Tuesday, March 12, 2013

Protests, IDPs, third terms?

Though ignored by the CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley, NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams, ABC World News with Diane Sawyer, PBS' The NewsHour, Democracy Now! and so many other so-called news outlets in the United States, the new report from Amnesty International, "Iraq: A Decade of Abuses," is getting coverage in Iraq.  The Iraq Times covers it as does Alsumaria, Al Mada and Kitabat.  But the report will apparently be like BBC Arabic and the Guardian newspaper's documentary James Steele: America's Mystery Man In Iraq which was aired last week and covered all over the world but ignored by the bulk of US outlets helping to ensure that American news consumers know all the celebrity gossip but are the most uninformed on world events.  Naomi Spencer (WSWS) notes the documentary today:
An investigative report by the British Guardian and the BBC’s Arabic language service links top US officials to atrocities carried out by Iraqi police forces after the 2003 US invasion of Iraq. General David Petraeus and Bush-era Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, among others, worked directly with US officials overseeing death squads, secret prisons, and torture practices in US-occupied Iraq. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis died and millions were displaced as a result of the chaos that the atrocities produced.
The memos and reports featured in the Guardian /BBC documentary come from the 2010 leak attributed to Army Private Bradley Manning and published by WikiLeaks. The Obama administration has protected the officials linked to the abuse, many of whom remain on the government payroll; David Petraeus was Obama’s CIA director until last November.

Spencer also notes that portions of the documentary were screened for protesters in Samarra last week.


The protests continue in Iraq.  Al Mada reports that there was a meet-up in Falluja on Sunday of various representatives for demonstrators from the western provinces.  The meeting follows Friday's "last chance" protest which saw Nouri's forces attack the protesters in Mosul.  National Iraqi News Agency reports protesters in Baaj and Tal Afar today are demanding that government officials reduce the "excessive deployment of military and security forces just near the government offices in the regions of western Mosul."  These are the forces that Nouri has sent in to intimidate the protesters.  Iraqi Spring MC posts this video of students in Tikrit protesting today.  And to be clear, that footage is Tuesday footage.  Nouri's forces shut them down yesterday.  They are protesting again today and showing solidarity with the protesters in Ramadi, Tikrit, Nineveh and Diyala.  You can also video of their protest today here.  Protests continue in Falluja.

Each day appears to be a contest to see which member of State of Law will earn the title of Dumbest of the Day.  Today it's Ibraheem al-Rikabi.  All Iraq News reports that the MP has stated that the protesters are moving the country towards a sectarian war.

Right.  The protesters are.

Can you get more stupid than al-Rikabi?

Probably not.  Nouri lost in the 2010 elections.  He refused to step down as prime minister.  He was able to hold on because Barack Obama and the Iranina government backed him.  For eight months, the defeated Nouri refused to step down.  Then Barack had the US-brokered Erbil Agreement that gave second place Nouri a second term as prime minister.  The heads of the politcal blocs signed off on that contract to try to get the country to move forward.  Despite the fact that he only got a second term as prime minister due to that contract, he refused to honor it after getting what he wanted.

That's what caused the protests in 2011.  That's what's caused them now.

State of Law needs to stop lying.

They can't be that stupid, no one can be.


You either keep your word or you don't.  If you don't and people object, you can't say, "Their objections are causing a sectarian war."

Nouri caused the problems.  The response to Nouri isn't causing the problems.  The response is a natural response by a people who have been lied to and who the government does not serve or protect.



In other news, Mohammad Sabah (Al Mada) reports that a judicial source states Nouri has asked the Federal Court to veto the measure passed by Parliament limiting the three presidencies -- Speaker of Parliament, Prime Minister and President of Iraq -- to two terms.  Want to still pretend that Little Saddam doesn't want a third term?

Friday, Dahr Jamail had a strong article at Al Jazeera about the internally displaced in Iraq.  Here's the opening:

 The first thing Haifa Abdul Majid did after being told I wanted to speak with her about her experience as a refugee in her own country was to, incredibly, express her gratitude for the fact that she has food.

“First I thank God because we are finding some food and can eat, unlike many other countries where people cannot even find food,” the 55-year-old grandmother said while holding her arms to the sky in thanks.

But the reality of her situation was quickly evidenced by her inability to offer the usual large repertoire of sweets, cookies, and other welcoming treats for guests, as is the usual custom in Iraq.

Instead of the aforementioned, she offered a glass of water.

Haifa has been living as a refugee in a corner of the Adhamiyah district of Baghdad, a stone's throw from the Tigris River, since 2007 when she fled increasing sectarian violence in her native Nahrawan town.

And according to current figures from Iraq’s Ministry of Migration and Displacement (MoMD), she is only one of 1.1 million other Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Iraq today.


The war created the internally and externally displaced.  The external displaced was the largest refugee crisis in the region since 1948.  Not seeing a lot of articles addressing that as the tenth anniversary approaches.




The violence continues.  National Iraqi News Agency reports 2 Tikrit bombings left one person injured, a Kirkuk communications tower guard was shot and wounded while on duty,  3 government employees were shot dead in 3 separate Baghdad incidents last night and yesterday also saw a Balad bombing outside the headquarters of the Islamic Party.  All Iraq News notes that the 3 government employees killed last night in Baghdad were a Minstery of Environment employee, a Ministery of Trade employee and a Ministery of Health employee.


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