Kofi accuses the US of:
* Absence of the protection of the Right to Life in Iraq
* “Military operations” that have resulted in “civilian deaths”
* Systematic use of torture in Iraq
* (US) Must not behave as if one is omnipotent
Kofi Annan says that “One must understand their limits” in his interview with the BBC today:
“One has to understand the limits of power,” he said.
“One has to understand power and the use of power and not behave as if one is omnipotent.”
Aljazeera reported on Kofi’s remarks about Iraq and “concerns about American military operations by the US-led forces in Iraq that have resulted in “civilian deaths, injury and displacement caused by excessive or apparent indiscriminate use of force”:
The right to life of civilians in Iraq has fallen victim to a combination of terrorism, violent crime and military excesses, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan says.
More than 80% of the 1100 bodies brought in to Baghdad’s Forensic Institute during the month of July bore evidence of violent death, “far in excess of the averages in previous months”, Annan told the Security Council on Thursday in a progress report on the world body’s operations in Iraq.
“These figures are indicative of a steadily deteriorating trend and provide an important indicator of the absence of protection of the right to life which prevails at this time in Iraq,” his report said.
In addition to attacks aimed at US-led forces, there was continuing concern about military operations by the US-led forces in Iraq that have resulted in “civilian deaths, injury and displacement caused by excessive or apparent indiscriminate use of force,” he said.
Kofi citing first and second hand accounts, also accused the US and Iraqi forces of excessive abuse of detainees:
First and second-hand reports from Baghdad, Basra, Mosul, Kirkuk and Kurdish areas in northern Iraq “consistently point to the systematic use of torture during interrogations at police stations and within other premises, in many instances belonging to the Ministry of Interior”, the report said.
The Indystar says the Dysfunctional U.N. is still on the wrong track
The Iraqi minister of oil, Ibrahim Bahr al-Ulum, says that the investigation into the UN’s oil for food program scandal shows that Iraq “was subject to the biggest international looting effort ever, in order to plunder the country’s finances;” he promised that the Iraqi government would wage a “national battle to recover its stolen money.”
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