Delegates Bring Challenge to End Iraq Sanctions Home
Delegates Bring Challenge to End Iraq Sanctions Home
by Vicki Linton
July/August 1998
Volume 35 Number 6 “U.S. Government Kills Iraqi Children” read the sign at the front of the meeting room. After visiting Iraq and seeing dying Iraqi children with their own eyes, delegates from the Iraq Sanctions Challenge returned to the U.S. ready to tell the truth about U.S. policy and to work tirelessly to stop it. On June 11, Rev. Lucius Walker of Pastors for Peace, and 4 others who travelled to Iraq with the Challenge, came to D.C. to report on what they witnessed and to advocate for renewed action from the movement to stop the U.S. war on Iraq.
Though the Sanctions Challenge delivered more than $4 million worth of medical aid to Iraq, it “was not primarily a humanitarian mission,” said Malcolm Cannon, Coordinator of the newly opened D.C. office of the International Action Center, which organized the Challenge. “No amount of humanitarian aid can change the situation in any fundamental way,” Cannon said. “This was a political challenge to the sanctions, to undermine the policies of the U.S. government. These sanctions are aimed at the entire Iraqi nation—this is genocide. The U.S. policy violates the international conventions against genocide.”
More than 1.5 million Iraqis have died under the sanctions supposedly aimed at their government for the past seven years. “That is one out of every 22 people in the country,” pointed out delegate Sharon Ceci. The sanctions touch the lives of all Iraqis as they bury friends, relatives, coworkers, and try to survive on the meager rations that the sanctions allow them. And the sanctions affect daily life in Iraq in many other ways as well. Lucius Walker noted that because of the sanctions, Iraqis cannot have normal social interactions, because of the daily hardships that make travel difficult, if not impossible.
Two delegates who are students talked about the effects on students and education of the U.S. policy. Fatima Alikahn, a student from New York University, talked about how similar the aspirations of the students at the University of Baghdad are to her own. Yet, they must be “put on hold because of the sanctions,” Alikahn said. “In biology classes they have no microscopes, no textbooks. The students have a thirst for knowledge,” said Alikahn, quoting Mohammed, “seek knowledge from the cradle to the grave.” Yet she noted that where education was once free for all in Iraq, now they cannot get computers because of the sanctions. “I do not think knowledge should be sanctioned,” she stated.
P.J. Park, a Junior at Sidwell Friends School in D.C., was also shocked by the effect the sanctions have had on educational opportunities in Iraq. He noted that students can’t get information from abroad, much less study abroad. “My school has all the computers, textbooks, teachers that anyone could want. The students of Iraq are being robbed. They study hard yet must work menial jobs after school in order for their families to survive.” Park described biology students who instead of studying up-to-date materials, struggle with photocopies of a 1984 biology textbook.
Park’s words sounded familiar to D.C. residents who hear continuously of shortages of textbooks in the under funded D.C. public schools. The delegates from the Sanctions challenge emphasized the similarity of conditions here and in Iraq. D.C. Statehood Party member Gail Dixon, a candidate for D.C. School Board, was invited to talk about how the policies of the same U.S. government that imposes sanctions on Iraq, create hardships for people in poor and working class communities in the U.S. “There is a correlation between what we see happening here in D.C. and in Iraq.,” Dixon stated. She noted that half of the health clinics in D.C.’s communities have been closed supposedly to save money. And added that, “this is what happens when you get in the way of profits.”
The U.S. government has taken self-government from D.C. because, as with Iraq, the U.S. government did not approve of D.C.’s leaders. D.C.’s elected school board was relegated to an advisory role, while the unelected Control Board dictated that a retired General would run the school system. The schools failed to open on time, school closings have continued, and the horror stories about no textbooks and inadequate supplies echo throughout the city.
Lucius Walker compared the conditions of Iraq to not only D.C., but to what he has seen in his travels to Haiti, Chiapas, and Central America, where the policies of the U.S. government and the effects of economic globalization have exacerbated poverty and supported government repression. In Iraq, “I saw what sanctions mean: Genocide,” said Walker. “Some of the children I saw in the hospitals we visited last month are not alive today.”
Walker described returning to the U.S. and seeing the connections between what is happening in Iraq and here at home. “I began to seen in Harlem anew some of what I had seen in Haiti, Chiapas, and Iraq. I came to D.C. and saw the opulence up on the Hill, and then the schools without books, the children without the opportunity to learn.”
Walker stated, “This is not accidental. There is an intentionality. It is designed by our government and those who control it.” Walker described the U.S. government as “the executioner of the poor throughout the world.”
Walker explained that he has also visited Cuba, and noted that though “Cuba suffers from the blockade, there is a difference. Because of the consistent commitment of a revolutionary government to put its people first, Cuba has survived.” He called on the movement to “defend that example that is in contrast to the debilitating effects of the blockade on other countries. Cuba is an example the world should not be bereft of.”
The U.S. government, far from being an example to the world, is everything the it accuses the Iraqi government of being, said Sharon Ceci. Iraq is accused of having weapons of mass destruction, “yet it is the U.S. government that gassed its own people,” Ceci declared, citing a new report from CNN and TIME magazine that documents the use of nerve gas by the U.S. army in Laos during the Vietnam War. The report claims that in 1970, a U.S. Special Forces commando team was sent in to Laos to search for defectors. The commandos used nerve gas on the town the defectors were suspected of hiding in, and on the U.S. men themselves when they were tracked down. (“Did The U.S. Drop Nerve Gas?,” TIME, June 15, 1998.) She noted as well the effects in Vietnam of the use of such chemical agents as Napalm and Agent Orange. Yet, the U.S. presumes to starve the Iraqi people because their government has possessed chemical weapons.
All of the delegates called on those attending the report-back to redouble their efforts to expose this hypocrisy and fight to put an end to the sanctions. Recent reports from the U.S./U.N. inspection teams indicate that the worldwide outcry against the sanctions is beginning to have an effect. The inspectors have recently stated that if Iraq continues to comply as it has been with the inspections, sanctions may be lifted in the coming months. (“Iraq Moves Toward End of Sanctions,” Associated Press, June 15, 1998) The message the Sanctions Challenge brings home is that now is the time to keep the pressure on the U.S. government to end its murderous sanctions policy.
The IAC is pressing forward with campaigns to follow-up on the work of the Sanctions Challenge. They will be producing a video and a book documenting the Sanctions Challenge and launching a clean water campaign to send specialists to Iraq to study what is needed to restore the water supply. They will also begin organizing to collect school supplies to send to Iraq. To find out more, contact the IAC at 1247 E St. SE, Washington, D.C. 20003; (202) 544-3496.
by Vicki Linton
July/August 1998
Volume 35 Number 6 “U.S. Government Kills Iraqi Children” read the sign at the front of the meeting room. After visiting Iraq and seeing dying Iraqi children with their own eyes, delegates from the Iraq Sanctions Challenge returned to the U.S. ready to tell the truth about U.S. policy and to work tirelessly to stop it. On June 11, Rev. Lucius Walker of Pastors for Peace, and 4 others who travelled to Iraq with the Challenge, came to D.C. to report on what they witnessed and to advocate for renewed action from the movement to stop the U.S. war on Iraq.
Though the Sanctions Challenge delivered more than $4 million worth of medical aid to Iraq, it “was not primarily a humanitarian mission,” said Malcolm Cannon, Coordinator of the newly opened D.C. office of the International Action Center, which organized the Challenge. “No amount of humanitarian aid can change the situation in any fundamental way,” Cannon said. “This was a political challenge to the sanctions, to undermine the policies of the U.S. government. These sanctions are aimed at the entire Iraqi nation—this is genocide. The U.S. policy violates the international conventions against genocide.”
More than 1.5 million Iraqis have died under the sanctions supposedly aimed at their government for the past seven years. “That is one out of every 22 people in the country,” pointed out delegate Sharon Ceci. The sanctions touch the lives of all Iraqis as they bury friends, relatives, coworkers, and try to survive on the meager rations that the sanctions allow them. And the sanctions affect daily life in Iraq in many other ways as well. Lucius Walker noted that because of the sanctions, Iraqis cannot have normal social interactions, because of the daily hardships that make travel difficult, if not impossible.
Two delegates who are students talked about the effects on students and education of the U.S. policy. Fatima Alikahn, a student from New York University, talked about how similar the aspirations of the students at the University of Baghdad are to her own. Yet, they must be “put on hold because of the sanctions,” Alikahn said. “In biology classes they have no microscopes, no textbooks. The students have a thirst for knowledge,” said Alikahn, quoting Mohammed, “seek knowledge from the cradle to the grave.” Yet she noted that where education was once free for all in Iraq, now they cannot get computers because of the sanctions. “I do not think knowledge should be sanctioned,” she stated.
P.J. Park, a Junior at Sidwell Friends School in D.C., was also shocked by the effect the sanctions have had on educational opportunities in Iraq. He noted that students can’t get information from abroad, much less study abroad. “My school has all the computers, textbooks, teachers that anyone could want. The students of Iraq are being robbed. They study hard yet must work menial jobs after school in order for their families to survive.” Park described biology students who instead of studying up-to-date materials, struggle with photocopies of a 1984 biology textbook.
Park’s words sounded familiar to D.C. residents who hear continuously of shortages of textbooks in the under funded D.C. public schools. The delegates from the Sanctions challenge emphasized the similarity of conditions here and in Iraq. D.C. Statehood Party member Gail Dixon, a candidate for D.C. School Board, was invited to talk about how the policies of the same U.S. government that imposes sanctions on Iraq, create hardships for people in poor and working class communities in the U.S. “There is a correlation between what we see happening here in D.C. and in Iraq.,” Dixon stated. She noted that half of the health clinics in D.C.’s communities have been closed supposedly to save money. And added that, “this is what happens when you get in the way of profits.”
The U.S. government has taken self-government from D.C. because, as with Iraq, the U.S. government did not approve of D.C.’s leaders. D.C.’s elected school board was relegated to an advisory role, while the unelected Control Board dictated that a retired General would run the school system. The schools failed to open on time, school closings have continued, and the horror stories about no textbooks and inadequate supplies echo throughout the city.
Lucius Walker compared the conditions of Iraq to not only D.C., but to what he has seen in his travels to Haiti, Chiapas, and Central America, where the policies of the U.S. government and the effects of economic globalization have exacerbated poverty and supported government repression. In Iraq, “I saw what sanctions mean: Genocide,” said Walker. “Some of the children I saw in the hospitals we visited last month are not alive today.”
Walker described returning to the U.S. and seeing the connections between what is happening in Iraq and here at home. “I began to seen in Harlem anew some of what I had seen in Haiti, Chiapas, and Iraq. I came to D.C. and saw the opulence up on the Hill, and then the schools without books, the children without the opportunity to learn.”
Walker stated, “This is not accidental. There is an intentionality. It is designed by our government and those who control it.” Walker described the U.S. government as “the executioner of the poor throughout the world.”
Walker explained that he has also visited Cuba, and noted that though “Cuba suffers from the blockade, there is a difference. Because of the consistent commitment of a revolutionary government to put its people first, Cuba has survived.” He called on the movement to “defend that example that is in contrast to the debilitating effects of the blockade on other countries. Cuba is an example the world should not be bereft of.”
The U.S. government, far from being an example to the world, is everything the it accuses the Iraqi government of being, said Sharon Ceci. Iraq is accused of having weapons of mass destruction, “yet it is the U.S. government that gassed its own people,” Ceci declared, citing a new report from CNN and TIME magazine that documents the use of nerve gas by the U.S. army in Laos during the Vietnam War. The report claims that in 1970, a U.S. Special Forces commando team was sent in to Laos to search for defectors. The commandos used nerve gas on the town the defectors were suspected of hiding in, and on the U.S. men themselves when they were tracked down. (“Did The U.S. Drop Nerve Gas?,” TIME, June 15, 1998.) She noted as well the effects in Vietnam of the use of such chemical agents as Napalm and Agent Orange. Yet, the U.S. presumes to starve the Iraqi people because their government has possessed chemical weapons.
All of the delegates called on those attending the report-back to redouble their efforts to expose this hypocrisy and fight to put an end to the sanctions. Recent reports from the U.S./U.N. inspection teams indicate that the worldwide outcry against the sanctions is beginning to have an effect. The inspectors have recently stated that if Iraq continues to comply as it has been with the inspections, sanctions may be lifted in the coming months. (“Iraq Moves Toward End of Sanctions,” Associated Press, June 15, 1998) The message the Sanctions Challenge brings home is that now is the time to keep the pressure on the U.S. government to end its murderous sanctions policy.
The IAC is pressing forward with campaigns to follow-up on the work of the Sanctions Challenge. They will be producing a video and a book documenting the Sanctions Challenge and launching a clean water campaign to send specialists to Iraq to study what is needed to restore the water supply. They will also begin organizing to collect school supplies to send to Iraq. To find out more, contact the IAC at 1247 E St. SE, Washington, D.C. 20003; (202) 544-3496.
