Secret Whitehall emails released yesterday provide damning new evidence that the notorious dossier making the case for invading Iraq was "sexed up".
They disclose that the intelligence services were sceptical over the "iffy drafting" of government claims that Saddam Hussein could mount a missile strike on his neighbours within 45 minutes of ordering an attack.
BAGHDAD - Iraqis have displayed surprising resilience to
years of bloodshed but mental health problems often go untreated in
Iraq, the World Health Organization (WHO) said in a study released on
Saturday.
A mental health survey published in the journal World Psychiatry
found mental disorders amongst Iraqis are no more prevalent than in
peaceful countries, contrary to what might be expected given the
violence unleashed by the 2003 U.S.-led invasion and years of war
before that.
The great number of Iraqi children affected with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is one of the saddest, and least known, legacies of the Iraq war. That a new clinic for their treatment opened last August in Baghdad is the first of its kind says a lot about how this problem is being addressed. Until now, hundreds of children suffering from PTSD have been treated by Dr. Haider Maliki at the Central Pediatric Teaching Hospital in Baghdad. Hundreds of thousands remain untreated.
Why are more Republicans happy with Obama's policies on government secrecy, wiretapping, non-withdrawal from Iraq, unqualified support for Israel and a host of other policies than most of the Democratic party's own base?
What do they know that many of us don't, or perhaps do not wish to know?
“There will still be American troops in Iraq, up to 50,000 of them.”
President Obama has surprised the national security establishment, and
not a few in the peace movement, with his Friday commitment to pull all
American troops out of Iraq by 2011.
This is the text of a talk by Chris
Hedges that will be read at anti-war gatherings to be held by The World
Can't Wait in New York's Union Square, Los Angeles, San Francisco,
Seattle, Nashville, Louisville, Chicago and Berkeley on March 19 to
protest the sixth anniversary of the start of the war in Iraq.
BAGHDAD - As the US and Britain steadily exit Iraq, a pre-invasion reality is returning for many. Essential services still don't work, while the old-world Ba'athist order is once again flourishing.
Saddam Hussein's loyalists have been removed from the extensive bureaucracies that once ran Iraq, but the often draconian rules they imposed over 30 years are back in vogue.
Security has improved across the country, to the extent of families being able to return to public parks and sports grounds even in provincial areas that are far less stable than the capital.
Barack Obama won the votes of many Americans by promising to swiftly end the Iraq War and bring U.S. troops home. He denounced George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq as a "violation of international law."
So will U.S. troops leave Iraq? Will those responsible for this trumped-up war face justice?
No, on both counts.
President Obama says U.S. combat troops will leave Iraq by August 2010. However, the U.S. military occupation will not end. What we are seeing is a public relations shell game.
During the presidential campaign red and white anti-war signs dotted the countryside. In some towns, they lined the streets.
The initial impetus for Barack Obama's candidacy came from the anti-war movement and his promise to bring the troops home.
At first, Obama argued that U.S. involvement in the war would end quickly after he became president. As the campaign wore on that urgency migrated to getting the troops out in 16 months.
MURRAY, Utah - Six months ago, Tarek Darwish and his family arrived in Utah as refugees craving a new and better life. Last week, his family wept and kissed his hand in farewell as the former lawyer, disillusioned, left to return to Iraq.
Life in Utah has been a list of disappointments. His family of seven lives in a two-bedroom apartment. None of the adults have jobs. His wife needs glasses and dental work but has been told Utah's Medicaid won't cover them.
