Sincerity, agreement - and deceit
May 26, 2004
(From Socialist Campaign Group)
At Prime Minister’s Question Time on 26 May, Tony Blair claimed in all sincerity, that Britain and the USA were “absolutely agreed” on the need for a full handover of sovereignty to the Iraqi appointed administration on June 30th.
Without realising the contradiction, he then went on to say that the USA and UK troops would keep their own commanders, and would be entitled to act in their own protection and self defence if necessary.
A few days earlier, Geoff Hoon had assured Labour MPs that the immunity from prosecution from the occupying forces in Iraq was “absolutely standard”, for all forces in a similar situation. I asked him if an appropriate parallel was the position of US troops in Britain under the Visiting Forces Act of 1952, and I came away from that meeting deciding that the Iraqi people would be treated with the same disdain as the rest of Europe are, by the Americans. The only difference is that in Iraq the British are also involved.
The chaos of Iraq fluctuates day by day depending on how many bombs have gone off and how many foreign troops have been injured or killed. We are very seldom given any hint of the number of Iraqi civilians who have died as a result of coalition activities. That said, since the start of hostilities in March 2003, nearly 1,000 coalition troops have died, at least 10,000 Iraqi civilians, an unknown number of Iraqi soldiers, and others will continue to die as a result of unexploded ordinance left over from cluster bombs.
The Coalition Interim Authority has foisted an economic strategy on Iraq that protects foreign investment at the expense of the needs of the Iraqi people, and huge amounts of money have been spent paying American contractors to rebuild the infrastructure destroyed by American bombers.
The International Committee of the Red Cross reported to Paul Bremmer and Sir Jeremy Greenstock in February 2004 their concerns about the treatment of prisoners. This report only became public knowledge in May of this year. Until it was raised in parliament, both Geoff Hoon and Jack Straw had not read it and seemed unaware it had been sent to their departments. Blair’s personal human rights envoy to Iraq, Anne Clwyd MP was also kept in the dark about this report, by British Officials in Bagdad.
Since then, Amnesty International have produced a substantial report in which the American offensive against global terrorism was “bankrupt of vision” and had “made the world a more dangerous place” and the report goes on to consider the question of prisoners in Guantanamo Bay, as well as detainees being held without charge in Iraq and Afghanistan. Irene Kahn (General Secretary of Amnesty International) said of the treatment of prisoners in Abu Ghraib prison, that “this is the logical consequence of the relentless pursuit of the war on terror since the 11th September. It is the result of the US seeking to put itself outside the ambit of judicial scrutiny.”
With a touch of irony she also went on to say that the US have lost the high ground!
The Stop the War Coalition organised another demonstration on 22nd May which was well attended, and a range of speakers all condemned the British government’s position and called for the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq. It seems that the only way forward now is for Britain and the USA to depart from the arrogant assumption that without occupying troops, the whole country would fall into chaos, and instead, name a date for withdrawal and the handing of authority to an accountable, rather than an appointed administration in Baghdad. They could then organise elections and if requiring international support could ask the UN for it. The basic problem of the Bush/Blair relationship is that it is unilateral, without legal basis, and with little remaining support either at home, or in Iraq itself.
The “smart insiders” claimed in the run up to the war in March 2003 that it would quickly be over, the occupying forces would be welcome, and that politics in Britain would soon return to normal, with the issue being forgotten. International affairs have dominated British politics consistently for a longer period than any other time in history, with the exception of WW1 and WW11. Labour has paid a huge price for this in loss of morale and members. It is essential that the party democracy is able to assert itself to change Labour’s policy of close relationship with the Bush administration, and change its preparedness to attack countries such as Afghanistan and Iraq. The Labour movement was built on high ideals which have been besmirched by the policies on Iraq. The Socialist Campaign Group and other Labour MPs have campaigned doggedly in parliament for international peace and justice. If we walk away from the Labour Movement, that opposition could disappear.
The Iraq war won’t go away
May 19, 2004
(From Highbury & Islington Gazette)
The issue of the Iraq war simply won’t go away. Those who supported the war claimed it would be a quick military victory followed by an easy peace and a democratic Iraq. The reality has been that there was no legal basis for the war, and that whilst technical superiority was always going to ensure an easy invasion, the chaos of Iraq has followed, and the appalling scenes from prisons controlled by the occupying forces show how right the anti war movement have been. Last Monday, parliament once again debated the issues of Iraq and Palestine and I voted against government policy in support of a strategy for withdrawal of British and American forces from Iraq, and the establishment of an accountable government recognised international by the UN and if it wished to, could call upon international support, but not an occupation of the country. Whilst the Americans claim to be handing power over to their appointed government on June 30th, they are busy constructing the largest US embassy the world has ever seen, which more and more resembles a colonial power’s seat of administration.
Last month I went to Israel and Palestine to witness the release of Morcechai Vanunu from prison. He has just completed an 18-year sentence for telling the world that Israel was illegally manufacturing nuclear weapons and subsequently, was kidnapped by Mossad, from Europe and faced a military tribunal in Israel. Thirteen of this last 18 years were spent in solitary confinement. I met him on the day of his release, where I waited in the dusty street outside Ashkelon prison, and travelled to St George’s cathedral in Jerusalem and had a good talk with him and the Archbishop that evening. He was in great spirits, and has dedicated his lift to opposing nuclear weapons and bringing about peace in the Middle East with justice for the Palestinian people. It is outrageous that he is denied the right to a passport and travel, and is effectively under Israeli house arrest, despite having completed his long sentence. I am full of admiration for the Israeli support commission for Mordechai and for the Israeli peace movement. Locally, CND, and in particular Ernest Rodker, David Polden, and Sabi Sagall have done excellent work in supporting Mordechai.
During the visit I also went to Ramallah, and had a fascinating talk with Hanan Ashrawi about the possibilities of peace in the region. Then I travelled to see the construction of the wall and realised just how obdurate the Sharon government is in looking for peace. Frankly, they don’t want it and they see a future of walls, security corridors between illegal settlements, and an apartheid state on the West Bank.
Closer to home: Transport in London is always a problem, but I do think that things are rapidly improving. Ken Livingstone’s brave policy of introducing congestion charging has cut car usage in Central London and interestingly has had a knock on effect in the wider area of London in increasing bus and tube usage and thus cutting pollution and making our environment much safer. However, there is still much to be done in terms of improving the tube network and if Ken had not been forced to spend years arguing with the Treasury over the funding of the tube, many improvements would already be underway. I am pressing very hard for the government to improve the funding for the big rail initiatives such as Crossrail and the East London line extension which will run into Highbury and Islington station. I support the Council and other initiatives in the rebuilding of Highbury and Islington station to create an efficient and modern interchange.
I have raised in parliament several times, the question of regeneration of Finsbury Park, and the Secretary of State for transport has promised to intervene with Network Rail to ensure they become effective partners in the rejuvenation of Finsbury Park station to create an efficient transport interchange for rail and bus travelers. Transport for London have done great work in promoting the scheme and have only been held up by the dilatory approach of Network Rail.
Following on from environment, the Kyoto Protocol on climate emissions was an incredible step forward, and credit to the governments who promoted it, in particular John Prescott of the UK. It has always been a tragedy that the US – the world’s biggest polluter has refused to sign it, and now there is pressure being put upon the Putin government not to sign the protocol on the grounds that it would damage their economic interests! It is tragic beyond measure, that governments look to short term economic advantage at the expense of the world’s environment, and I urge everyone to support the environmental groups in ensuring that the whole world signs up to this protocol, not just to limit carbon emissions, obviously very important, but also to reduce pollution levels in all other spheres.
Locally we can also do something: Islington still has one of the worst records in London for the recycling of waste, and the doorstep collection has still not extended to all council estates, and we are awaiting the formation of the Environment Forum to follow on from the excellent work in the past by LA 21. Protecting the environment is a real and relevant direct concern to everyone, and I sympathise with those who feel constantly frustrated at excessive packaging, excessive pollution, and an inability to recycle goods because of inefficiency in waste collecting methods.
Rails for people
May 12, 2004
This morning in Westminster there will be a Parliamentary debate on rail franchises. The Government will have to respond to the serious concerns expressed by MP’s on behalf of Rail users and workers at the state of the railways, but also of the whole principal of handing out franchises to private sector organisations to run services, and be paid to do so.
Britain is in a unique position in Europe; having once had one of the most intensive networks anywhere the massive “Beeching” closures of the 1960s halved the network to around 10,000 track miles. The efforts of British Rail to invest in new track and stock were often hampered by a combination of treasury rules on investment and the huge power of the road lobby to encourage a car and lorry based economy at the expense of rail. Nevertheless British Rail did achieve a great deal with electrification and high speed trains.
The Tory Government of John Major used their surprising win in the 1992 election to claim a mandate for putting the railway system into the private sector, “where it belongs”, claimed the Prime Minister.
The legislation provided for the separation of track and operation by different companies and maintenance by yet more. This ludicrous system had several effects.
Railtrack were allowed to make profits from a combination of track access charges to operators and the sale of assets of the railways themselves. Historically railways have had huge amounts of city centre land for sidings and freight depots which have become desirable for development. Their income from track usage came from the train operating companies.
But this was never a straight commercial transaction as the operating companies were given franchises for the running of a service on a particular line, and in most cases heavily subsidised for so doing. Thus the Tory privatisation consisted of giving Railtrack the power to levy an income from the operators who are paid to operate. It was not free market privatisation, more like a conduit for public money into private hands.
The subsidy levels are enormous. For the last financial year the total subsidy to the Train Operating Companies is £1,320,900,000 not including the massive development grants. In 10 years, Britain has moved from a cash starved public railway that had the benefit of integration and the certainty that any subsidy went to provide a public service to an open till for private profit. The Tories used to complain about the “inefficiency” of the public sector yet strangely don’t complain about subsidies to private companies.
In opposition, Labour opposed privatisation and when in Government opposed taking the whole system back into public ownership, preferring the regulation and subsidy model of operation.
This fragmentation of the system has led to enormous problems, huge costs and an indifferent level of service. The plethora of controls, companies, contractors and sub contractors is not only costly, but dangerous to safety. It was only after the deaths at Hatfield, Paddington and Potters Bar that Network Rail, the successor to Railtrack took all its maintenance back in house to reduce the confusion between contractors and authority.
Since the 1997 election and John Prescott’s refusal to countenance taking the railways back, we have had changes to respond to each crisis. The structure of the industry reflects this muddled thinking with the Secretary of State paying money to an industry where the Government owns Network Rail, the successor to Railtrack, yet the Rail Regulator is able to instruct the Strategic Rail Authority on what it wants who in turn hand out franchises to private operators to run services. Thus public spending priorities are decided by a regulator and the profits made privately. It is hardly efficient, accountable or democratic.
The reason for the debate today is that most of the franchises are currently up for renewal and the Secretary of State, Alastair Darling is reviewing the whole structure.
Welcome as the review is, it really should have happened six years ago.
In advance of the key decisions concerning the future structure of the industry and the and franchises the Commons Transport Select Committee published an interesting report in April.
They expressed “deep concerns about the spiraling costs and poor performance of the railways…” and continued to explain that their report “identifies serious systemic flaws in the present organisation of the railway.”
The Committee, under the Chairpersonship of Gwyneth Dunwoody recommends that a public sector Railway Agency be created that would have powers to manage the entire railway system.
It also called for the Government to take back “into its own hands decisions about the sums which will be spent on the railway.” Using sharp language the report states that “it will correct the absurd position in which the Government simply underwrites the Regulators funding decisions”.
This summer provides a great opportunity for the railway industry.
The end of many of the franchises provides not just the opportunity to have effective regional operations that can integrate travel at a local level but also ensure effective public control and accountability. Indeed Transport for London have made a very good case for the control of all Transport undertakings in London to be handed to them so that proper integration of bus tube and surface rail could take place. This is one of the platforms of Ken Livingstone who is campaigning for re-election as Mayor of London.
It is also an opportunity to return the system to public ownership with the single Railway Agency proposed by the select committee having the power to run railways itself.
The Government’s review is due this summer. Facing unpopularity for the war and the private sector strategy in so many public services there is an opportunity to do something different.
One hopes that the Department of Transport would accept the environmental and economic logic of train travel. Less pollution and fuel economy are benefits of train travel, integrated and affordable public transport gets people out of their cars, as London has shown.
Public opinion never supported rail privatisation and certainly does not support the current structure. Wouldn’t it be nice if this opportunity was seized for the public good.
The scandals of war
May 5, 2004
The furore that greeted the Daily Mirror’s photos of the abuse of Iraqi captives seemed a bit contrived. Supporters of the war desperately hoping that they could prove the forgery of the images and thus brush it all aside.
What they conveniently forget are the other issues surrounding the occupation of Iraq; here are a few to consider:
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- The use of Depleted Uranium shells by the coalition forces at an even greater volume than in the Gulf War of 1991. No reliable studies are yet available of the levels of contamination, and thus fall out from the shells when they have burnt. However we do know that cancer rates in Southern Iraq went up sevenfold in the years after the Gulf War.
- Cluster Bombs, notoriously the cheapest weapon available at last year’s London Arms Fair, are lying unexploded waiting for children to pick up, and die from.
- Helicopter gun ships in Fallujah and Tikrit, and the death toll of 11,000 Iraqi civilians since the start of the war.
The reports of the treatment of prisoners in what was a notorious jail under Saddam; is it to gain the same reputation under the Americans?
Those who support the US/UK coalition forces’ presence in Iraq whilst desperately blaming the media, seem to be ignoring the related issue of attitudes by the forces themselves.
The Mirror photos are horrific and vile, as are the images of American soldiers ill-treating Iraqis. Equally vile are the records of the execution of American hostages and the deaths of countless Iraqi soldiers and irregulars.
The violence that is now commonplace in Iraq is the product of the illegality of the war in the first place, and the deepest suspicion that the Americans have no plans to leave after the end of June, merely install a puppet Government to ensure the oil flows, and if the Iraqi forces cannot control the situation then the US and UK will remain.
That suspicion is fuelled by the way western media continue to report the war. All deaths are a tragedy but some seem more tragic than others. Thus the total Iraqi death toll of 18,000 since March 2003 of civilians and military is hardly mentioned on the US media, only the loss of some 600 US servicemen and women. This media style and lack of challenge to the stream of statements by US military from their compound in Baghdad, (one of them even complained that Fallujah was full of foreign fighters!), helps to build up a general denigration of Iraqis and all things Arabic. Is it any wonder, with this diet of “information” and the very difficult tasks given to frightened young soldiers, that brutalising takes over and the horrendous events of the last few weeks become the norm.
Much of this was predicted. That the US and the UK would succeed in invading Iraq with their over-whelming fire power was never in doubt; those of us who questioned the next phase were condemned as doom mongers and as being supporters of Saddam Hussein. Tragically, everything the anti war movement warned about has come to reality.
George Bush has led from a position of patriotic arrogance and not indulged himself in legal arguments; for him the war is justified because the US is fighting it.
Tony Blair, Bush’s most useful ally, has used very different tactics. He made claims of the existence of weapons of mass destruction and then that Iraq was a threat and then that there had to be regime change. He also claimed that the first UN resolution gave him legal cover for the war. This cavalier attitude towards legality and justice has had an unprecedented response. Last week fifty two former diplomats publicly criticised the whole middle least strategy, and delivered the strongest public rebuke ever witnessed on a British Prime Minister. The real problem is that Blair seems incapable of ever disagreeing with Bush; he has to be seen “shoulder to shoulder” with George W.
The war was illegal, the occupation is illegal and the behaviour of the occupying forces ever more controversial. In those circumstances, there is a strong case for withdrawal to enable an accountable Government to run Iraq, elections to be held, and the UN to be the international body that would provide support, if requested. Despite all signs to the contrary, Bush and Blair continue to claim that the coalition is winning the peace and the hearts and minds of the people.
The morass of Iraq, in the words of Senator Kennedy, “looking ever more like Vietnam is increasingly mirrored by Palestine”.
Regarding Israel/Palestine, Ariel Sharon presented George Bush with a plan of withdrawal from Gaza in return for keeping illegal settlements on the West Bank. This was endorsed by Bush and, in keeping with all other policy in the region, supported by Blair. Since Likud members have rejected this “concession” the strategy of endorsing Sharon looks even more threadbare.
Now is surely the time to recognise that there will be no peace until the Palestinians are treated justly and that the discredited Sharon plan is nothing but an endorsement of more Israeli expansion. The diplomats simply repeated what most of the world knows; endorsement of US strategy in Israel is disastrous for Palestinians but is also a touch stone throughout the region.
Vietnam is constantly used as a comparison to the present Iraq war. There are comparisons of style and statements, but one is different. The Vietnam war was a continuation of the French colonial wars and partition. The US forces only started to grow in numbers after 1963, but it was three years before there were large protests in the rest of the world. The Middle East and Iraq policy have never enjoyed public support.
The next big demonstration for Palestine on May 15th will provide the anti war movement with an opportunity to show just how isolated the US and UK policies are.
Liberating Palestine
May 1, 2004
(From Noticias)
Last month I visited Palestine and Israel and found myself shocked, depressed and inspired. The original purpose of my visit was to be present at the release of Mordechai Vanunu from Ashkelon Prison, where he has served 18 years for telling the world the truth about Israel’s nuclear weapons.
Before going to the prison I traveled to Jerusalem, and arrived just as the national mourning had begun in Palestine for the death of the Hamas leader - Rantissi; the victim of an Israeli helicopter attack. At the same time in West Jerusalem, it was the national day of memory for the holocaust. There was an eerie quiet over the whole city. Walking the Via Dolorosa was almost biblical, with all the stores and markets closed. For the first time I could actually see the Stations of the Cross and the inspiration that Islam, Christianity and Judaism draws from this beautiful city.
The journey to Ramalluh by car ought to take a few minutes, but it is a daily nightmare for thousands of Palestinians. First a bus out of the city, to be met by a road blocks and checkpoints. One then disembarks and walks through barbed wire barriers under the watchful eye of nervous young Israeli soldiers fingering their rapid-fire machine guns. Then another bus, and down the potholed road to the Palestinian town; bustling and busy it is also a site of ruins and destruction. It reminds me and every Palestinian that they are not free. The President’s office is surrounded by rubble and the pock-marked remains of buildings. Yasser Arafat has spent his life being hunted by Israel.
Only a few kilometers out of town the land is crisscrossed by new and very special roads linking the Israeli settlements. Palestinians are forbidden to travel on these roads, and they are forced to travel between their villages on tracks. The only other place I have witnessed this kind of humiliation of people was in South Africa at the end of apartheid!
Standing on a hill, admiring the olive trees, I saw the wall: a massive concrete barrier with a security sanitaire either side, it strides through farms and villages to cut communities, steal land and isolate Palestinians. An act of madness and vengeance that impoverishes and angers Palestinians and does not make Israelis safe, it merely makes them more paranoid.
Later that day, and dozens of checkpoints later, I arrived in Tel Aviv to join the international welcoming party for Mordechai Vanunu. Mordechai has served 18 years, 13 of them in solitary confinement for telling the world that Israel was making nuclear weapons. When he emerged into the blinding sunshine, the well wishers cheered and sang in Hebrew. Mordechai is a Hero, though he also met with abuse. A sizeable throng called for his execution and abused the international peace delegation. When they heard his speech their anger turned to fury. In two minutes he expressed no regrets for his actions, called for Israel to abandon all nuclear weapons, and for the Palestinian people to be supported and allowed to live in peace.
Much later I talked to him. He speaks calmly, quietly and rationally. Eighteen years in prison for telling the truth have made him even more committed, educated and informed. A dangerous opponent of a regime that only seems to understand occupation, settlements and killing innocent people in Gaza or the West Bank in the name of “security”.
Without justice for the Palestinians there will be no peace in the Middle East. The open cheque the USA gives Israel is not a road to peace. Only justice can achieve that.
