On March 5, the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers鈥 Unions (ICEM), the global union federation for oil workers, issued a call for 鈥渟trong condemnation鈥 by supporters of workers鈥 rights of US-led military raids on union offices in Baghdad on February 23 and 25. During the raids, targeting the General Federation of Iraqi Workers (GFIW), a member of the union鈥檚 security staff was arrested and office equipment was destroyed. On February 19, the Iraq Syndicate of Journalists was raided and computers and membership records were confiscated.
Iraq
Four years after the US-led invasion of Iraq, the country is wracked by ongoing and escalating violence. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died, according to a study published in the respected British medical journal The Lancet in October.
On January 30, 2003, as Washington assembled its military forces for the long-planned invasion of Iraq, US magazine Business Week explained to its corporate readership the expected benefits of the coming US-led occupation: 鈥淪ince the US military would control Iraq鈥檚 oil and gas deposits for some time, US companies could be in line for a lucrative slice of the business鈥, and thus they could 鈥渇eel just as victorious as the US Special Forces鈥.
On February 23 and 25, US and Iraqi forces raided the head offices of Iraq聮s national trade union centre, the General Federation of Iraqi Workers (GFIW). One of the union聮s security staff was arrested and later released. The soldiers destroyed furniture and confiscated a computer and fax machine. The union has condemned the attacks as unprovoked and is demanding a written apology from the occupation forces, the return of seized property and compensation for damages. Messages of protest can be lodged at: .
Three Iraqi women aged 25-31 face execution after being sentenced to death by the Supreme Iraqi Criminal Court for involvement in resistance to the US-led occupation of Iraq. Wassan Talib, Zainab Fadhil and Liqa Omar Muhammad denied the charges. A statement by the World Tribunal on Iraq and the Brussels Tribunal Executive Committee opposing the execution noted: 鈥淭he United States and its local conspirators, in creating hundreds of thousands of widows and reducing life in Iraq to a struggle for bare survival have placed women in the crosshairs and now on the gallows.鈥 Arguing that the women should not have been charged at all, the groups cited a 1982 UN General Assembly resolution affirming 鈥渢he legitimacy of the struggle of peoples for independence, territorial integrity, national unity and liberation from colonial and foreign domination and foreign occupation by all available means, including armed struggle鈥.
On February 17 聴 one day after the US House of Representatives approved a non-binding, bipartisan resolution opposing President George Bush聮s plan to increase the size of the US occupation force in Iraq by 21,500 combat troops 聴 the commander of US forces in Baghdad announced he had filed a request for even more soldiers.
The US troop casualty rate in Iraq surged to a post-invasion high over the four months to the end of January, according to a February 7 Associated Press. AP reported that more US troops 聯were killed in combat in Iraq over the past four months 聴 at least 334 through Jan. 31 聴 than in any comparable stretch since the war began.聰
A report from the bipartisan US Congressional Budget Office (CBO) on the costs of the Iraq war released on February 1 revealed that US President George Bush聮s plan, announced on January 10, to deploy an additional 21,500 US troops to Iraq this year could result in up to an extra 48,000 troops being deployed.
A foretaste of US President George Bush鈥檚 plan to use 41,500 US troops to 鈥渟tabilise鈥 war-torn Baghdad came on January 24 when the US occupation forces conducted their second assault in a month on the city鈥檚 Haifa Street neighbourhood.
Last month, total US military casualties in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion exceeded 50,000 dead and wounded. By January 28, 3071 US soldiers had died in Iraq and at least 47,657 had been wounded, according to Pentagon figures.
On January 21, a day after 25 US soldiers died in Iraq (the third-highest death toll for a single day since US troops invaded Iraq in March 2003), 3200 additional US troops arrived in Baghdad as part of US President George Bush鈥檚 plan to boost US forces in Iraq by 21,500 troops. All but 4000 are to be sent to Baghdad, already occupied by 24,000 US combat troops.
Testifying to a January 12 US Senate hearing on President George Bush鈥檚 new Iraq war strategy, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice warned Nuri al Maliki, Washington鈥檚 puppet Iraqi prime minister, that he was 鈥渓iving on borrowed time鈥.
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