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Sunday, 17 December, 2000, 17:21 GMT
Should UN sanctions against Iraq be lifted?
In a row with the UN, Iraq has suspended oil exports, demanding a surcharge to be paid into an Iraqi-controlled bank account.
The United Nations, which allows Iraq to sell oil to purchase food and medical supplies, says this would contravene sanctions imposed after the Gulf War 10 years ago.
Iraq has become increasingly confident over the past few months amid widening cracks in the sanctions regime, with an increasing number of countries resuming flights to Baghdad.
Should sanctions remain in place as long as the dispute over weapons inspections is unresolved? Or have they only led to hardship for the population?
This Talking Point is now closed. A selection of your e-mails are posted below.
Steve Smith, UK
Lift the sanctions. The UN intervention was complete hypocrisy in the first place, serving US foreign policy. US friendly countries and countries foolish enough to have no oil reserves can behave as badly as they want.
I think the sanctions should be lifted ASAP because it's the people of Iraq who are suffering not Saddam Hussein. Let the people of Iraq begin a new life, a life without sanctions.
I hear time and again about how
the ordinary Iraqis are suffering
while Hussein and his Baath party
sycophants live in luxury. I have
a question? If it is SO bad in Iraq why
don't the people rise up over throw
Why do so many people blame America for the sanctions against Iraq? They were imposed by the United Nations. I think there is enough money in Iraq for the people to have a decent life, But the Iraqi government spends it on other things. Does anyone remember when they gassed their own people, and when they invaded Kuwait? I think the sanctions should stay until Saddam is removed.
Sepher Irani, USA
First off, sanctions don't work. They didn't work in Cuba, and they aren't working here. They are just making innocent Iraqis suffer and starve, and creating more animosity towards the US.
To think that my government takes money out of my pay-check every week to
bomb and starve a whole generation of innocent children makes me ill to my stomach.
They can blame Saddam all they want, but he is living in luxury, and the US has to take the blame for helping him create his war machine in the first place.
Lift the sanctions and let our Iraqi brothers and sisters live as human beings.
The sanctions are still there because of the economic benefits for the USA and UK. No one cares about the suffering of the Iraqi people.
The whole Iraq affair has been a farce from start to finish. If the Americans wanted Saddam out, he would be out. However, he currently serves a purpose so that the American public can put a face to so-called Islamic fundamentalism and he also ensures America's presence in the region!
I think the sanctions should be lifted. Why should innocent people die whilst their evil leaders rule?
Chris (ex-UK), Germany
If the purpose of sanctions was to prevent Iraq from producing weapons of mass destruction, it has proved to be ineffective.
Indeed a great injustice has been committed against the people of Iraq. The time will come when history will repeat itself and America and its allies might be at the wrong end of the stick. Do unto others as you would have them do to you. American never learn though.
Yes. It's time to lift the sanctions against Iraq on humanitarian grounds. The innocent people of Iraq should not be punished anymore - 10 years of sanctions is too much.
The whole Gulf war was not for the freedom of Kuwait nor was it for the destruction of Saddam's power. It had two main objectives: control the oil resources in the Gulf, and make the Arab world fall in debts to the western countries; destroy a strong military power which may endanger Israel in case of war between Israel and the Arabs.
The sanctions are still there because of economical benefits for the USA and UK. No one cares for the suffering of Iraqi people. That is the democracy and human rights principles of western countries.
Sanctions should be imposed fairly and equally to all errant states irrespective of their relation with USA.
If this fairness cannot be achieved, then by definition the sanctions lose their importance and value.
Invasions and occupations of land of other counties should be treated the same way as in the case of Kuwait and as such, we should see similar sanction imposed on other well know errant countries some of them so close to the USA.
What most people seem to forget is that Iraq was such a prosperous country with very high standards of education, health etc. I know because I lived there. This was achieved when Saddam was in power and the world was turning a blind eye on his actions. So why is it his fault now when those standards have deteriorated? Surely the sanctions have something to do with it! I think those sanctions will never be lifted by the so-called UN. Iraq will just have to find a way to break them.
Sayyid Baqir, USA
Sanctions, we are told by the anti-militarists, are preferable to armed conflict. However, in this case, sanctions have done far more harm to the civilian population than would have been the case had the western-led armed forces finished the job when they had the chance.
It seems to be another example of avoiding taking tough decisions, preferring instead a more pacifistic response that has ended up hurting the very people it was designed to protect.
Sanctions should be lifted. The US is upset that someone stood up to them, so children and the sick have to suffer.
Not only should the illegal sanctions be stopped, but we should also help Iraq clean up all of the depleted Uranium or the Iraqi people may never recover from the war.
On a colder note, the U.S. knows that we need allies and stability in the Middle East. The current combination of our alliance with Israel and the toll of the sanctions may do much to shake this New World Order.
By all means lift the sanctions...As long as Saddam steps down.
It's only the Anglo-Saxon alliance of the USA and the UK which, in keeping with the practice of its politicians, refuses to ever admit that it has made a mistake.
The USA and UK should agree to end sanctions now before the sanction-busting actions of its allies, including those in the Arab world, make them a laughing stock.
There has been a 4 to tenfold increase in the number of spontaneous abortions, congenital malformations, and leukaemia and other cancers. This probably has something to do with the 300-800 tons of uranium dropped on Iraq during the war. Of course, we cannot be certain since scientists are prevented from testing the ground. Dennis Halliday, ex-coordinator of the UN humanitarian program in Iraq, referred to the oil for food programme as a "policy that satisfies the definition of a genocide." Yes, I think it's time to end these sanctions. They have not weakened Sadam's dictatorship as they were meant to.
Yes I think we should keep the sanctions imposed. In fact I don't think they are severe enough. Just because they have the highest infant mortality in the world, they have to learn that if you step out of line with the new world order, you get punished. It also helps to demonstrate to other countries how ruthless we can be, so they also do as they are told.
Never too late to do the right thing. Lift the sanctions now.
I am originally from Iraq. Although, I know just how hurtful the sanctions have been, one must recognise that Sadam could be doing a great deal more to improve conditions in that country. A friend of mine told me that medicine bought through the oil-for-food programme is kept in warehouses until it expires. Another story circulating around is that Uday, Sadam's son is making a fortune by selling this medicine on the black market.
Nevertheless, sanctions have to be removed at least to stop Sadam from being able to point at the West and tell the Iraqi people "they are the source of all your pain".
We should take a look at history to see where sanctions have really worked, The US sanctions on Libya, Cuba and Iraq have done nothing but keep these dictators in power while secret meetings are held between those Western power and their dictator friends. Stop killing the young children of the world and lift the sanctions now.
Mr Alvin Gordon, Jamaica
The UN sanctions should be lifted.
The people who are currently suffering are the needy.
The UN should not lower itself to the level of Sadam Hussein, but lift the sanctions.
If he causes problems again, this time, "finish the job against him", but not against his suffering people.
I would like to correct a misimpression repeated here and many other places. UN Resolution 1284, passed last December, does not ease sanctions. It temporarily suspends them for brief intervals. Each suspension must be independently passed by the Security Council where the veto of one of the permanent members can prevent the suspension. No standard for such a veto is included in the resolution; it can be entirely political. Oil extractors will not be eager to invest in Iraq under these conditions of uncertainty.
Sanctions aren't hurting the people as they allow for food and medical expenses.
Sadam is pulling in more money today than before the sanctions went into place.
He has the funds and the means to spend them on his people. If his people are suffering, Sadam's to blame, not the sanctions. Asserting that the sanctions are harmful to the people demonstrates remarkable ignorance.
Yes, sanctions affect the people and this is unfair. However, Saddam Hussein can lift them at any time by co-operating, or the people could rise against him. Either way, they have a choice. There is also no alternative. How else can we stop Hussein?
I find it laughable that the UN and USA is so obsessed with the so- called military capability of Iraq. Let's not forget that Pakistan became a nuclear power a couple of years back. If I remember correctly the USA said it was "concerned" at this latest nuclear escalation when Pakistan conducted their first nuclear test. What about the potential threat of a nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan over Kashmir? That's a more real possibility than the impoverished Iraq posing a threat to anyone.
Sanctions on Iraq imposed by the UN have only succeeded in causing the suffering of innocent people while Iraq's military power has long since been extinguished.
Finally, we all tend to condemn the fact that Saddam "may" (note please) use nuclear warheads etc but correct me if I am wrong, there is only ONE country is the world that has ever done so, and Oh if it isn't America, who surprisingly are at the forefront of this ongoing battle!
Even after World War II, Germans with all their atrocities were not starved to death, then why Iraqis. I really can't see my Iraqi brothers and sisters die just because they lived under a wrong leadership.
I am against sanctions on Iraq and am truly sorry for the suffering they are causing on the common people in Iraq. You would think that after seeing sanctions fail in ousting Cuba's leader after all these years the US government would get a clue.
Iraq was, ten years ago, the most modern nation, the most economically and militarily, advanced nation, in the Arab world - a nation that was becoming a real challenge to the Western ruled regional economic order and especially the orderly politics of oil. For this, above all, she paid the price. About five thousand children still die a month, from malnutrition born illnesses, and contaminated water, and Iraq's progressed civilization now systematically and determinedly, pushed back many years.
So what have sanctions served, except to make the sanctioned nation more determined to be a formidable power? The U.S., to save face, is allowing the sanctions to be broken, bit by bit, but 10 years of growing hate will not be broken. GET CIVILIZED AND LIFT THE SANCTIONS NOW
M Kamal, UK
The sanctions are having an appalling effect on innocent Iraqi civilians, but I don't see what else the West can do.
I am prepared to consider ways that sanctions could be rethought to ease the situation, but wholesale lifting of sanctions is not the answer. If only we'd got rid of Saddam nine years ago, this would never have happened.
The USA has perpetrated the myth of Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction" in order to consolidate it's military power in a politically and economically strategic region. The USA is governed only by self-interest, and the establishment of total hegemony over the world and its resources. As a result the people of Iraq must suffer and die until the rest of the world wakes up and lets go of the coat-tails of the US. I would suggest that we have more to fear from the weapons of mass destruction amassed by the USA.
I think we should lift the sanctions and just let nature take its course. Of course the rest of the Arab world will be asking us to come back when SCUDs loaded with anthrax start landing in their countries. Personally, I think we should stay out of it.
Sanctions must stay in place until Iraq is certified in having abandoned weapons of mass destruction. The peace of the region depends on it.
During the early Bush years, Saddam was "our kinda guy". Under the Reagan and Bush administrations we sold Iraq weapons and mines and supported Sadam in his war on Iran. He was our kinda Arab, doing what we wanted, and everything was fine. Now, he is an enemy and a world threat. How can he be a threat when he couldn't even defeat Iran with US and Russian backing? The Gulf War was a slaughter. Sadam isn't a danger, except at the gas station. Our "National Interest" is at stake here, i.e. oil. That is the real reason we bomb Iraq every week and all this talk about the US and the UK being there to protect regional security is propaganda.
Ornella Sangiovanni, Italy
The biggest mistake in this whole scenario was when the allied forces did not get rid of this maniac. Sanctions are a tool in the hand of the US to contain Sadam but the real tragedy is that ordinary people are suffering. The Western powers have a game to play and at this point as per their calculation Sadam is still needed.
Yes, and no. It's true that sanctions are a blunt instrument and that the Iraqi people as a whole are suffering from them. However, they are also thwarting the ambitions of that repellent regime which is now clearly desperate to get them lifted. Suspending their own oil exports shows just how desperate they are.
One has to adopt schoolboy tactics and language when dealing with this regime - it is incapable of responding to anything else.
Iraq has recently been allowed to sell oil again for the purposes of obtaining humanitarian goods (medicines, food etc) which in any sensible country would be put to good use. Lifting sanctions would merely allow money to flow into the Iraqi coffers from where it would be spent on rebuilding the Iraqi war machine. If Sadam really cared about his people he would use every penny on improving conditions for them inside the country and not on nuclear, biological and conventional weapons research. Also, lifting the sanctions now would send the signal that the international community has accepted Iraq back into the fold - this is not the kind of message we should be sending to a murderous, unscrupulous and unstable regime.
The USA has perpetrated the myth of Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction" in order to consolidate it's military power in a politically and economically strategic region. The USA is governed only by self interest, and the establishment of total hegemony over the world and it's resources. As a result the people of Iraq must suffer and die until the rest of the world wakes up and lets go of the coat-tails of the US. I would suggest that we have more to fear from the weapons of mass destruction amassed by the USA.
The genocidal sanctions against Iraq have proven itself, with the death of thousands of innocent civilians, far removed from the actions of their President Saddam, a stooge to the West! The lifting of criminal sanctions is long overdue!!
There will only be peace in gulf when Americans (CIA) will be out. They create problems and then solve them their own way.
What people forget is that the sanctions on Iraq have led to the deaths of thousands of innocent children. As John Pilger pointed out in a recent documentary even morphine which is essential for the treatment of pain in cancer cases is banned ! Even the old apartheid regime in Pretoria did not have to put up with such excesses !
The Iraqi people have suffered enough. It is time for the U.N, and more specifically two members of the 'big 5' in the Security Council (USA & GB) to forget their so called 'special interests', both political and economic, and start having a special interest in saving the lives of innocent people and start re building their country. While we're at it could someone please remove the power of veto from the big five altogether!
Scott Ritter, the US Marine officer who headed the UNSCOM inspection team in Iraq has condemned the sanctions as a cruel, ineffective, and unnecessary policy which punishes the innocent children of Iraq. Denis Halliday and Hans Von Sponeck who headed the UN Oil-for-Food program in Iraq both resigned in protest at the cruelty imposed on the Iraqi children by the sanctions policy. Russia, France, Jordan, and other Middle Eastern Arab countries have defied the UN imposed sanctions. Does the US and Britain need more proof than this.
M. Bailey, Belgium
There has been no change in Saddam's position since the end of the war, and therefore there is no reason to lift the sanctions. If the people are suffering then it is their responsibility as citizens to protect the interests of their country and rise up against the person who is responsible. After all, 'people power' has worked in most of Eastern Europe in recent years, and most recently in Serbia - Why not Iraq?
The sanctions are a disgrace. They are nothing to do with weapons of mass destruction (the US being the only country in the world ever to have used any). The only point of them is keep the US supplied with cheap foreign oil (while it stock piles its own resources). Denis Halliday in charge with administering the UN policy resigned claiming he could no longer administer an 'immoral and illegal' policy. The UN, perhaps the greatest international organisation ever to have been set up is being consistently abused by the US who have no desire to see any democracy or equality in the world which threatens their power and influence.
The sanctions have never proven their effectiveness on the intended goals. Only the economy and the people suffer, while the leaders are still enjoying their lives to the fullest.
M.Saqib Aftab, Kuwait
Absolutely yes. Three cheers for France for sending a passenger jet to Baghdad along with humanitarian aid. I hope this sets a precedent. Are they the only people on Earth who realize sanctions on Iraq are torturing the innocent Iraqi civilians and do nothing to promote peace and safety in the region?
Peter Keating, UK
The sanctions only affect the people, specifically the children of Iraq, while Saddam lives in his luxury palaces. It is quite clear that sanctions hurt the poor masses in Iraq. They should end now.
Why should 22 million people pay for the mistakes of one person? If Saddam's policies are not compatible with that of the USA, should the innocent Iraqi people pay for it? or are these the rules for the so called new World Order: You either play along and bow your head to the USA or have your country bombed! Starving the Iraqi people is a crime against humanity and the sanctions should be lifted immediately.
The sanctions that were imposed on Iraq did not achieve anything except killing innocent people. The sanctions did not harm the Iraqi regime at all. So what is the purpose of these sanctions? Is it to punish innocent people?
Mark M. Newdick, USA/UK
Yes, sanctions must remain. Yes, the people suffer.
Yes, the people of Iraq follow Saddam Hussein like lost sheep.
If we don't like Blair we get rid of him, just as we found out with Major during the last election.
End of story.
After the gulf war the people of Iraq would have overthrown Saddam if the US had not allowed Saddam to fly his helicopter. The US needs Saddam in power so that it can stay in the gulf region and get cheap oil.
The US doesn't care about the children or the people of Iraq, its main goal is to get its hand on cheap oil. The US will always try to keep some sort of sanction/restriction on Iraq so that it can justify its troop presence in the region.
The only way out of this for the Iraqi people is when there is a revolution in the region especially in Saudi Arabia and the Americans are thrown out.
William Robertson, South Africa
There is a big conspiracy behind all these. Saddam Hussein is made a scapegoat. How long will the people suffer? The sanctions are not working. It has become a prestige matter for the so-called Western hegemony to remove Saddam. They are not worried about the people. It will set a bad precedent among the developing nations.
President Clinton claimed that the sanctions specifically target military developments, and moreover, that Saddam Hussein is starving his own children to incite international sympathy. Can anyone back this up or correct it?
The UN has failed to maintain a neutral role with regard to arms inspections in Iraq. The embargo should have been lifted long ago. Half a million Iraqi children and women died of the embargo. I must say it is a slow and organised genocide planned by the security council of the UN.
Whenever we have bad leaders the ones who suffer are the people. So I think it is the time to lift the sanction for the sake of the people.
John M. Jackson, United States
The Sanctions have been in effect for ten years now and Saddam is still in power. Obviously,
the sanctions are not working. How much longer should the people of Iraq suffer, before
the west realizes this.
The ordinary Iraqi people have suffered enough as a result of the sanctions. I think it is time to lift them.
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