Starvation as a Method of Warfare
Hussein Al-Alak, "The London Progressive Journal"
In January 2007, the Iraq Solidarity Campaign informed the international
community about the damage which the growth of poverty has caused to the
children of Iraq, through the much publicised paper "Western Civilisation - The
Unspoken Fate of Iraqi Children".
The report, which was published by a wide variety of publications including the
Morning Star, URUKNET, the UN Observer, Palestine Chronicle and the Global
Research Institute, reported that the increase in poverty since the 2003
invasion has resulted in the growth in the child sex trade, the forced
separation of families, an increase in drug and alcohol abuse. Psychiatrists
have also highlighted the effect of the ubiquitous violence on the school
attendance rates and performance, referred to in the report as "learning
impediments".
The report also found that 400,000 of Iraq's children are also suffering from a
condition called "wasting", which is characterised by chronic diarrhoea and high
deficiencies of protein. However, the conduct of the US-backed government of
Iraq has sunk to a new low, with news that the regime of Jalal Talabani and
Nouri Al-Maliki, who are not satisfied with the murder of one million Iraqis
since the occupation began, now plan to starve the rest by eliminating Iraq's
already meagre ration service by June 2008.
The ration system was first established during the 1990s to combat the
widespread poverty which had resulted from the UN Sanctions, in a British and
American backed blockade which saw the murder of an estimated 1.5 million
children due to "embargo related causes". The 6,000 children lost per month was
viewed by America's Madeline Albright as being a "price worth paying".
Whilst the country was ruled by Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath Party, the United
Nations themselves praised Iraq's ration system as being "the world's largest
and most effective relief effort" and even in the face of invasion, the
"tyrannical" Iraqi President "ruthlessly" provided his population with an
advanced six months' supply but now the "independent" Iraqi government have
decided to end the system, which has saved millions from starvation, on the
grounds that the closure is "in line with the obligations it has made to the
World Bank".
Some analysts say that millions of Iraqis will be affected, particularly
families with no bread winners, as well as women, the unemployed and children.
It is also believed that Iraq is going to lose control of its own inflation and
that the people are therefore going to experience a price increase in food, fuel
and other daily essentials.
In other words, British and American Troops who are based in Iraq at the
"invitation" of the Iraqi Government are going to be made to shoot their bullets
at, and kick down the doors of, an increasingly starving population. Is this
what being against Saddam or Al-Qaida now means?
The news has come as a shock to both campaigners and Iraqi families, in the face
of recent allegations by one Arab newspaper, which recently revealed that Iraqi
MP's were being offered five million dollars each, to vote in favour of the
privatisation of Iraq's nationalised oil. It was further revealed that monies
brought in from oil revenues were not even going towards the so-called
"reconstruction" of democratic Iraq.
But campaigners, led by the Iraq Solidarity Campaign (ISC), have sworn that
plans to eliminate this essential service will not go unopposed in either the
Middle East or the West, and have already begun to mount a challenge to the
Iraqi regime and the US/British occupying powers, in a direct challenge which is
already gathering momentum.
Within twenty-four hours of launching the campaign, the international petition
"Act Against Iraq Poverty", addressed to the governments of Iraq, Britain and
America, has been endorsed by a variety of political parties and personalities.
The ISC demand that the ration service be maintained and be developed to provide
for the needs of Iraqi families.
Already the petition has been signed by many political organisations including
the Communist Party of Britain's Somerset Branch, RESPECT (renewal), a Liberal
Democrat councillor, the Polish Labour Party, the Pakistan Peoples Party, the
Australian Socialist Alliance, the US Party for Socialism and Liberation, the
Massachusetts Green Party. Even some members of the Democratic and Republican
parties in the US have endorsed it.
This is alongside the National Revival and Sovereignty Movement of Russia, the
Iraq Solidarity Association in Stockholm, the Uruknet Association in Italy, and
the former Scottish MSP Tommy Sheridan's Socialist Solidarity Party in Scotland.
The breadth of international support from campaigners has also come from as far
afield as Palestine, Jordan, Iraq, Mexico, Sweden, Thailand, Canada, Australia,
New Zealand, Spain, Sri Lanka, the UK and Venezuela, each with a crystal clear
message to the occupying governments and their stooges; "If you don't shoot or
torture your victims, you starve them to death. Shame on you!"
One supporter from the United Kingdom wrote, "I add my name to those who urge
the UN, the British and Americans, to continue the rationing program in Iraq and
stop the abuses aimed at hungry Iraqis!" with Ian Douglas from Cairo asking
Bush, Brown, Maliki and Talabani, "What is a government that starves the
people?"
Comments to the occupiers from US citizens have also included "Over a million
slaughtered, millions of widows and orphans, millions of refugees - and now the
dirty occupiers want to snatch the bread from the mouths of the living - stop
this genocide of the defenceless Iraqi people." As others have stated on the
petition, the occupying powers need to pay the Iraqi people reparations for the
damages and trauma caused by the illegal invasion in 2003. There have been other
demands for an independent commission to be established and see to the
perpetrators of the war and invasion be tried as war criminals.
The international campaign against the elimination of the rations has been
established against the backdrop of the seriousness that ending the service will
cause to the Iraqi people, as one health worker recently told Dahr Jamail of the
International Press Service: "I and my wife have five boys and six girls so the
ration costs a lot when it has to be bought. I cannot afford food and other
expenses like study, clothes and doctors."
But as one woman recently said to "Al-Jazeera", "If they reduce the quantity of
the ration, we will be displaced [made homeless] as the money to pay bills will
have to be used for food. If we are considered a poor family today, tomorrow we
will be considered absolutely desperate."
To sign the international petition please follow the link:
http://www.petitiononline.com/hattycat/petition.html
* Hussein Al-Alak is Chairman of the Iraq Solidarity Campaign.