DENIS HALLIDAY is probably the world's most high-profile critic of continuing sanctions against Iraq. He should know. As United Nations assistant secretary-general heading the international organisation's humanitarian mission in Iraq he was first-hand witness to the havoc the sanctions were wreaking on the country and its people. In 1998 he resigned in disgust.
While in Cairo in July, Halliday found time to talk to AMIRA HOWEIDY from the Al-Ahram Weekly about the 10-year long genocidal war still being waged against Iraq and the medieval tactics used in a dangerous game masterminded by Washington.
Question: On June 9, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1302, which extends the "oil for food" program for another 180 days. How do you evaluate this resolution and should we expect improvement in the plight of the Iraqi people?
Resolution 1302 is a continuation of the oil for food program, which was not designed to resolve the crisis in Iraq. When it was assembled in 1996, it was designed to stop further deterioration.
But the fact is that oil for food has sustained the humanitarian crisis. Mortality rates of children under five years of age still remain at 5,000 per month, plus an additional 2,000-3,000 people per month among adults, other children and teenagers. These people are dying because of bad water, inadequate diets, broken-down hospital care and collapsed systems.
We have massive malnutrition in Iraq, despite the oil for food program. There is a huge social collapse, families falling apart with children out of school taking to the streets. The electric power is 35% of what it was in 1990. So the oil for food program has totally failed to bring about the well-being of the Iraqi people.
Having said that, it has, however, provided something like 20 million tonnes of basic food. It does make a huge difference in keeping the Iraqi people alive — but only barely alive.
The conditions in Iraq today under the UN economic sanctions and the oil for food program constitute famine conditions. The average birth weight of a child in Iraq today is less than five pounds. That is an indicator of famine. The oil for food program is something that the UN should be ashamed of. It is a continuation of the genocide that the economic embargo has placed on Iraq.
I say genocide because it is an intentional program to destroy a culture, a people, a country — economic sanctions are known to do that. [Secretary of state Madeleine] Albright herself acknowledged half a million dead children back in 1996. Yet the member states — the United States and the United Kingdom in particular — have continued the economic embargo despite their knowledge of the death rate of Iraqi children. That is genocide.
Oil for food is better than nothing, but it is not the solution. The solution is to rebuild the economy. There is no other way to address the problems of the Iraqi people but to give 100% of the oil revenues back to Iraq and allow Iraq to invest that money in agriculture, health care and education, to rebuild the infrastructure, water systems, sewage systems, electric power and rebuild its capacity to produce oil and so on. That is the only solution to this crisis.
Question: After 10 years of disarmament and sanctions, outrageous mortality rates and evidence of famine, why has the UN Security Council failed to agree on lifting the embargo? Do you believe that the continuation of this genocide is deliberate?
I think the UN Security Council today reflects the wishes of the US. The US, supported by the UK, has corrupted the UN. They deliberately sustain this policy.
This is not about Kuwait, it is about something much bigger. It is a new form of neo-colonialism [applied by] the US to dominate the Arab world in order to control the supply of oil and destroy and suppress perhaps the strongest country within the Arab world which in 1990 dared to challenge the West. A country which dared to stand up and plan to create some regional leadership.
The US found that unacceptable. They were afraid of the power that Saddam Hussein represented after the Iraq-Iran war. Although the economy was damaged and he was short of money, he had capacity. When they realised this capacity, and when he foolishly invaded Kuwait — a grave mistake — it was a gift to President George Bush. They prayed for something like that and they got it.
They destroyed Iraq and they were very happy to do that. They were very frightened that he would withdraw from Kuwait before [General Norman] Schwarzkopf and Bush were ready to crush the Iraqi people.
But when they did that, they broke the international law and the Geneva convention. They deliberately targeted the civilian infrastructure. And this was the US — under the umbrella of the UN — committing crimes against humanity during the Gulf War.
Question: When they launched Operation Desert Fox against Iraq in 1998, was it actually possible for the US and the UK to get rid of Hussein?
I think they deliberately decided to keep the government in Baghdad in power to sustain the instability of Iraq on the one hand, and the threat that Iraq posed for the Kuwaitis and the Saudis in the Gulf on the other.
This has been done to control the financial and oil resources of the Arab world in order to provide opportunities to sell American weapons. And they have done it very successfully.
Defence secretary William Cohen travelled all over the Arab world selling hundreds of billions of dollars worth of planes and guns. It is called business. They have got a market for military hardware from the US and Europe and they've got control over the oil resources.
I mean, we know that Iraq probably has the world's biggest supply of oil in the world, not the second. But this has all been suppressed. In other words, the Americans have got what they wanted. Who cares about 6,000-7,000 people dying every month?
I think we must address the fact that the American policy vis-a-vis Iraq serves to diminish the entire Arab world. It has been gobbling up Arab financial resources that should be going to the people; to education and to the future, into oil production and petrochemicals. That money is going into military arms, which will never be used — I hope.
Question: Do you have any insight into exactly where the money is going?
Well, we know that the US has sold huge amounts of weapons to Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states. The United Arab Emirates just bought US$6.3 billion worth of fighters the other day. We know of the huge presence of NATO and the US in Turkey. We know military support goes to Israel.
Here, we have a huge problem. Nuclear warheads in Israel, some of them undoubtedly pointed toward Baghdad, raise the whole problem of double standards. Moreover, Turkey can invade Iraq at will and does, nothing happens. Israel can invade Lebanon, nothing happens. There are no sanctions, no reparations, nothing is happening. It is just a huge game that's controlled by the US.
Question: Calls are now being made to have Western leaders who caused this genocide sit trial in the war criminals tribunal. Is this possible and do you support such calls?
I do. I think it has become known as the Pinochet tactic. [Former Chilean dictator Augusto] Pinochet has done us all a favour by being vulnerable and being caught — even though he was released. It was a signal to everybody from Bush, Albright to Hussein; men and women alike who make decisions that constitute crimes against humanity have got to watch out. They're not free to travel, they're not free to do these things. They will be — and must be — prosecuted.
Question: How has your international lobbying — including efforts in Egypt — fared so far?
I have been invited by the Egyptian Committee for Lifting the Sanctions Against Iraq to come here, meet with them, to talk to them about my perceptions and my experience. This is what I've been doing around the world, speaking about sanctions and trying to get governments to have some courage and some integrity to stand up and take on the US. I am here to talk to people in Egypt to encourage them to do more. Egypt is fundamental, pivotal even, in making a difference.
But one of the problems I encounter around the world, in Europe for example, is that they do not see the Arab leaders standing up and defending the people of Iraq. This is a real problem. They do not see the Arab League standing up and passing resolutions demanding an end to economic sanctions.
Egypt may have done more than other countries, but it is not enough. If the Arab world does not identify with the people of Iraq and demand the US put an end to their suffering, then it is very difficult for the rest of us.
Countries like Egypt have a special relationship with Washington, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait and they have got to use their connections. The sanctions are responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of fellow Arabs. Some day this will become very costly.
It is going to be very difficult for Kuwait and Saudi Arabia to rebuild a relationship with Iraq. The Iraqi people know that they are responsible for continuing this regime of sanctions. It is very damaging.
We need in the Arab world a vision for the next 50 or 100 years. The sooner we end the crisis in Iraq, the sooner the Arab world can rebuild its relationships and the Arab League can play a bigger role.
The whole of the Arab world is damaged by the economic sanctions of the Iraqis. I cannot visualise harmony in the Middle East without peace in Iraq.
[Abridged from Al-Ahram Weekly.]