Sunday, March 02, 2014

Hejira

As we noted yesterday, "Nouri's cease-fire (just another lie)."  Even the pretense of a cease-fire has now vanished despite the claims Thursday that one was being extended for a week.  NINA notes Nouri's military shelled Falluja Sunday evening leaving eight civilians injured, and security forces announce they killed 10 suspects in Falluja today.

Nouri al-Maliki's assault on Anbar, which began at the end of December, was supposedly going to end violence.  Of course, that was never going to happen.  All he did was an attack an oppressed people who had been demonstrating for over a year.  If he wanted peace, he would have listened to their demands.  He chose not to.

Yesterday Nickolay Mladenov, the Special Representative in Iraq for United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, declared, "Only by working together can Iraqis address the causes of violence and build a democratic society in which rule of law is observed and human rights are protected."  NINA adds that MP Wesal Saleem is calling for "the Ministry of Justice to expedite the release of the detainees who were released by the Iraqi judiciary and are still in jails."  This has been one of the demands of the protesters.

Nouri's ignored it.

And instead decided the 'answer' was assaulting Anbar.

Didn't work.

As we noted at Third this morning, "Iraq Body Count sees 930 violent deaths for February, UNAMI counts 703, Margaret Griffis and Antiwar.com count 1,705."


And still the violence continues.

National Iraqi News Agency reports 1 attorney, Marwan Abdel Moneim, was shot dead in Arkebah Village,  Karabilah bombing left 2 Iraqi soldiers dead and two more injured, an Askari bombing left three people injured,  1 man was shot dead in northern Baghdad (Meshahda area), 1 person was shot dead in souther Baghdad (Diyala Bridge area), a Qayyarah bombing left three people injured, the bombing of a Hammam al-Alil police member's home left two people injured,  a Khawaled Village bombing left three Iraqi soldiers injured, a landmine explosion in al-Salman killed 1 woman who was herding sheep, police captain Hisham Awad was shot dead near Aswad Village,  the bombing of Younis Hamid Suleiman al-Obeidi's Kirkuk home left his son injured, a Dabaghiah Village roadside bombing left three people injured, a southern Baghdad sticky bombing (Rashid area) left 1 person dead and two more injured, a Lezaka Village bombing left 1 Sahwa dead, a Karabilah bombing left 3 Iraqi soldiers dead and two more injured, security forces announced they killed 5 suspects in Ramadi, police say they killed 4 suspects "south of Mosul,"  Nouri's federal police say they killed 74 suspects "south of Mosul,"  1 police member was shot dead outside his Al-Hasawiya Village home, a Falluja bombing left 1 person dead and three more injured, 2 corpses were discovered ("riddled with bullet holes in the head") near Makarem Village, 1 corpse was discovered in southwest Baghdad (Saidiya area) a day after he was kidnapped,  1 corpse (military uniform, handcuffed, gunshots to the head) was discovered in Yousfiayh, and 2 corpses were discovered in Baghdad.


By the way, praise for Anadolu Agency which actually reports in their "Iraqi army says it killed 10 militants in Falluja" -- see, that's how it's done.  You don't 'report' "10 militants killed in Falluja" -- as though you were present when you're just repeating a government claim.  Good for Anadolu Agency.

In other news,  the Kurdish Globe reports on the continued tensions between Baghdad and Erbil:


 Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's dispute with Iraq's Kurds over its independent oil exports has escalated with the central government blocking Kurdistan's share of the state budget and banning two airlines from operating between Europe and Kurdistan.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's dispute with Iraq's Kurds over its independent oil exports has escalated with the central government blocking Kurdistan's share of the state budget and banning two airlines from operating between Europe and Kurdistan.
Kurdistan's president, Massoud Barzani, warned Maliki that his actions are "a declaration of war against the people of Kurdistan."


But, of course, Nouri doesn't see it that way.  Rudaw notes:


 Iraq’s Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said in a television interview that a budget and oil dispute with the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in the north has been “exaggerated,” and that the central government felt a sense of responsibility toward the Kurds.
“I don’t know why the problems have been so exaggerated,” Maliki said in an interview with the semi-official Al-Iraqiya TV. “We feel responsible for Kurdistan and its people, even if the Kurdish government doesn’t feel that way,” he added.


Thousands of government workers in the KRG have been without payment because Nouri's blocked the KRG from receiving their part of the national budget.



I'm traveling in some vehicle
I'm sitting in some cafe
A defector from the petty wars
That shell shock love away
-- "Hejira," written by Joni Mitchell, first appears on her album of the same name

 The number of US service members the Dept of Defense states died in the Iraq War is [PDF format warning] 4489.




On this week's Law and Disorder Radio,  an hour long program that airs Monday mornings at 9:00 a.m. EST on WBAI and around the country throughout the week, hosted by attorneys Heidi Boghosian, Michael S. Smith and Michael Ratner (Center for Constitutional Rights) topics  addressed include consumer privacy rights, attorney Bret Grote provides a report on Russell "Maroon" Shoatz who has been released from solitary confinement and attorney Pam Spees discusses priests abuse of children.

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