Current News in Context
April 27, 2005
A member of Parliament is assassinated, the government has yet to be formed three months after the 30 January elections, an analysis of Fallujah as 'our Guernica', and an update on the use of torture are featured below. I am sending a summary of the Temporary Administrative Law that is the current constitution, and an interesting article from Becky Branford on the impact it has played in the impass to form a new government.
For those of you in the Philadelphia area
Dahr Jamail will be at Friends Center on Thursday 28 April.
See below for a piece in today's Guardian with Jonathan Steele.
Iraqi Member of Parliament Assassinated, no government announced
"Gunmen shot an Iraqi woman member of parliament on Wednesday in a fresh shock to politicians whose failure to form a government three months after elections has allowed violence to thrive unchecked.
Iraqi police said Lame'a Abed Khadawi, a member of caretaker Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's political party, was shot outside her house in eastern Baghdad. She is believed to be the first person in the 275-seat National Assembly to be killed.
Allawi himself survived an assassination attempt this month when his convoy was attacked by a car bomber. Khadawi was one of around 90 women elected to the assembly on January 30. By law, a third of the candidates on party lists had to be women."
*****
This is our Guernica
Jonathan Steele and Dahr Jamail
Wednesday April 27, 2005
"Robert Zoellick is the archetypal US government insider, a man with a brilliant technical mind but zero experience of any coalface or war front. Sliding effortlessly between ivy league academia, the US treasury and corporate boardrooms (including an advisory post with the scandalous Enron), his latest position is the number-two slot at the state department.
Yet this ultimate "man of the suites" did something earlier this month that put the prime minister and the foreign secretary to shame. On their numerous visits to Iraq, neither has ever dared to go outside the heavily fortified green zones of Baghdad and Basra to see life as Iraqis have to live it. They come home after photo opportunities, briefings and pep talks with British troops and claim to know what is going on in the country they invaded, when in fact they have seen almost nothing.
Zoellick, by contrast, on his first trip to Iraq, asked to see Falluja. Remember Falluja? A city of some 300,000, which was alleged to be the stronghold of armed resistance to the occupation."
Jonathan Steele is the Guardian's senior foreign correspondent; Dahr Jamail is a freelance American journalist.
*****
The Army exonerates four top officers, including Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, of wrongdoing at Abu Ghraib prison. The report does recommend punishment for Reserve Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, who was in charge of all Iraq prisons at the time of the prisoner-abuse scandal.
Human Rights Watch: Investigate Rumsfeld and Tenet on Torture
Getting Away with Torture? Command Responsibility for the U.S. Abuse of Detainees
The Associated Press today published a list of US soldiers that have been charged with murder. The list does not include individuals who have been charged with killing Iraqi detainees being held by US forces.
Another Delay for new Iraq Government
A Reminder: Becky Branford with the BBC several weeks ago outlined some of the institutional constraints of the Temporary Administrative Law, a complicated political system drafted under occupation. It currently serves as the constitution for Iraq. She reminds us this law is at the very center of the delay.
Iraq's Political System Under Fire
Summary of Iraqi Administrative Administrative Transitional Law
*****
Iraqi Civilian and Security Forces Killed
Civilians: 262
Security Forces 173
Total (through 27 April) 435
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