] - [newsletter 28 Mar 2006 - Part One]

uruknet.info   اوروكنت.إنفو :: information from occupied iraq :: informazione dall'iraq occupato

Uncertainty... Riverbend, Baghdad Burning I sat late last night switching between Iraqi channels (the half dozen or so I sometimes try to watch). It’s a late-night tradition for me when there’s electricity- to see what the Iraqi channels are showing (...) I was reading the little scrolling news headlines on the bottom of the page. The usual- mortar fire on an area in Baghdad, an American soldier killed here, another one wounded there… 12 Iraqi corpses found in an area in Baghdad, etc. Suddenly, one of them caught my attention and I sat up straight on the sofa, wondering if I had read it correctly. (...) The line said: "The Ministry of Defense requests that civilians do not comply with the orders of the army or police on nightly patrols unless they are accompanied by coalition forces working in that area." That’s how messed up the country is at this point.... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22037 The Media and Iraq: What's Wrong With This Picture? Gabriel Rotello Mr. Bush wants to know why the media don't publish more "success stories" about Iraq. I want to know the opposite: why the media don't publish photos and videos that -- in no uncertain terms -- show the blood-drenched truth. Watching TV news or reading the papers, you'd think this was a war without human faces. There are no victims, only numbers. "39 Killed." "50 Dead." But where are the bodies? That's right, the mangled, gouged, decapitated, amputated, burned bodies? I'll tell you where: On File. Locked away in the photo and video archives of the major news organizations. The supposedly "negative" media are deliberately holding back from actually showing us the negative human costs of Bush's war, and that puts the lie to any blather about how negative they really are... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22033 Video exposes cold-blooded murders Massacred by the Marines Nicole Colson , Socialist Workers "IT WAS a massacre in every sense of the word." That’s how Khaled Ahmed Rsayef described the murder of 15 Iraqi civilians--including his brother and six other relatives--by U.S. Marines last November. The full horror of what the victims faced in their final minutes was made public last week in a Time magazine report detailing what witnesses say was a calculated mass killing by Marines on a rampage... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22029 ACLU: Pentagon concedes Abu Ghraib photo, video case RAW STORY The American Civil Liberties Union today announced that the Department of Defense has withdrawn its appeal of a district court order compelling it to turn over images depicting detainee abuse by U.S. forces at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The Defense Department will identify which public images come from the contested trove and release any additional images in its possession... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22027 Tomgram: Michael Schwartz on Why the Media Gets the War Wrong Tom Engelhardt & Michael Schwartz The media loves anniversaries, the grimmer the better. On the third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, our newspapers and TV news were filled to the brim with retrospectives on the origins of the Iraq war, reassessments of how it was conducted by the Bush administration, and reconsiderations of the current quagmire-cum-civil-war in that country. An amazing aspect of this sort of heavy coverage of events past is the degree of consensus that quickly develops among all mainstream outlets on certain fundamental (and fundamentally controversial) issues... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22022 Kurdistan: Meet the New Bosses Aaron Glantz, CommonDreams.org The neocons in Washington love to talk about how they're promoting freedom and democracy in Iraq. They often cite as their example the country's Kurdish population, staunch allies of Washington, who have been protected by the American military since no-fly zones were imposed after the 1991 Gulf War. But just how much freedom is there in northern Iraq? Consider the case of Dr. Kamal Sayid Qadir, a well-known Kurdish writer, lawyer, and university lecturer who holds Austrian citizenship. He was picked up by the Kurdish security service in Arbil on Oct. 26. This week, he was sentenced to a year and a half in prison for defaming Kurdish leader Massood Barzani.. Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22020 More "progress" in Iraq - gays being slaughtered Eli Stephens, Left I on the News ...AP may think that the "status" (presumably they mean the legal status) of gays and lesbians remains unclear, but the situation of gays and lesbians is a lot clearer. That is, if you read sources other than the corporate media, which as far as I can tell have yet to breath a word about the fate of gays in Iraq, who are being systematically persecuted and killed in Iraq thanks to a death-to-gays fatwa issued by Shiite Muslim leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani last October... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22026 Shiites Say U.S. Is Pressuring Iraqi Leader to Step Aside EDWARD WONG, NYTimes Senior Shiite politicians said today that the American ambassador has told Shiite officials to inform the Iraqi prime minister that President Bush does not want him to remain the country's leader in the next government. It is the first time the Americans have directly intervened in the furious debate over the country's top job, the politicians said, and it is inflaming tensions between the Americans and some Shiite leaders... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22019 DAILY WAR NEWS FOR TUESDAY, March 28, 2006 Today in Iraq Baghdad: Three groups of gunmen wearing military uniforms but arriving in civilian cars kidnap at least 24 Iraqis working at a money exchange and two electronics stores in Baghdad Tuesdady. The assaults happened separately but within the same half-hour period. Car bomb explodes as police exchanged fire with two attackers outside a police station south of Baghdad, wounding at least a dozen people. Five people wounded when roadside bomb explodes near restaurant in north Baghdad. Member of interior ministry's public order brigade injured by gunfire in the southern Dura district. Iraqi intelligence agent shot by gunmen in the southern Risala neighborhood. Iraqi police patrols find 14 dead bodies in execution-style in western Baghdad district. The bodies were blindfolded, bound and shot in the head. Civilian injured when vehicle filled with explosives detonates in northwestern Baghdad. Tikrit: Gunmen attack car carrying Iraqi contractors in Tikrit, killing two and wounding one. The men provided construction and other services to U.S. troops... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22014 Halabja Protesters May Face Death Penalty Amanj Khalil in Sulaimaniyah (ICR No. 169, 23-Mar-06) Demonstrators who last week torched a monument to the victims of a gas attack on Halabja could face the death penalty if convicted, according to a judge investigating the incident (...) Locals said they mounted the demonstration because of anger at what they said was cynical exploitation of their plight by local politicians (...) A security source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said authorities have arrested about 80 people. Kurdish regional government spokesman Jamal Abdullah said 40 to 45 remain in custody, suspected of setting the monument on fire and inciting violence. Local human rights groups have not been allowed to see the detainees. All of the demonstration's organisers are now in hiding. "I'm afraid of being arrested and tortured to confess things I haven't done," said one who asked not to be named... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22025 Halliburton overcharged for Iraq oil work: report Reuters Oil services company Halliburton Co. repeatedly overcharged taxpayers and provided substandard cost reports under a $1.2 billion contract to restore Iraq’s southern oil fields, according to a new report by U.S. Rep. Henry Waxman (news, bio, voting record). Waxman, a California Democrat, said Democratic staff members of the House Committee on Government Reform examined a series of government audits and correspondence that criticized Halliburton’s performance under the "Restore Iraqi Oil 2″ (RIO2) contract... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22028 The continued madness of King George Doug Thompson With all the public furor over his use of the National Security Agency to spy on Americans, and the near-mutiny in the Republican party over his high-handed approach to the Presidency, you'd think George W. Bush might have learned a thing or two about the dangers of arrogance. Nah, not our despot-in-chief, King Dubya. When he signed the extension of the USA Patriot act into law, he added his own "addendum" to the law that says he doesn't have to tell Congress a damn thing about what he and his storm troopers are up to when it comes to abusing the expanded police powers included in the bill... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22031 Soldiers flee to Canada to avoid Iraq duty Duncan Campbell, The Guardian Hundreds of deserters from the US armed forces have crossed into Canada and are now seeking political refugee status there, arguing that violations of the rules of war in Iraq by the US entitle them to asylum. decision on a test case involving two US servicemen is due shortly and is being watched with interest by fellow servicemen on both sides of the border. At least 20 others have already applied for asylum and there are an estimated 400 in Canada out of more than 9,000 who have deserted since the conflict started in 2003... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22030 Fitzgerald Will Seek New White House Indictments Jason Leopold It may seem as though it's been moving along at a snail's pace, but the second part of the federal investigation into the leak of covert CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson is nearly complete, with attorneys and government officials who have remained close to the probe saying that a grand jury will likely return an indictment against one or two senior Bush administration officials. These sources work or worked at the State Department, the CIA and the National Security Council. Some of these sources are attorneys close to the case. They requested anonymity because they were not permitted to speak publicly about the details of the investigation... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22032 U.S. appeals to Iraq's top cleric to help end political impasse Nancy A. Youssef and Warren P. Strobel, Knight Ridder Newspapers U.S. officials sent a message this week to Iraq's senior religious cleric asking that he help end the impasse over forming a new Iraqi government and strongly implying that the prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jafaari, should withdraw his candidacy for re-election, according to American officials. The unusual decision by the White House to reach out to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani suggested how eager the Bush administration is to jump-start negotiations that have failed to produce Iraq's first permanent postwar government more than three months after national elections... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22018 The Cowards Path An open letter to Ralph Nader Linda H Riegler Dear Mr. Nader, Sir, I owe you an apology… (...) In the 2000 elections even as I was impassioned by your words, and although inspired by your courage in a way that has alluded me since my youth. I sat silently applauding you (I even considered "vote-swapping"), but in the end, I cast my vote for Al Gore. I was completely secure in my convictions. As desperately, as we needed you, it was far more critical to elect Al Gore than to risk (I’d been doing my homework over the last twenty years) allowing America to fall into the hands of George Bush and Dick Cheney (...) I understand now, that I am a war criminal. I am responsible. I am complicit in disseminating depleted uranium throughout the Middle East. I am responsible for the renditions, for Abu Ghraib, for the torture, for the illegal spying, etc. I am responsible. I am responsible for it all... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22017 A Man’s Word Monica Benderman ... My husband, Sgt. Kevin Benderman, chose to no longer participate in war. He followed the Army regulations, filed a Conscientious Objector application, and acted honorably every step of the way. His unit commanders chose to punish him for not allowing them to control him with their threats, and my husband went to jail simply because his commanders had no integrity, no honor and no respect for the very constitution they had given a sworn oath to uphold. Sadly -- the military administration has sided with my husband’s commanders to this point... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22016 Iraq has not fallen Truth About Iraqis It is a rarity these days to see good news coming out of Iraq. Sure, I am not talking about the planted US military version of events or the bloggers on "assignment in Iraq" embedded with some military unit. Nor am I talking about the so-called valor and bravery of the Iraqi Army as it storms the hideouts of "insurgents" and scores kills against women and children. No, I am indeed talking about the voice of one woman, who has in nearly three years saved the writing of history from those who seek to enslave it, refashion it to their own whims and manipulate it for generations to come... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22015 It's the Media, Stupid Ramzy Baroud There is little disagreement on the indispensable role of the media in influencing political debate and narrative, thus shaping public discourse. Among progressives, liberals and most political minorities in the United States and Europe, there is an equal consensus regarding the troubling alliance that is bringing warmongering politicians, ideologues, religious zealots and media moguls together. They alone possess the capabilities to sway the public in any way they wish, or so it seems; they stack a nation's priorities in the way they find most fit; they concoct wars and justify them when they go awry. In short, they manipulate democracy by manipulating the public, using whatever means necessary: fear, misinformation and all the familiar rest... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22012 Iraq: Prosecutions threaten freedom of expression in northern Iraq Amnesty International Amnesty International is greatly concerned by the prosecutions of two critics of the Kurdish authorities in northern Iraq and the threat these pose to freedom of expression in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region. Kamal Sayid Qadir, an Austrian national of Kurdish origin, has been imprisoned since October 2005 for allegedly defaming Kurdish political leaders, while high school teacher and journalist Hawez Hawezi is facing prosecution, also on defamation charges... Read the full article / Leggi l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=22013 www.uruknet.info: a site gathering daily information concerning occupied Iraq: news, analysis, documents and texts of iraqi resistance available in Italian and English.   You receive this newsletter because you subscribed it. If you think it was an abuse, or simply if you don't want to receive it any more, click here to unsubscribe from the newsletter.