Author: garykent

Member of the Central Committee of the Iraqi Communist Party Published by Nameh Mardom, central organ of the Tudeh Party of Iran, 26 May 2006, Issue No. 739 1- The new government of Iraq was announced yesterday. What is your view about the composition of the new government? Is this any near to your concept of the Government of National Unity? What position the ICP will take towards this government? – The new Iraqi government was formed after lengthy and tortuous negotiations between the various political blocs that won in the elections in Dec. 2005. The idea of setting up … Continue reading Interview with Salam Ali

Andrew Rawnsley argues that if the cause of humanitarian interventionism is lost in Iraq, it will not just be Tony Blair who has tragic cause to be sorry. He says that despite the terrible mistakes made after the removal of Saddam, the case for liberal interventionism is still compelling. In a globalised world, morality and self-interest alike demand that Western nations cannot ignore what goes on within the borders of other states when they threaten their own citizens, their neighbours or the rest of the world. Rawnsley fears that the alternative is to retreat into the school of foreign policy … Continue reading Realism and intervention after Iraq

The Times reports this atrocity in which the coach of the Iraqi national tennis team and two of his players were shot dead in Baghdad, apparently for wearing shorts, in a district where Islamic radicals have started to enforce brutal, Taleban-style law.

The Times carries a shocking piece on an alleged massacre by US Marines last November in al-Haditha, a town on the Euphrates. An American soldier died in a roadside bomb and, it is reported that marines then ran amok, killing as many as 24 unarmed Iraqi civilians, including women and children, in cold blood. The eye witness account by a ten-year-old girl, Iman Hassan is harrowing. The awful incident is the subject of a US military inquiry with possible courts martial and murder charges. That is how it should be. American, British and other foreign troops in Iraq must uphold … Continue reading The Marines and a massacre in Iraq

The TUC carries this report of a trade union womens visit to Britain. The aim of the visit is set out as follows: The TUC believes strongly that womens participation in public life, and in particular in trade unions, is vital to the development of a free, democratic and open society. Given the fact that Iraqi/Kurdish women today make up half of Iraq’s population and some 35% of the workforce (in some industries, they are the majority, including some parts of heavy industry as a result of the need to draft women into the labour force to replace men sent … Continue reading Solidarity with Iraqi and Kurdish women trade unionists

TUC AND MOBILE PHONES FOR IRAQI TRADE UNIONS That this House notes that unions representing workers in Iraq and Iraqi Kurdistan face incredible challenges in defending working people and rebuilding democracy and that one of their requests for solidarity from British trade unionists is the provision of mobile phones, which are crucial for any union organiser but especially in Iraq, where travel can be dangerous and landlines are not sufficiently reliable or widespread; further notes that mobile phone handsets are expensive to buy in Iraq and that buying new ones could eat up scarce union resources, but that the Iraqi … Continue reading LFIQ Chair Dave Anderson MP has tabled a Commons motion backing TUC appeal for mobiles for Iraqi trade unions

The BBC reports that Hero Ibrahim Ahmad has warned that high unemployment levels in Iraq are making disaffected youths easy targets for extremists. The wife of President Jalal Talabani founded the Kurdistan Womens Association in 1989. She told a conference in London that I believe that if we are to genuinely try to end the misery and misfortunes of all of the people of Iraq, we must work together regardless of ethnic background, nationality or religion to achieve freedom of the individual and a respect for human rights and dignity equally for both women and men.

The New York Times examines the role of Iraqi charities in rebuilding civil society where , it says, small acts of pure altruism often go unnoticed but the outlines of a nascent civil society are taking shape. It says that since 2003 the government has registered 5,000 private organizations, including charities, human rights groups, medical assistance agencies and literacy projects. Officials estimate that an additional 7,000 groups are working unofficially.

Solidarity with Iraqi gays, feminists, democrats and socialists Public meeting – Panel discussion, with Qs and As Friday 19 May 2006 7 – 9 pm Conway Hall, Red Lion Sq, London WC1 (nearest tube Holborn) All Welcome Panellists include: Ali Hili of the Iraqi LGBT- UK group, Houzan Mahmoud of the Organisation for Women’s Freedom in Iraq and Peter Tatchell of OutRage! This event is a part of the International Day of Action Against Homophobia programme organised by GALHA, with the support of OutRage! and other LGBT groups. “We hated Saddam’s tyranny, but the situation for gay people in Iraq … Continue reading Women, Gays & Secularism in Post-War Iraq

LFIQ Chair Dave Anderson has tabled the following Commons motion as a basis for the LFIQ campaign to support independent unions in Iraq That this House applauds the recent Labour Friends of Iraq delegation to Erbil and Sulamaniyah to meet unions, parties, and ministers from Iraqi Kurdistan as well as 22 union leaders from Baghdad, Basra and Babel; is concerned that Iraqi Ministers, through Decree 8750 of August 2005, have frozen the monies of unions including those affiliated to the Iraqi Workers’ Federation, leaving organisations which represent up to a million Iraqis and which are the bedrock of a non-sectarian … Continue reading Commons Motion on Labour Rights in Iraq