Christmas in Iraq: SEVEN YEARS AFTER THE INVASION
In April 2003, the U.S., Britain and other allies, including the Spain, ruled then by José María Aznar, invaded Iraq. In Spain, Aznar lost the Elections because of that it in 2004.
During 2003, in the streets of Madrid and Barcelona took place huge demonstrations (million participants in each of them) agaisnt the Spanish involvement in the Iraqi war.
After that a terrorist attack was commited in Madrid´s train station of Atocha on 11th March 2004, killing nearly 200 people. Two days later took place a rebellion of the population, during the pre-electoral night of 13 March 2004, because the Government of Aznar tried to hide the link between the terrorist attacks in Atocha and the Spanish participation in the Iraqi war, and blamed ETA, instead of al-Qaeda.
http://antonioromea.blogspot.com/2010/09/los-pecados-de-aznar-11-m-2004.html
The invasion of Iraq occurred under the pretext of finding the alleged weapons of mass destruction and toppling Saddam Hussein, but the real purpose was making business:
1. To appropriate the Iraqi State´s owned oil by Exxon, Chevron, Texaco, BP, etc.
2. To spend the arsenal of existing weapons and then ordering new purchases of weapons, to be sold to the Pentagon by Lockheed and Boeing. And paid with the taxes of all the Americans, instead of spending the taxes incomes to solve the lack of quality in gubernmental free medical care, State kindergartens and State´s pensions for retirement
3.The Business of Security (Blackwaters and others) and the Reconstruction of Iraq (Dick Cheney's Halliburton and Bechtel). That meant for iraqis to have in their homeland: Mercenaries, Private Armies and foreing Construction Contractors.
Seven years and hundreds of thousands of deaths later (Arab sources speak of a million dead and 900,000 widows), Iraq is an unstable country with strong ethnic and religious tensions, and a sanctuary for radical groups affiliated to Al Qaeda. Nothing of that existed before the USA invasion.
More than that, Iraq has lost the secularism that had before the invasion. Also women have seen undermined their rights, which contradicts the ideological principles declared by the Western invaders.
The Christian minority in Iraq is another collateral victim. In recent days there have been many bomb attacks which have caused dozens of deaths. The most serious was the assault of a church in Baghdad that killed 52 people.
Now in Iraq are living about 300,000 Christians, against the 800,000 who lived before the U.S. invasion. The branch of Al Qaeda in Iraq has declared war on them.
On the other hand, the so-called War of the Resistance (sunnies), continues but now is not focused on attacking the Americans, because they do not patrol any more, now they are stationed in fortified bases. So in 2010 the attacks were focused on the iraqi police, that the Resistance consider collaborators.
The year 2010 finished with an attack on December 28, in which three suicide bombers entered the police station in Mosul ( Kurdish area) and killed a police colonel, two days before a major attack in the Sunni area killed dozens of policemen.
And only in the two first days of this year 2011, acording to EFE News Agency, 5 persons have been killed in Iraq, in four different attacks, in Balad, Bagdad, Qiyara and Faluya, and 16 injuries, amog then a prosecutor, militars and civilians.
Additional data on the invasion are: (source About.com)
- Two and a half million internally displaced, acording to war census elaborated in 2007),
- More than two millions Iraqi refugees in Syria and Jordany.
(In both cases the real figures, including those not registered, could more than double)
-The number of unemployed can reach the 60%. In addition to that there are often curfews, that force you to stay at home.
-Inflation was 50% in 2006.
-The 28% of Iraqi children are suffering from severe malnutrition in 2007, a fact unknow in Iraq, which had been disappeared in the decade of the 50 after the independence and the Baath socialist revolution.
-The number of doctors before the invasion was of 34,000, then: 12,000. The number of physicians murdered since 2003 exceeds 2,000.
-An Iraqi home has an average of one to two hours of electricity a day.
-The 70% of Iraqis lack adequate access to drinking water.
-The 82% of Iraqis oppose the presence of foreigners. (Data from the British Government.)
-Number of Iraqis who believed that the presence of foreign troops has improved security: 1%
By Antonio Romea
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