Monday, November 28, 2005

Worse than under Saddam

That's the bleak assessment of former Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, on the state of human rights in Iraq. Speaking in an interview with the Observer, Allawi said

'People are doing the same as [in] Saddam's time and worse,' Ayad Allawi told The Observer. 'It is an appropriate comparison. People are remembering the days of Saddam. These were the precise reasons that we fought Saddam and now we are seeing the same things.'

[...]

'We are hearing about secret police, secret bunkers where people are being interrogated,' he added. 'A lot of Iraqis are being tortured or killed in the course of interrogations. We are even witnessing Sharia courts based on Islamic law that are trying people and executing them.'

He said that immediate action was needed to dismantle militias that continue to operate with impunity. If nothing is done, 'the disease infecting [the Ministry of the Interior] will become contagious and spread to all ministries and structures of Iraq's government', he said.

Now, Allawi is running for election, and he doesn't exactly have clean hands over torture and killing: in 2004 he was accused of personally executing suspected insurgents in a Baghdad police station. But when you read reports like this and thisand this, it's hard to deny that he has a point. A war purportedly waged to end torture and murder (among other things) seems to have simply shifted the boot to the other foot, and allowed the Shi'ites to run some death squads and torture centres of their own, rather than being the victims. Was that really worth killing all those people for?

5 comments:

  1. Sorry Sadam - all is forgiven.

    The other benefit is that you could be unconditional buddies with saddam this time. After-all as much as he may gas the kurds and invade places like kuwait you can always say "it was worse under the democratic reigeme!"

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anon - I think the point is that the US and the CotW has failed quite miserably to live up to its promise to make life better for Iraqis.

    The US administration of Iraq has failed miserably, and it seems the elected Iraqi Parliament is not strong enough to withstand the corruption from "Insurgents", Shia militias and ordinary criminals.

    The answer isn't putting Saddam back in charge, but improving the performance of post-Saddam administration. Committing war crimes and stealing Iraq's oil wealth isn't a good start.

    ReplyDelete
  3. No anon.. if:
    a) Saddam was bad enough to warrant invading and putting on trial
    b) things are worse now, then
    c) those responsible for the current mess should be put on trial. Which they certainly should be.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Oh yes Bush is a bad bad man. Right up there with Saddam and Kim Jong Il. Hell, he's worse than Hitler, Stalin and Guevara!!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Oh yes Bush is a bad bad man. Right up there with Saddam and Kim Jong Il. Hell, he's worse than Hitler, Stalin and Guevara!!


    yup exactly, prob you meant this as a joke, but outside of the bushlovers camp thats exactly what the world thinks

    ReplyDelete

Due to abuse and trolling, comments have been disabled. If you don't like this decision, you can start your own blog here

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.