London Wallpaper: Bush Admn Documents Violate Charter of Nuremberg Tribunal on War Crimes

Bush Admn Documents Violate Charter of Nuremberg Tribunal on War Crimes
http://tarafits.blogspot.com/2010/09/bush-admn-documents-violate-charter-of.html
*"History is but glorification of murderers, criminals and robbers." - *Karl
Popper*"**On February 15, 2003, a month before the US invasion of Iraq,
probably the largest protest in human history, between six and ten million
protesters took to the streets of some 800 cities in nearly sixty countries
across the globe" *William Blum*.****The war in Iraq is a historic strategic
and moral calamity undertaken under false assumptions – undermining
America's global legitimacy – collateral civilian casualties, – abuses, –
tarnishing America's moral credentials. Driven by Manichean impulses and
imperial hubris, it is intensifying regional instability."* Zbigniew
Brzezinski, National Security Adviser to US President Jimmy Carter.

Rumsfeld, Bush and the Supreme War
Crime<http://www.juancole.com/2010/09/rumsfeld-bush-and-the-supreme-war-crime.html>
*
*

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*

According to US Prof Juan Cole 's blog of 24 September ,2010, Joyce Battle used
the Freedom of Information Act to extract classified documents from 2001
about the Bush administration's plans for an aggressive war on Iraq.

Document 8 [pdf] contains notes of then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
prepared for a meeting with CENTCOM commander Gen. Tommy
Franks<http://www.gwu.edu/%7Ensarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB326/doc08.pdf>in
Tampa, Fl., on November 27, 2001. It shows a plan to pull a lot of
troops
out of Afghanistan and put them into Iraq and to 'decapitate' the Iraqi
leadership.

After all that, the memo sets out points under the heading 'how start?',
which clearly detail various schemes to start a war under false pretenses,
including baiting Saddam into an attack on the Kurds in the north, or
breathlessly announcing from the White House that a firm connection had been
found between Saddam and Usama Bin Laden. That several such possibilities
were listed showed that Rumsfeld did not really care how the war was
started, he just wanted that war. And it shows he was entirely willing to
manufacture the pretense once it was decided on.

The memo clearly was developed in close consultation with deputy secretary
of defense Paul Wolfowitz and his subordinate Douglas Feith, both of them
part of the Israel Lobby in the Bush administration, whose obsession with
Iraq derived from their right-Zionist commitments.

Rumsfeld's memo certainly violates the charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal on
war crimes <http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/full/390>:

(a) Crimes against peace:

(i) Planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression or a
war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances;

(ii) Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of
any of the acts mentioned under (i).

The Nuremberg Tribunal declared that <http://www.un.org/icc/crimes.htm>"To
initiate a war of aggression . . . is not only an international crime; it is
the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that
it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole."

That the United States has failed to come to terms with its war crimes in
Iraq only sets us up for a repeat performance. For a nation that lives by
laws and the esteem of allies to act like an outlaw will ultimately
undermine its own foundation. It is like playing golf in a bathroom– you're
going to end up with a lot of self-inflicted bruises. So ends Prof Cole

*Operation Iraqi Freedom is a War Crime *

For details on US led illegal Iraq war and brutal occupation see my*
*
http://tarafits.blogspot.com/2010/09/end-of-combat-mission-in-iraq-another.html
*Below is a report of Dirk Adriaensens , Coordinator of SOS Iraq, member of
the Executive Committee of the BRussells Tribunal. Since 1990 Dirk has
followed the situation in Iraq closely**.* * * *Iraq has been converted into
a living hell by US and its allies.*

Take care Gajendra Singh 24 September, 2010.Delhi
*IRAQ: THE AGE OF DARKNESS* *Part I : "Success", a devastating balance
sheet *

In the immediate aftermath of the 2003 invasion, the triumphalist verdict
of the mainstream media was that the war had been won; Iraq was assured of a
benevolent, democratic future. The Times's writer William Rees-Mogg hymned
the victory: "April 9 2003 was Liberty Day for Iraq. (…) It was achieved by
"the engine of global liberation", the United States. "After 24 years of
oppression, three wars and three weeks of relentless bombing, Baghdad has
emerged from an age of darkness. Yesterday was an historic day of
liberation."

"The problem with this war for, I think, many Americans is that the premise
on which we justified going to war proved not to be valid, that is Saddam
having weapons of mass destruction," Defense Secretary Robert Gates told
reporters while visiting Iraq.

"So when you start from that standpoint, then figuring out in retrospect how
you deal with the war — even if the outcome is a good one from the
standpoint of the United States — it will always be clouded by how it
began."

So here Robert Gates acknowledges that this war was illegal according to
international law, because there was no "casus belli". But in the same
sentence he says that the outcome has been good for the United States. What
does he mean exactly? How can all the killing and destruction be a good
outcome for the USA? And what about responsibilities? If you know that Iraq
is still paying reparations for the invasion in Kuwait in 1990, how about
the payment of reparations by the USA for the destruction it inflicted upon
Iraq?

"We fought together, we laughed together, and sometimes cried together. We
stood side by side and shed blood together," Gen. Ray Odierno told Iraqi
military leaders and hundreds of American soldiers and officers during the
ceremony that officially closed combat operations."It was for the shared
ideals of freedom, liberty, and justice." Yes, they laughed together, like
in the infamous, by Wikileaks released video of the "Collateral Murder"
helicopter gunship attack on Baghdad civilians in July 2007, that killed
more than a dozen Iraqis, two of them journalists of Reuters. And blood they
surely have shed together! A lot of blood of over a million mothers,
fathers, children and elderly Iraqi people. All that for "shared ideals of
freedom, liberty and justice", Mr. Odierno? Well, most Iraqis don't share
that view. For them, the country has slided into the age of darkness. *The
facts* Here the facts:* *Iraq's child mortality rate has increased by 150
percent since 1990, when U.N. sanctions were first imposed. By 2008, only 50
percent of primary school-age children were attending class, down from 80
percent in 2005, and approximately 1,500 children were known to be held in
detention facilities. In 2007, there were 5 million Iraqi orphans, according
to official government statistics. More than 2 million Iraqis are refugees
and almost 3 million internally displaced. 70 percent of Iraqis do not have
access to potable water. Unemployment is as high as 50 percent officially,
70 percent unofficially. 43 percent of Iraqis live in abject poverty. 8
million Iraqis require immediate emergency aid. 4 million people lack food
and are in dire need of humanitarian assistance. 80 percent of Iraqis do not
have access to effective sanitation. Religious minorities are on the verge
of extinction. In a recent Oxfam-designed survey, 33 percent of women had
received no humanitarian assistance since 2003; 76 percent of widows did not
receive a pension; 52 percent were unemployed; 55 percent had been displaced
since 2003; and 55 percent had been subjected to violence - 25.4 percent to
random street violence, 22 percent to domestic abuse, 14 percent to violence
inflicted by militias, 10 percent to abuse or abduction, 9 percent to sexual
abuse and 8 percent to violence inflicted by multinational forces. Iraq has
a dysfunctional parliament, rampant disease, an epidemic of mental illness,
and sprawling slums. The killing of innocent people has become part of daily
life.

William Blum gives a short but devastating overview of the "good outcome" of
this war: "No American should be allowed to forget that the nation of Iraq,
the society of Iraq, have been destroyed, ruined, a failed state. The
Americans, beginning 1991, bombed for 12 years, with one excuse or another;
then invaded, then occupied, overthrew the government, killed wantonly,
tortured ... the people of that unhappy land have lost everything — their
homes, their schools, their electricity, their clean water, their
environment, their neighborhoods, their mosques, their archaeology, their
jobs, their careers, their professionals, their state-run enterprises, their
physical health, their mental health, their health care, their welfare
state, their women's rights, their religious tolerance, their safety, their
security, their children, their parents, their past, their present, their
future, their lives ... More than half the population either dead, wounded,
traumatized, in prison, internally displaced, or in foreign exile ... The
air, soil, water, blood and genes drenched with depleted uranium ... the
most awful birth defects ... unexploded cluster bombs lie in wait for
children to pick them up ."

Hannah Gurman adds the following challenge to this grim picture of "success"
*: "*No matter how much the U.S government erases the past or predicts the
future of Iraq, ordinary Iraqis will continue to face the more messy and
complicated realities of the present. I dare Obama and everyone else in the
spin machine to go to Iraq and look a child in the eyes. A child who, seven
years after the U.S. invasion, still lacks adequate housing, drinking water,
sanitation, electricity and education. Now, tell that child that the war in
Iraq was a success."

Or read this evaluation of the " Iraqi success story" by Iraqi Dr. Riad El
Taher: "To date the net achievements of the Bush/Blair adventure are:
Handing the Iraqi people a future in the hands of thugs and economic
profiteers. None of them have had the slightest interest to serve the Iraqi
people. The proof is instant wealth acquired by Chalabi, Alawi, Maliki,
Sistani, Hakin, Bayati, Bachachi, Baher Alom and Rubai by virtue of their
political adventure. Iraq's natural resources are mortgaged for the next 50
years to the international oil contractors. Iraq experience intellectual and
talent are forced to migrate. Sectarian divide is thriving and encouraged by
the constitution. Ethnic minorities are undermined or forced to leave –
Christians/Subain. Human rights, particularly of women, are violated and
have reversed their past achievement in protecting maternity rights,
employment and health. Education, health, environment and water resources
are not seriously addressed and the same applies to agriculture, industries
and culture. Thanks to Bush/Blair, Iraq held several democratic elections
where the votes were bought by favour, intimidation or fear. Currently Iraqi
citizens have access to a mobile phone, multi-TV channels, which are owned
by the Iraqi Green Zone thugs and their sponsor US/UK/Kuwait investors". The
destruction of Iraq has produced 2 million refugees but they're not welcome
in Europe. The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) on Friday expressed its concern
and objected to the continuing forced returns of Iraqi citizens from Western
European countries soon after 61 people were flown back to Baghdad. The
fundamental contradiction of this success is the fact that Bremer's 100
orders turned Iraq into a giant free-market paradise, but a hellish
nightmare for Iraqis. They colonized the country for capital - pillage on
the grandest scale, a cutthroat capitalist laboratory, weapons of mass
destruction. Iraqis got no role in the planning nor were given subcontracts
to share the benefits. New economic laws instituted low taxes, 100% foreign
investor ownership of Iraqi assets, the right to expropriate all profits,
unrestricted imports, and long-term 30-40 year deals and leases,
dispossessing Iraqis of their own resources, so no future government could
change them, writes Stephen Lendman. A Transparency International Report
states that the corruption in Iraq will probably become "*the biggest
corruption scandal in history*". And as the U.S. draws down in Iraq, it is
leaving behind hundreds of abandoned or incomplete projects. More than $5
billion in American taxpayer funds has been wasted — more than 10 percent of
the some $50 billion the U.S. has spent on reconstruction in Iraq, according
to audits from a U.S. watchdog agency. That amount is likely an
underestimate, based on an analysis of more than 300 reports by auditors
with the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction. Despite $53
billion in "aid" spent since the 2003 invasion, 70 percent of Iraqis are
without potable water or electricity. These funds have lined the pockets of
foreign military contractors and corrupt officials. The Special Inspector
General for Iraq Reconstruction said the US Department of Defence is unable
to account properly for $8.7bn. Out of $9bn, 96% is unaccounted for. It's
interesting to note that much of this money is not "aid" money, but came
from the sale of Iraqi oil and gas, and some frozen Saddam Hussein-era
assets were also sold off. Iraqi authorities have started the construction
of a security wall around the capital Baghdad, reports the country's
Al-Iraqiya TV citing a Baghdad security spokesperson. The concrete wall with
eight checkpoints is to be completed in mid-2011. So not only the people of
Baghdad are forced to live in gated communities (concrete "security"
barriers between different districts), the whole city will be gated, sealed
off from the outside world like a medieval fortress. This past May, a
study called *The Mercer Quality of Living survey* released its results of
"most livable city" in 2010. It ranked Baghdad dead last—the least livable
city on the planet. This is due to the complete destruction of Iraq's sewage
treatment plants, factories, schools, hospitals, museums and power plants by
the U.S. military. UN-HABITAT, an agency of the United Nations, recently
published a 218-page report entitled *State of the World's Cities, 2010-2011
*. Adil E. Shamoo's comment: Almost intentionally hidden in these statistics
is one shocking fact about urban Iraqi populations. For the past few
decades, prior to the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, the percentage of the
urban population living in slums in Iraq hovered just below 20 percent.
Today, that percentage has risen to 53 percent: 11 million of the 19 million
total urban dwellers. In the past decade, most countries have made progress
toward reducing slum dwellers. But Iraq has gone rapidly and dangerously in
the opposite direction. The 2007 launched Global Peace Index (GPI) ranks
countries annually according to peacefulness, identifying key peace or
violence drivers. Of the 144 countries in its 2009 report, Iraq ranked last,
Afghanistan second last. In April 2010, Amnesty International released a
report titled, "Iraq: Human Rights Briefing," Their conclusion: "the human
rights situation in the country remains grave. All parties to the continuing
conflict have committed gross abuses and the civilian population continues
to bear the brunt of the ongoing violence. The security situation is still
precarious despite some improvement in 2009. Attacks on civilians, arrests,
kidnapping, armed clashes" happen daily. There is still no functioning
government in Iraq. "Some cynical analysts intimate that the current
situation was exactly what the US (and Israel) wanted or what Washington had
in mind when it drafted the constitution. The current Iraqi divisions keep
the country weak and at the mercy of the US and allow the latter to continue
playing the part of the balancing power in order to perpetuate its
presence", writes Saad Jawad, professor of political science at Baghdad
University. Who is threatening Iraq's security? Who is responsible for the
deadly attacks, car bombs…? There are a lot of stories about involvement of
security forces. On the 28th of August U.S. forces have arrested a deputy of
Ahmad Chalabi, Ali Faisal al Lami, who was once the Bush administration's
favorite Iraqi politician, and implicated him in bombings that killed
Americans and Iraqis. Al Lami is a Shiite Muslim official and a member of
the Sadrist Party who's serving as an executive of the Justice and
Accountability Committee, which Chalabi heads. The meaning of this piece of
information is that the thugs, who came to Iraq with the US troops, whose
militias were armed, funded and trained by the US, are at least partially
responsible for the strings of bombings that ravage the country. With
these facts in mind, it's astonishing to hear the US officials talk about a
"good outcome for the United States". Obama declared the so-called e*nd to
Combat Mission in Iraq*. He refuses to look back at 7 years of catastrophe;
he wants to look at the future, escape his responsibilities. Perhaps the
most striking comment on Obama's speech came from Chris Floyd: After
mendaciously declaring on 31 August an "end to the combat mission in Iraq",
(…) Obama delivered what was perhaps the most egregious, bitterly painful
lie of the night: 'Through this remarkable chapter in the history of the
United States and Iraq, we have met our responsibility." "*We have met our
responsibility!*" No, Mister President, we have *not*. Not until many
Americans of high degree stand in the dock for war crimes. Not until the
United States pays hundreds of billions of dollars in unrestricted
reparations to the people of Iraq for the rape of their country and the mass
murder of their people. Not until the United States opens its borders to
accept all those who have been and will be driven from Iraq by the savage
ruin we have inflicted upon them, or in flight from the vicious thugs and
sectarians we have loosed -- and empowered -- in the land. Not until you,
Mister President, go down on your knees, in sackcloth and ashes, and
proclaim a National of Day of Shame to be marked each year by lamentations,
reparations and confessions of blood guilt for our crime against humanity in
Iraq.' But the US does not intend to pay reparations for the damage done.
On the contrary: Christopher Crowley, USAID director in Iraq, said the push
for Iraqis to take over the U.S. victims aid program is part of a general
trend for all American assistance programs in Iraq. The U.S. is "seeking a
larger contribution from the (Iraqi) government to these programs so they
will become more sustainable as time goes on," he said. Crowley said many in
the U.S. believe Iraq has the means to pay its own way to rebuild after the
war, with the world's third largest proven reserves of crude oil. Asked why
the Iraqi government should pay compensation for deaths during American
operations, he said the victims "are Iraqi citizens". This is really
unbelievable: The US wants the Iraqi government to pay compensations for the
destruction and all the killings the US military machine inflicted upon the
country. The reasons they give are: a) Iraq can sell a lot of oil to
reconstruct the country and b) the victims are Iraqis and thus compensations
should be paid by… Iraqis. Twisted logic this is. Comment from an Iraqi:
"Someone entered my house illegally and destroyed everything and killed my
family and he asks me to pay for the damage? Am I talking to barbarians who
just came out of a cave?" All this destruction has cost the US taxpayer a
lot of money. "As the United States ends combat in Iraq, it appears that our
$3 trillion estimate (which accounted for both government expenses and the
war's broader impact on the U.S. economy) was, if anything, too low. For
example, the cost of diagnosing, treating and compensating disabled veterans
has proved higher than we expected." writes Joseph Stiglitz in the
Washington Post. Moreover, a report published by the Strategic Foresight
Group in India in a book entitled *The Cost of Conflict in the Middle East*,
calculates that conflict in the area over the last 20 years has cost the
nations and people of the region 12 trillion U.S. dollars. The Indian report
adds that the Middle East has recorded "a high record of military expenses
in the past 20 years and is considered the most armed region in the
world."Imagine if that sum would have been spent on rural and urban
infrastructure,
dams and reservoirs, desalination and irrigation, forestation and fisheries,
industry and agriculture, medicine and public health, housing and
information technology, jobs, equitable integration of cities and villages,
and repairing the ravages of wars rather than on arms that can only create
destruction. * * *The unbearable lightness of Iraqi public services* As
mentioned above, basic necessities such as potable water, reliable
electricity, garbage pickup, a functioning sewage system, employment, health
care, etc. are beyond the reach of the vast majority of Iraqis. Iraq has
slided into the age of darkness, not only in the figurative, but also in the
very literal sense, since light has become a scarce commodity. Complaints
have been growing about public power lasting just a few hours each day.
Iraqi police used water cannon and batons to disperse protesters in the
southern city of Nassiriya after protests flared on 22 August over crippling
electricity shortages and inadequate services. Similar demonstrations
occurred in Nassiriya in June when 1,000 protesters tried to storm the
provincial council building, scuffling with police, and also in Basra, where
two people died in clashes with police. Violent protests in several cities
over power shortages In June forced Iraq's electricity minister Kareem
Waheed to resign. He was replaced by Hussain al-Shahristani, Oil Minister
of Iraq, who came to Iraq in 2003 on the back of US/UK tanks. He issued a
decree: "prohibits all trade union activity and ceases all forms of
cooperation and official discussions with the electricity sector
unions;  Directs
management to help police enforce the closure of union offices and
confiscation of documents, furniture, computers and anything else
present. Akram
Nadir, the International Representative of the Federation of Workers
Councils and Unions in Iraq, FWCUI, has urged people to write protest
letters to Al-Shahristani: "This order is a clear violation of international
labour standards which your government is obligated to uphold, and we call
on you to reverse course and stop this assault on Iraqi unions." After the
"Desert Storm"bombing campaign in 1991, power plants and power lines were
for 91% destroyed: 95 power stations and all power lines of 400,000 and
135,000 volts. The oil supply had totally stopped: the oil fields of Kirkuk
in the north and Rumaila in the south, refineries, pumping stations, oil
terminals for export in Um Qasr and Fao: all eliminated. Iraqis were able to
restore electricity within 6 months, despite the severe sanctions imposed on
the country. The reconstruction campaign following the end of hostilities in
March 1991 was an achievement of staggering proportions. Now, after 7 years
of "liberation", basic public services are still not properly functioning. A
blogger wrote: "During the reign of the old minister, we used to have
electricity power for two hours on and four hours off. That means we used to
have electricity for eight hours a day. Sometimes it was less than that. Now
and during the days of Shahristani, we have less than four hours a day
electricity during the crazy SUMMER of Iraq where temperature is always over
50 degrees for more than three months. The great minister came up with the
reason for the problem and a very simple solution to solve the dilemma of
electricity.* He believes that we (Iraqi people) waste electricity and all
the families in any house should gather in one room at night and
sleep together.* I do not know how he could even say that or even think
about this shameful solution." Shahristani doesn't have to worry about the
summer heat. Have a look at some of the Iraqi Excellencies' salaries: Iraqi
president: About 700,000 USD a year. Iraqi Vice presidents: 600,000 USD a
year. Iraqi news agencies claim that Vice President Adel Abdul Mahdi
receives One Million USD a month, in total. Maliki's salary is equal to that
of the Iraqi President. Head of the Judiciary council: about 100,000 USD a
month (not clear on allocations). Their pension: 80 percent of the last
received paycheck for the rest of their lives. Freedom? Liberty? Justice? *
* *Part II: Endless occupation and its insidious effects *
*Withdrawal? * Even
as President Barack Obama was announcing the end of combat in Iraq, U.S.
forces were still in fight at the so-called end of Iraq combat mission.
American soldiers were sealing off a northern village early Wednesday as
their Iraqi partners raided houses and arrested dozens of suspected
insurgents. "Along with the Great Wall of China," said Ambassador Hill, "
the US embassy in Baghdad is one of those things you can see with the naked
eye from outer space. I mean, it's huge." Indeed. At 104 acres, it is the
largest U.S. embassy in the world. In addition to six apartment buildings,
it has a luxury pool, as well as a water and sewage treatment plant. (…) The
State Department has requested a mini-army to protect this Fortress America
-- including 24 Black Hawk helicopters and 50 bomb-resistant vehicles. After
this month's withdrawal, there will still be 50,000 US troops in 94 military
bases, "advising" and training the Iraqi army, "providing security" and
carrying out "counter-terrorism" missions. About 5,800 of them airmen, said
Maj. Gen. Joseph Reynes, director of the Air Component Coordination Element
for U.S. Forces-Iraq. Meanwhile, the US government isn't just rebranding
the occupation, it's also privatising it. There are around 100,000 private
contractors working for the occupying forces, of whom more than 11,000 are
armed mercenaries, mostly "third country nationals", typically from the
developing world. One Peruvian and two Ugandan security contractors were
killed in a rocket attack on the Green Zone only a fortnight ago.
ThePentagon may be sharply reducing its combat forces in Iraq, but the
military
plans to step up efforts to influence media coverage in that country -- as
well as in the US. "It is essential to the success of the new Iraqi
government and the U.S. Forces-Iraq mission that both communicate
effectively with our strategic audiences (i.e. Iraqi, pan-Arabic,
international, and U.S. and USF-I audiences) to gain widespread acceptance
of core themes and messages," according to the pre-solicitation notice for a
tean of 12 civilian contractors to provide "strategic communication
management services" there. The plain and simple fact is that the war and
occupation will continue until the people of Iraq and the world force the
U.S. to total withdrawal. People in this country (the USA) have a particular
responsibility to build a powerful movement of determined political
opposition to the ongoing occupation of and war upon Iraq waged by the U.S.
government. Do not be fooled into thinking that Obama or any presidential
administration will leave Iraq on its own volition, concludes Kenneth J.
Theisen form the US antiwar group "World Can't Wait". And the National
Popular Resistance has stepped up its activities against the occupation
recently: There has also been a major increase in rocket and mortar attacks
in the fortified Green Zone and at the Baghdad airport, according to Brig.
Gen. Ralph O. Baker, the deputy commander of American forces in central
Iraq. General Baker, who said there had been about 60 such attacks in the
last two months compared with "two or three" in the preceding months * * *The
infamous underevaluation of civilian casualties counts.* While the
destruction of Iraq is considered by Washington's ruling elite as a "good
outcome for the United States", most journalists in the mainstream press
keep on fixing the number of civilian casualties at around 100.000. Another
lie, a gross underestimate and an insult to the suffering Iraqi people. That
number comes from Iraq Bodycount, an organisation that does valuable work in
collecting data of the deaths that are reported in the mainstream press. But
their figures cannot serve as a scientific norm to establish a relevant
estimate of Iraqi casualties. Let's give a few examples: Twenty
thousandof Iraq's 34,000 registered physicians left Iraq after the
U.S. invasion. As
of April 2009, fewer than 2,000 returned, the same as the number who were
killed during the course of the war. Iraq bodycount has some 70 doctors in
their database of casualties, which means that they have only listed 3,5% of
the estimated number of killed physicians. Iraq Bodycount has 108 academics
listed in its database. The B*Russell*s Tribunal has a partial list of 448
murdered academics, compiled from different sources. Although that list is
very incomplete, Iraq Bodycount lists only 24% of the academic casualties
reported by the B*Russell*s Tribunal. Perhaps the best monitored category of
victims in this war are the media professionals. The B*Russell*s Tribunal
has a list of 354 killed media professionals. Al-Iraqiya director general
Habib al-Sadr told AFP in September 2007 that at least 75 members of his
staff have been killed since he took over the channel in 2005 and another 68
wounded. The B*Russell*s Tribunal list of killed media professionals had at
that moment less than 1/3rd of this number in its database. But the number
of Iraq Bodycount stands at only 241 casualties. Les Roberts, author of
the two Lancet studies of Iraq mortality, defended himself on 20 September
2007 against allegations that his surveys were "deeply flawed": "A study of
13 war affected countries presented at a recent Harvard conference found
over 80% of violent deaths in conflicts go unreported by the press and
governments. City officials in the Iraqi city of Najaf were recently quoted
on Middle East Online stating that 40,000 unidentified bodies have been
buried in that city since the start of the conflict. When speaking to the
Rotarians in a speech covered on C-SPAN on September 5th, H.E. Samir
Sumaida'ie, the Iraqi Ambassador to the US, stated that there were 500,000
new widows in Iraq. The Baker-Hamilton Commission similarly found that the
Pentagon under-counted violent incidents by a factor of 10. Finally, the
respected British polling firm ORB released the results of a poll estimating
that 22% of households had lost a member to violence during the occupation
of Iraq, equating to 1.2 million deaths. This finding roughly verifies a
less precisely worded BBC poll last February that reported 17% of Iraqis had
a household member who was a victim of violence. There are now two polls and
three scientific surveys all suggesting the official figures and media-based
estimates in Iraq have missed 70-95% of all deaths. The evidence suggests
that the extent of under-reporting by the media is only increasing with
time." A memo by the MoD's Chief Scientific Adviser, Sir Roy Anderson,
stated that: "*The* (Lancet)* study design is robust and employs methods
that are regarded as close to "best practice" in this area, given the
difficulties of data collection and verification in the present
circumstances in Iraq*."In an e-mail, released by the British Foreign
Office, in which an official asks about the Lancet report, the official
writes: "*However, the survey methodology used here cannot be rubbished, it
is a tried and tested way of measuring mortality in conflict zones*." The
discussion about casualties is not over yet, but we can safely put forward
the number of + 1 million excess deaths caused by this war, most of them
from violent causes. An archive of articles about the heated discussions in
the press and blogs on civilian death counts during the US occupation can be
found on the B*Russell*s Tribunal website:
http://www.brusselstribunal.org/Lancet111006.htm *A dark summer for Iraqi
academics* The B*Russell*s Tribunal is well known for its campaign it
started in 2005 to create awareness about the situation of Iraqi academics.
It receives regularly updates on summary executions of Iraqi academics from
a variety of Iraqi sources. Here's a short overview of casualties that
occurred during the summer: * * *Ehab Al-Ani*, Hospital Director in Al Qaim,
was killed on 5 June 2010 by a roadside bomb. The initial investigation
indicated that Dr. Al Ani was not killed randomly. On 29 June, *Ahmed Jumaa*,
vice-chancellor of the Islamic University in Ramadi, was killed by a
roadside bomb in Hit. On the same day Professor *Ali Sayegh Zidane*, a
specialist in cancer in the Harithiya hospital in Baghdad was assassinated
by gunmen. On 14 July Iraqi police found the decomposed body of university
professor *Adnan Al-Makki*, who was stabbed to death with a knife in his
home in Baghdad. On the same day an *unknown university professor* was
assassinated by gunmen in West Baghdad. On the 11th of August, early in the
morning, gunmen burst into the house of *Dr. Intisar Hasan Al Twaigry*,
director of Illwiyah obstetric hospital in Baghdad. They tied up her
husband, shot only Dr. Al Twaigry and left with 20.000 $. *Mohammed Ali
El-Din*, specialized in pharmacy, was killed in the afternoon of the 14th of
August in the area of Al Numaniya. He was attacked by armed men. They opened
fire on the professor and he died immediately. The professor came back to
Iraq a few months ago after a period of studies in George Washington
University, USA. *Dr Kamal Qasim Al Hiti*, prof of sociology, was kidnapped
in Baghdad on 14 Aug 2010, 4 pm. A few weeks before, he received a letter
with a bullet threatening him to leave. His tortured body was found on the
22th of August in the Tigris river opposite the Green Zone, in the Karad
district (under control of the Islamic Supreme Council - Badr Brigade). His
face was partially burned, he was tortured and hanged. He was very outspoken
against the occupation. He was the editor of Al Mustaqila newspaper that was
raided and eventually banned for criticizing the occupation and its
militias. On 28 August 2010 the B*Russell*s Tribunal received the
following email: "I would like to add the name of my close friend* Dr.Samer
Saleem Abbas*, who was assassinated in his private ultrasound clinic by a
gunman with silencer pistol with cold blooded killer, who told his patients:
"there is no need to stay and wait in the clinic anymore: your doctor is
dead". Dr.Samer was shot 5-6 bullets, one of them in his mouth... He was
killed with a pen in his hand. He used to work as Radiologist/Specialists
and chair of radiology department at a specialized surgery hospital
(Al-Jerahat Hospital) in Baghdad medical city.