We call on those states responsible for the invasion and occupation of Iraq to terminate their illegal and immoral war, and express our solidarity with the Iraqi people in their struggle for peace, justice and self-determination.

In particular, we demand:

  1. An immediate end to the US and UK-led occupation of Iraq;
  2. Urgent action to fully address the current humanitarian crises facing Iraq’s people, including help for the more than three million refugees and displaced persons;
  3. An end to all foreign interference in Iraq's affairs, including its oil industry, so that Iraqis can exercise their right to self-determination;
  4. Compensation and reparations from those countries responsible for war and sanctions on Iraq;
  5. Prosecution of all those responsible for war crimes, human rights abuses, and the theft of Iraq's resources.

We demand justice for Iraq.

This statement was adopted by the Justice for Iraq conference in London on 19th July 2008. We plan to publish this more widely in future. If you would like to add your name to the list of supporters please contact us.

Thursday 19 January 2017

The battle for Mosul

Last week, I received the following email:

“Dear Friends,
As you might have heard, the American Coalition have been bombing civilian areas in Mosul. Over the past few days the coalition targeted 3 houses of well known professors and researchers in Mosul University. One of them was my college professor and mentor Prof. Dr Mohamad Tybee Al-Layla.
Dr Al-Layla got his PhD in Geotechnical Engineering from the University of Texas, USA. Worked as a faculty member in the Department of Civil Engineering in the Engineering College of University of Mosul since the early seventies of the last century. He was assigned as a Chairman of the Civil Engineering Department and the dean of the college twice. Supervised more than 30 PhD and Master degree thesis in Geotechnical Engineering and Civil Engineering. He published 48 research and technical papers in Iraq and abroad, and became an editing member of 3 scientific journals and magazines.
He received the prestigious award of the Iraqi Science Day on June 2nd, 2014.
He worked sincerely and hard for about 40 years to educate and help thousands of highly efficient and intelligent engineers graduate, many of whom became ministers, deputy ministers, academics and high ranking executive directors in Geotechnical, Irrigation Engineering and other civil and political posts inside Iraq and abroad.
Being one his students, it breaks our hearts that even though Dr Al-Layla was such a great scientific Iraqi figure who never let down or disappointed the University of Mosul community or even the city of Mosul in its hardest times, the crime of targeting his house by the American Coalition and his painful death along with his innocent family under the rubbles of his house, will remain an unforgettable disaster to us, one that all parties hold responsibility for, that reminds all of us that we are still sinking into the abyss the criminal US occupation of Iraq has led to.
May his soul rest in piece, and the souls of the many innocent thousands dying every month in Mosul by ISIS and the Coalition without accountability nor remorse.”

The battle for Mosul, an Isis stronghold in northern Iraq, has raged on for months. In the last four months alone, an estimated 145,000 people have been displaced and the vast majority of them are in need of major humanitarian assistance, according to the UN.

Civilians have been caught in the crossfire between Iraqi ground troops and Isis militants. The later also shoot at anyone leaving the city without their authorisation. Militias allied to Iraqi regular forces have been accused of sectarian atrocities. But by far the biggest cause of civilian fatalities is Coalition air strikes, which UK forces are also involved in. Some of these, it is alleged, have deliberately targeted hospital and educational establishments.

What’s not in doubt is the huge increase in bombardments killing civilians since the start of 2017. The website Airwars attempts to record all reported instances of these strikes. It also comments on the degree to which each has been independently corroborated. Just to give a flavour of the level of bombardment, I will quote from their reports for the first twelve days of this year:

January 2nd: Mosul: Four women were killed and 8 injured by Coalition strikes, according to local reports. January 3rd: As many as 22 civilians were reported killed, and 29 injured, in air strikes by an unspecified party in eastern Mosul according to local media. Yaqein reported that one civilian was killed and 11 injured in the Noor neighbourhood of eastern Mosul. January 4th: Press and local sources said that 16 displaced civilians were killed or injured, mostly children and women, after Coalition warplanes targeted their houses in 17 July neighbourhood, at the right side of Mosul. A local sources said that a named civilian, Imad Ahmed, was killed in raids on Farms district, north of Mosul. January 5th: Five members of the same family were killed when a Coalition air strike hit a house, according to local sources. Multiple reports referenced dead and wounded Iraqi troops killed in a friendly fire incident by Coalition strikes. Local sources told Mosul Ateka that 26 civilians from 4 families were killed when their home was bombed by Coalition strikes. Fourteen people including women and children were killed, and 15 wounded by Coalition strikes in the Garage and Fatih areas, according to local reports. Local sources said two named civilians (a father and son) were killed after a missile targeted their house in the left side of Mosul. January 6th: Local sources and relatives of victims said that more than 20 civilians from three families were killed, including children and women, after Coalition air strikes targeted their houses in front of Saddam mosque at the entrance of Farms district, north of Mosul. Local sources said that a family of three children and their grandmother were killed after their house was hit by a missile during raids in the Agricultural residential neighbourhood in central Mosul area, which is still under ISIL control. Local sources said civilians were killed and injured after Coalition Apache helicopters targeted a market in Sumer neighbourhood, southeast of Mosul, with machine guns. January 7th: Five civilians were reported killed, including 3 children and 2 women in raids in West Mosul. Local and medical sources said that 15-27 civilians were killed and many others injured and children displaced, in an alleged Coalition air strike. Local and medical sources said that 12 civilians were killed and many others injured, mostly displaced women and children, in the locality of Ibn al-Haytham area of Mosul due to Coalition air strikes southeast of Mosul. January 8th: One civilian was reported killed in alleged Coalition air strikes that targeted an ISIL member in a civilian vehicle, in Hadbah neighbourhood in the northeast of Mosul. Local reports say that the streets in eastern Mosul were covered by the bodies of dozens of civilians – their deaths caused by Coalition airstrikes and heavy artillery. Local reports indicated that shelling struck civilian homes in Sukkar, Talla and Mufthana neighbourhoods in eastern Mosul, “resulting in the burying of dozens of civilians under the rubble,” according to an account in a report by Iraqi Spring Media Centre. Local sources and relatives of victims said that Coalition air strikes targeted a family house in Muthanna neighborhood northeast of Mosul. January 10th: Local sources reported that the Coalition targeted Hadbah neighbourhood, northeast of Mosul, with three raids. January 11th: Local sources said Coalition air strikes and artillery shelling targeted Hadbah neighbourhood northeast of Mosul , killing dozens of civilians. Local sources reported that Coalition air strikes bombed a house with three missiles in Second Ka’afat neighborhood, northeast of Mosul. Local sources reported that Coalition air strikes bombed a house in Maliah neighbourhood, at the left side of Mosul during an operation to retake it. Up to 17 civilians were killed and five others injured, mostly women and children from the same family who were inside the house at the time of the strike. January 12th: Local sources reported that the international Coalition and/or US aircraft had carried out air strikes in New Mosul neighbourhood, at the right side of Mosul, leaving up to 30 civilians dead and 14 others wounded. https://airwars.org/coalitioncivcas2017jan-mar/

To emphasise, these are the strikes reported in a period of just twelve days. Yet, sources in Iraq suggest this may be a severe underestimate of the true numbers of civilian fatalities which could be around 10,000.

Yet, with very few exceptions, none of this has been repeated in western media, a failure of historic proportions, which helps conceal this humanitarian tragedy. At the end of 2016, Parliament voted that UK forces should take part in these bombardments - how many civilian casualties have our troops been responsible for? Why is there no outrage at this killing from the skies that western powers are inflicting on the same country they invaded 14 years ago, before Isis - the creation of their own interference - existed? Activists should lobby their MPs and demand some answers from the Government about its involvement in this carnage, which can only increase the likelihood of more terrorist attacks on British soil.

Friday 13 January 2017

Sabah Jawad



We are very sorry to announce the death of Sabah Jawad on 9th January in London. Sabah was an Iraqi exile who opposed both Saddam Hussein and any attempt to intervene in Iraq by western powers. He was centrally involved in the campaigns against the first Gulf War in 1990/91 and in the Stop the War Coalition against the invasion of Iraq in 2003. He continued to campaign against the occupation and the impact of that intervention on his own country and the rest of the Middle East, and was for many years a member of the STW steering committee. He will be known to many supporters for his speeches at meetings and demonstrations. We are very grateful for all of the work that he did. We send our condolences to his family, friends and comrades, and below we print an appreciation of him from his fellow Iraqi comrades. We will let people know of memorial arrangements.

Lindsey German, StWC Convenor

---
Sabah Jawad, founding member of the Stop the War Coalition, Iraqi Democrats Against Occupation and decades long activist for democratic socialism in Iraq passed away peacefully, 09 January 2017, at a London hospital, following a sudden deterioration in his condition.

Sabah was born in Iraq and lived in exile in Britain due to his strong opposition to repressive regimes in his beloved Iraq. He was a committed socialist and held firmly to the idea that only democratic socialism could bring dignity, justice and prosperity to the Iraqi people. He campaigned vigorously against Saddam's repressive policies, but never for a moment entertained the idea that imperialism could become a friend of the Iraqi people. On the contrary, he always upheld the principle that true democracy could only come about through the protracted struggle of the Iraqi people themselves for a better future and ridding Iraq of imperialist presence and interventions.

Along with his Iraqi comrades and friends, in 1991 Sabah became very active against the murderous US-led war and sanctions on Iraq and was a founding member of the Iraqi Democrats Against Occupation and of the Stop the War Coalition. He served as an Officer of STWC for many years. He redoubled his efforts when the US and British governments started beating the drums of war in preparation for the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq.

During his student days, Sabah was active in the Iraqi Student Society and later became an active member of Britain's National Union of Journalists during a strike that he led at a news agency. He was a committed internationalist who fought for the rights of British workers and opposed racism in all its forms, including Islamophobia.

His support for trade unionism and his close links to the struggles of the Iraqi people alerted him to the re-emerging independent trade union activity among oil workers in Basra. In 2004 he established close links with leaders of the workers campaigning against the occupation and for workers rights, particularly the president of the Basra Oil Workers Union, Hassan Juma'a. Within hours of his passing away yesterday, the Executive Bureau of the Iraqi Oil Workers Union issued a statement mourning the loss of Sabah as an honorary "member of the union" who fought against the US-led occupation, upheld the rights of Iraqi workers and staunchly defended their union.

In the past few years, Sabah became acutely concerned about the counter-revolution that has been sweeping the Middle East following the uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Bahrain.

Consequently, he stood firmly against the NATO war on Libya, the US-Saudi-Qatar-Turkey proxy war on Syria, the Saudi invasion of Bahrain and the Saudi-led war on Yemen. He identified SaudiQatari backed Wahhabi and al-Qaeda-type sectarian terrorism in Iraq and Syria as posing a grave danger to both societies as well as to the unity of the peoples of the entire region. He also opposed the sectarian and racist campaigns in the Arab world, by Saudi and Qatari regimes and propaganda tools such alJazeera TV, against the Iranian people.

The struggle of the Palestinian people against Zionism and for a free Palestine was always a source of inspiration for Sabah and he regarded this struggle as vital to establishing a just and peaceful Middle East.

The anti-war movement, the Iraqi people and his comrades and friends have lost a loyal and principled campaigner. We shall miss you Sabah.

Sami Ramadani
Kamil Mahdi
and Iraqi Democrats Against Occupation
10 January 2017
http://www.stopwar.org.uk/index.php/news-comment/2355-remembering-sabah-jawad