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Iraq stands firm despite embargo: envoy

Recorder Report

Lahore: The Iraqi Ambassador to Pakistan, Abdul Karim Aswad, said that Iraq stands firm against the allies and claimed that it has been successful in rebuilding most of its infrastructure destroyed during the Gulf war.

He was addressing a seminar on "9 years of continuous brutal aggression and inhuman embargo on Iraq" organised by the Pak-Iraq Friendship Association in connection with 9th anniversary of the American-led aggression against Iraq, here on Monday.

He said American aggression could not achieve its full objectives, in spite of the brutal and comprehensive destruction that was wrought in Iraq. The failure of the aggression led the Zionist Americans to impose their embargo on Iraq but still Iraq is standing firm, he added.

Iraq has implemented all the requirements of Resolution 687, and still the Security Council has not lifted the embargo due to 'aggressive American position,' the Ambassador maintained.

He said the embargo is still effective and is the cause of tragedy in nearly all aspects of life in Iraq. Internationally, there is a rising demand for lifting of sanctions, he maintained.

Aswad said that the US attitude towards Iraq remains hysterical. It has issued, through the Security Council, a new Resolution 1284 to perpetuate the embargo by imposing new conditions. This new phase of the American plot would eventually fail and Iraq would achieve victory by ending the embargo and defeating the aggressors, he asserted.

The Iraqi envoy said that embargo was the most brutal form of war because it punishes the entire population, targeting children and the future of the nation.

Embargo is a weapon of mass destruction. From 1990, when embargo was imposed on Iraq, until now, more than 1.5 million citizens of Iraq, most of them children under the age of five, died of malnutrition and preventable diseases, he revealed.

A third of Iraq's surviving children today suffer from stunted growth and nutritional deficiencies that would deform their shortened life, he added.

The Iraqi ambassador reiterated that Iraq would continue its 'nationalist policies' as a base for building a new and more modern Arab civilisation. Iraq would never stop its sincere struggle to achieve Arab unity, freedom and prosperity.

This noble mission and human massage of the nation will never stop whatever the Zionist Americans and their allies do, he added.

Aswad said that Iraq believes that justice eventually would prevail especially when there is determination and ability to struggle and give sacrifices.

He appealed to the Muslim countries to support Iraq and co-operate with its people and its patriotic leadership in order to end the American aggression and put an end to the brutal embargo.

Abdul Qadeer Khamosh, Chairman of the Pak-Iraq Friendship Association said that the embargo could be lifted within an hour if Iraqi President Saddam Hussain is ready to negotiate with Israel like Yasser Arfat, Husni Mubarik and Hafiz ul Asad.

He said that Saddam was struggling for the entire Muslim Ummah. He urged the governments of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia not to allow the US forces to use their soil for aggression against Iraq.

Addressing the seminar, other speakers including Abdul Qadir Shaheen a PPP leader, Sohail Akhtar Malik, Saeed Ullah Siddiqui, condemned the American aggression against Iraq and expressed their solidarity with the Iraqi public.