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Fake
Iraqi Sovereignty
By Ghali Hassan
“Comes
July and it will be no different from June”
Paul
Bremer, American Proconsul in Occupied Iraq, April 2004.
05/19/04 "ICH" Popular sovereignty means people have
the capacity to control their own affairs without interference
from outside. According to the Webster Dictionary, sovereignty
is the “right to exercise supreme power, especially over a
body politic”. According to Noam Chomsky, sovereignty of a
nation is: “the right of political entities to be free from
outside interference”. For
the United States, sovereignty is “precious and have to be
protected”. However, in today’s world, the United States
exercises “Supreme power” with brute violence to attack
weaker nations in contravention of International law.
In the past year, the issue of “sovereignty” have been mostly
associated with the United States “granting sovereignty” to
the Iraqi people. This is after an unprovoked violent
destruction, and occupation of their country. As anyone who has followed this war knows,
Iraqis have been considered “the enemy” by the occupying
powers, and thus Iraqis are in danger of being abused, tortured
and killed if they show any resistance to occupation.
Iraqis are denied the right to manage their own affairs. Democracy and
human rights have been denied to Iraqis, not because Iraqis do
not like democracy and human rights, but because the U.S. feared
democracy. The U.S. considered sovereignty as the duty of the
U.S. to take possession by conquest. The US conquered Iraqi
sovereignty by the barrel of the gun. The bombing of Iraq and
the killing of Iraqi civilians are straight-out war crimes. The
conquest of Iraqi resources, including oil, and the protection
of Israel’s crimes against the Palestinian people were the
main reasons for the occupation of Iraq.
Since the first day of occupation, the United States has consistently
opposed holding early democratic elections in Iraq for unfounded
grounds. The Bush Administration has developed a strong appetite
for selection and appointee form of democracy, which the
Administration alleged constitutes, “a transition to full
Iraqi sovereignty”. Who buys this?
Mr. Bush Administration desperately needs the Iraqi people to win him
second term the Presidency of the United States. Iraqis have to
be proud to decide on the fate of the U.S. presidential
election. As it goes, Iraqi “sovereignty” will be restored
on 30 June, and Mr. Bush will have his election in November. A
second “mission” will be “accomplished”, this time on
The White House lawn.
Recently, officials of the Bush Administration, made it clear that Iraqi
sovereignty will be a limited transfer of power. The Wall Street
Journal (May 13, 2004) reported, “Mr. Bremer and other
officials are quietly building institutions that will give the
U.S. powerful levers for influencing nearly every important
decision in Interim Government will make”. Furthermore, The
Journal reported,”[t] he new Iraqi government will have little
control over its armed forces, lack the ability to make or
change laws and be unable to make major decisions within
specific ministries without tacit U.S. approval”. Asked at a
House hearing if the U.S. forces would leave Iraq if asked by
the interim government, Undersecretary of State Marc Grossman,
said that the “Iraqi interim constitution and the U.N.
resolution gave them the authority to remain in Iraq”.
Real power will rests with the American Proconsul and the U.S. Army
commanders. The US-appointed “Iraqis” will have to ask the
occupying powers to remain in Iraq to protect them from the
Iraqi masses. Indeed, Secretary
of State Colin Powell and his State Department “anticipate” such
request. Most
Iraqis consider those appointees as irrelevant traitors serving
U.S. interests. Recent polls showed that over 80% of polled
Iraqis want the occupiers to leave Iraq immediately and allow
the Iraqis to manage their own affairs. Only 1% of those polled
Iraqis agreed that the goal of the US was to establish democracy
in Iraq.
Finally, the only path to true sovereignty is resistance to occupation.
Once the occupation is over, sovereignty can be built again. To
keep Iraq together, the U.S. and its allies are good advised to
leave Iraq and provide reparations for their unjustifiable
actions.
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