[uruknet.info] - [daily information from occupied iraq] - [newsletter 16 Dec 2005 _Part One]

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The Crimes of U.S. ‘Democracy’
Ghali Hassan, GlobalResearch.ca
As the Occupation of Iraq is approaching three years, the mass murder of
Iraqi civilians is not questioned, but normalised in Western conscience.
President Bush reached the stage where he is able to make his own figure of
Iraqi deaths, with no remorse or sadness. The war was not the result of
"wrong intelligence"; the war was an illegal act of aggression, and a
premeditated mass murder. 'Democracy’ is used as a tool to manipulate the
public and justif! y war crimes (...) The real motives for the war remain
conspicuously hidden from the public: the colonisation of Iraq to enhance
U.S. imperial dominance, the destruction of Arab nationalism, and most
importantly support for Israel's Zionist expansion and criminal policies
against the Palestinians. Moreover, the most relevant was that public
consent in the West has been manufactured and the U.S. had its way to
commit a 'Supreme International Crime’ against defenceless people,
disguised as 'spreading democracy’...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18747&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18747


SECRET IRAQI PRISONS:
CALL FOR IMMEDIATE INTERNATIONAL INVESTIGATION INTO TORTURE BY GOVERNMENT
FORCES
Doctors for Iraq
Doctors for Iraq is calling for an immediate international investigation
into crimes of torture committed by Iraqi Government forces and police.
Doctors for Iraq has seen evidence that torture has been used widely
against Iraqi civilians who have been arrested randomly without legal
procedure and have been transferred to secret prisons (...) These secret
prisons are closed to human ri! ghts organisations and the majority of
prisoners being held in these facilities have not been charged and are
unaware of why they are being held. Prisoners are being subjected to
horrific forms of torture including: Sleep deprivation, being hung by their
legs and arms for long periods of time, cutting instruments and electrical
drills being used against detainees, electric shock, sexual humiliation and
abuse, threats of rape and physical violence being used against family
members...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18739&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18739


Cindy Sheehan's War
Samuel Bostaph
...Sheehan’s crusade against the war did not begin in Crawford. Since
Casey’s death, little more than a month shy of his 25th birthday, she had
written letters, given speeches, and testified before Congress against the
war and continued occupation of Iraq, as well as founding the Gold Star
Families for Peace. But it was her vigil in a roadside ditch outside the
president’s ranch, as she and other protesters waited in vain for a meeting
with him, that captured media attention and! made her internationally known
as the "Peace Mom."...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18761&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18761


Misery in the Name of Democracy: The US Works Elections in Iraq, Venezuela,
Bolivia, and Haiti
Yifat Susskind, CommonDreams.org
The Bush Administration is touting Iraq's December 15 election as a giant
leap forward for freedom guaranteed to ignite fervor for democracy across
the entire Middle East. But closer to home, the Administration has
discovered that democracy has created a monster and that the monster is
democracy. In Latin America and the Caribbean, popular movements are
demanding that the United States'! "gift to the world" make good on its
promise of majority rule. That would likely disrupt a system-otherwise
known as "free-market democracy"-that has benefited a small elite and
worsened poverty for most people. The possibility has so alarmed CIA
Director Porter Goss that he recently labeled the spate of upcoming
elections in Latin America as a "potential area of instability"...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18760&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18760


Ex-FBI translator's case may reveal Plame's crucial CIA role
Mike Mejia, Online Journal Contributing Writer
For over a year, speculation has run rampant in the U.S. media and in the
blogosphere about the CIA leak investigation being conducted by Special
Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald. The thought-provoking questions asked by
journalists and bloggers alike are many and varied: Who, in addition to
Scooter Libby and Karl Rove, was involved in leaking the name of CIA
operative Valerie Plame to the media in order to pu! nish her husband,
former Ambassador Joe Wilson, for his refutation of President Bush's Niger
uranium claim? What was the role of the White House Iraq Group (WHIG) in
peddling Plame's name to the media? Who forged the Niger uranium
documents?...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18759&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18759


Propaganda Review
– from the ‘war against the ‘anti-Christ’ to the ‘war on terror’
William Bowles, I'n'I
...Reading 'Culture Inc.’ again, all these years later, one thing is clear,
that of the parallel role that anti-communism played in the struggle for
'hearts and minds’ to the current one played by the 'war on terror’.
Underpinning both campaigns are the economics of capitalism and the need to
undermine and/or destroy all opposition to corporate capitalism. The
historical parallels between the two campaign! s are all too real as are
the techniques used but exposing the relationships is not as easy as it
seems, so deep-rooted are the prejudices that have been created over the
generations, especially the fear created around the word communism, a fear
that has little to do with the former Soviet Union...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18758&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18758


An Incredible Day in America
Martin Garbus
Today, for two separate reasons, has been an incredible day in America.
First, the United States has legitimized torture and secondly, the
President has admitted to an impeachable offense. First, the media has been
totally misled on the alleged Bush-McCain agreement on torture. McCain
capitulated. It is not a defeat for Bush. It is a win for Cheney. Torture
is not banned or in any way impeded. Under the compromise, anyone charged
with torture can defend himself if a "rea! sonable" person could have
concluded they were following a lawful order...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18756&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18756


The King of Terror
Jeff Wells, Rigorous Intuition
The only commentary some stories require is the sound of one's head
striking the desk. For instance: "Zarqawi 'captured, but let go' BAGHDAD:
Iraqi security forces allegedly caught terrorist leader Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi but released him because they did not realise who he was"
(...)That reminded me of a Newsweek story from last April, which "revealed"
how bin Laden sent two envoys to Iraq to assess the resistance in the
summer of 2003, eventually en! dorsing Zarqawi as the "prince of Al Qaeda
in Iraq." Like the palid "strangers" of the film Dark City who are forever
recasting reality, our masters of war are forever erasing distinctions and
disappearing details. Little things, like deaths and resurrections,
vanishing accents and the regeneration of amputed limbs...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18755&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18755


America's Own Chronicle of Its Hellish Descent
Iraq, Ourselves
PIERRE TRISTAM, CounterPunch
..."Iraq, Ourselves" traces the descent of American values into various
circles of hell. The lust and gluttony for power, the greed for cheap and
easy profit from Iraq's ruins, the wrath of our terrified military, of our
mercenary "private security" goons, and now of Iraq's government-backed
death squads and their hunt for heretics: All of it combines into a
three-ring circus of violence with the Tigris for a Ri! ver Styx and the
Potomac for a Rubicon. Our imperial president crossed that one three years
ago, with fraud on his lips and hubris in his plastic laurels...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18754&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18754


Troops transport Iraqi ballots
Officials estimate 70 percent turnout.
AP
Final results in Iraq’s parliamentary election might not be known for two
weeks, but early indications show the Shiite tickets doing well in
traditional Shiite strongholds, election officials said today. In Mosul,
capital of the predominantly Sunni Arab province of Nineveh, indications
were that the Sunni coalition came in first, said a representative for the
Shiite United Iraqi Alliance, Hameed Shabaky (...) Many Sunnis said they!
voted to register their opposition to the Shiite-led government and to
speed the end of the U.S. military presence. "What happened yesterday in
Sunni areas and Iraq does not mean that the resistance is getting weaker,"
said Mohammed Abdelkarim, 42, a teacher in Ramadi, an insurgent stronghold
west of Baghdad. "The resistance will not die till the withdrawal of the
occupation forces."...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18753&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18753


Support GI Resister Katherine Jashinski Now!
Courage to Resist Newsletter
...On the morning of November 17, 2005, Katherine Jashinsky became the
first woman from within the military to make public her resistance to the
Iraq war. Katherine is a National Guard Specialist on active duty with the
111th ASG since January of this year, and was seeking Conscientious
Objector (CO) status from the military. At the gates of Fort Benning
Georgia, surrounded by supporters, Katherine held a press conference
announcing her pla! nned refusal to be deployed to the Middle East. Her
announcement at Fort Benning coincided with the annually-held protest
gathering demanding the closure of the notorious School of the Americas...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18752&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18752


Coming to terms
Imad Khadduri, Free Iraq
...According to contacts that Asia Times Online spoke to in Iraq, the
activities of the Badr Organization against Arab Sunnis started with the
targeting of former Iraqi Air Force officers and pilots. Several of the
pilots were assassinated, including some who had flown aircraft to Iran for
safekeeping during the first Gulf War in 1991. A number of these Iraqi
pilots and officers had been trained in Pakistan during the 1980s. The
contacts said that over three dozen former I! raqi Air Force personnel have
been killed. The Iraqi resistance is sure that the Badr Organization is
behind most of the killings, having been provided information on some of
the targets by Iranian intelligence."...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18751&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18751


Iraq insurgents say election truce won‘t last
Fadel al-Badrani
Iraqi secular insurgents and Islamist militants said on Friday they would
soon resume attacks on U.S. troops and their Iraqi allies, saying they had
only observed an election truce to let fellow Sunni Arabs vote. Both Saddam
Hussein loyalists and religious militants said the insurgency would rage
until U.S. troops leave Iraq . "As long as the occupation exists along with
those agents who brought it, we will continue our armed struggle," said Abu
Muyas! ir, 52, a former member of Saddam's Baath party who is a local
guerrilla leader in Falluja, west of Baghdad...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18750&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18750


"779" the PKK List Participating in the Iraqi Elections!
an iraqi tear
"Hizb al-hal al-democrati al-kurdistani- the Party Kurdistan Democratic
Solution" is a "Kurdish" party that occupied a luxury apartment owned by a
former high ranking Iraqi official at Abu Nuwas Street in Baghdad in the
first weeks of the occupation. The party organized many press conferences
but always their statements were ambiguous. The Party moved to another
building in Baghdad; raising PKK flags every often (...) The candidates
sho! uld be Iraqis holding Iraqi IDs and the Ration Cards, the data base of
the ration cards is the base recognized by the Electoral Commission that
put the conditions for the nominees who should represent Iraqi political
parties and movements. The question is: from where PKK members in Iraq did
get Iraqi documents?...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18749&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18749


Corporate Media Reveals the Obvious: Neocons Authorized Domestic Snooping
Kurt Nimmo, Another day in the empire
It’s treated as almost a ho-hum subject by the corporate media: Bush
allowed the NSA "without court approval" to spy on Americans, according to
the Los Angeles Times. "For several years after the presidential order was
signed in 2002, the intelligence agency monitored calls and e-mails of
hundreds of people in the country to search for evidence of terrorist
activity," that is to say they "monitored" Ame! ricans who have
disagreements with the government, since there aren’t any terrorists
(outside of the White House and the Pentagon) in the United States. "It
said the previously undisclosed decision to permit some eavesdropping
inside the country without court approval represented a major shift in U.S.
intelligence gathering. The NSA, based at Ft. Meade, Md., is authorized to
monitor communications on foreign soil."...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18746&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18746


US ambassador “will remain the critical behind-the-scenes power,” says New
York Times
Iraqi election to rubber-stamp continued US occupation
Patrick Martin, WSWS
The Bush administration and the American media are, predictably, hailing
the December 15 election as a giant step towards democracy in Iraq. In
reality, as they well know, Thursday’s balloting only provides a
parliamentary screen—and a very thin one—for continued US occupation and
domination. Whatever the outcome of the voting, real power in t! he
oil-rich country will remain firmly in the hands of the American military
and the chief US representative in Baghdad, Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18745&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18745


"Cruel, inhuman, and degrading"
Eli , Left I on the News
...Was it cruel and inhuman to imprison Jose Padilla in solitary
confinement for 3 1/2 years without charges? How about Iraqi General Amer
al-Saadi, who surrendered voluntarily to the Americans, only to spend the
next 2 1/2 years (and counting) in solitary confinement, again without
charges, a man not even suspected or accused of any violent acts (not that
Padilla was ever formally accused either, press conferences not qualifying
as legal proceedings)? Was ! his treatment "cruel and inhuman"? I know if
someone did that to me, I'd certainly think so. How about the hundreds of
prisoners in Guantanamo, illegally imprisoned in dog cages, without legal
rights and often without their families knowing where they are? Cruel and
inhuman? How could it not be?...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18762&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18762


Iraqi Resistance Report for events of Thursday, 15 December 2005
Translated and/or compiled by Muhammad Abu Nasr, member, editorial board,
the Free Arab Voice
...Under the control of the US occupation regime and in accordance with an
American-imposed time-table, Thursday was an "election day" in occupied
Iraq. With offices and institutions ordered closed by the puppet regime,
Iraqis were urged to cast ballots in an "election" for a "parliament"
concocted on the basis of a "constitution" drafted by an American Zio! nist
law professor and imposed by force of US arms. Iraqi Resistance
organizations made clear that they consider any elections held under the
guns of the occupation to be un-free, illegal, and illegitimate...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18744&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18744


99% in the south of Iraq
Imad Khadduri
"Less than two days before nationwide elections, the Iraqi border police
seized a tanker on Tuesday that had just crossed from Iran filled with
thousands of forged ballots, an official at the Interior Ministry said. The
tanker was seized in the evening by agents with the American-trained border
protection force at the Iraqi town of Badra, after crossing at Munthirya on
the Iraqi border, the official said. According to the Iraqi official, the
border police found several thous! and partly completed ballots inside...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18743&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18743


IRAQ: Morgue can't cope with numbers of bodies arriving on a daily basis,
doctors say
IRIN
Lack of space and a shortage of doctors to deal with corpses at Baghdad's
only mortuary is causing a delay in the release of bodies for burial.
"Insecurity in the country has affected our work and has caused a delay in
the delivery of corpses to their families. A small number of staff and
equipment has made things worse," said director of the Forensic Medicine
Institute (FMI) in the Ministry of Health, Dr Fa'aq Ameen...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18742&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18742


US Tortures its Own Prisoners
Lenin's Tomb
...And so how can this be surprising, given the kind of state we are
discussing? How can Abu Ghraib be a surprise? We knew that the CIA had been
using torture for decades. We knew that the US government was prepared to
murder its own citizens - in Waco, on Ruby Ridge, in John Africa's
community, and now also in New Orleans. The cops shoot people to death
quite frequently, as they are increasingly doing in the UK. There were
reports of torture and ritual beatings in the U! S before. But it's the
first time I've ever seen it on video footage. And it needs to be said, and
repeated and amplifed: the US government tortures its own people. And some
are prepared to trust these people, these sociopaths, in Iraq, in
Afghanistan and in Haiti?...

<http://www.uruknet.com/?s1=1&p=18741&s2=17>Read the full article / Leggi
l'articolo completo: http://www.uruknet.com/?p=18741




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information concerning occupied Iraq: news, analysis, documents and texts
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