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News Releases

  • Afghanistan: What’s Happening?

    MARC HEROLD Herold, a professor at the University of New Hampshire, is the author of the just-released report “A Dossier on Civilian Victims of United States’ Aerial Bombing of Afghanistan: A Comprehensive Accounting.” He said today: “More than 3,700 civilians have been killed in Afghanistan directly from U.S. bombs since Oct. 7. For example, on Oct. 11, two U.S. jets bombed the mountain village of Karam, comprised of 60 mud houses, during dinner and evening prayer time, killing 100 to 160 people. On Dec. 1, as part of the intense bombing campaign of Tora Bora, B-52s bombed the villages Kama…

  • Iraqi Documents and U.S. Response

    HANS VON SPONECK Former head of the United Nations oil-for-food program in Iraq, Von Sponeck was recently in Iraq and is currently in Geneva. He said today: “The U.S. government’s actions amount to a campaign of severe political harassment. They should give Hans Blix the time to assess the documents. Bush disparaging Iraq when it is complying with total access for the weapons inspectors shows a disregard for the reality on the ground. The U.S. controlling of documents and sharing them with only the permanent members of the Security Council and not the 10 rotating members further intensifies the existing…

  • Iraq: * Medicine * Inspectors * ‘No-Fly’ Zones

    DANNY MULLER RAMZI KYSIA In Baghdad: KATHY KELLY Muller, Kysia and Kelly are members of the Voices in the Wilderness campaign. The U.S. government has given Voices delegates until tomorrow to pay $30,000 in penalties for taking medicine to Iraq. More Information ALICE SLATER Director of the Global Resource Action Center for the Environment, Slater said today: “No one is talking about our own violations of obligations to disarm, for example under the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Our government is violating international law, even as it accuses Saddam Hussein of doing so. We see U.S. officials trying to upset the current disarmament…

  • Behind the War Lobby

    JONATHAN GRANOFF Director of the Global Security Institute, Granoff said today: “Richard Perle’s recent statements that the U.S. is determined to go to war regardless of Iraqi compliance with the weapons inspectors subverts the international system as well as the Constitution.” The Mirror in London reported on Nov. 20 that Richard Perle, head of the Pentagon’s Defense Policy Review Board, in a meeting with British members of parliament, “admitted the U.S. would attack Iraq even if UN inspectors fail to find weapons.” The article quoted a British member of parliament: “This makes a mockery of the whole process and exposes…

  • Iraq: Oil-For-Food; War No Matter What?

    DENIS HALLIDAY Halliday is former head of the UN oil-for-food program and a former UN Assistant Secretary General. The Security Council was expected to extend the oil-for-food program today. Halliday said today: “It’s good under the circumstances that the program is being extended for another six months — it keeps people alive — but it should not be necessary. We should have given the economy back to the Iraqis as a prelude to [the recent UN Security Council resolution] 1441. It would have made sense to get rid of the deadly economic sanctions as part of an agreement to ensure…

  • Will Inspectors Be Used for Spying on Iraq Again?

    As UN weapons inspectors arrived in Baghdad, Reuters reported that the head of the inspectors, Hans Blix, said he “could not rule out the possibility that there might be spies on his team. He added that any intelligence agents would be ordered off the group.” The following are portions of the public record and some analysts available for interviews: “U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan has obtained what he regards as convincing evidence that United Nations arms inspectors helped collect eavesdropping intelligence used in American efforts to undermine the Iraqi regime, according to confidants who said he is deeply alarmed by…

  • Ramadan: Interviews Available

    JEANNE BUTTERFIELD Executive director of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, Butterfield said today: “The administration has taken a number of unprecedented actions which target the Muslim and Arab communities in the United States. They have denied the right to open hearings, the right to a day in court, the right to counsel. The government is not simply engaging in legitimate law enforcement profiling, but in ethnic and religious profiling.” More Information DR. LAILA AL-MARAYATI Founder of the Muslim Women’s League, Al-Marayati is a physician and is on the board of Kinder USA, a new charity founded by Muslim medical professionals.…

  • Decoding the New UN Resolution on Iraq: Myth-Shattering Analysis at Accuracy.org/un2

    Today the Institute for Public Accuracy released a detailed analysis of the new UN Security Council resolution on Iraq. The assessments feature conclusions of several legal and political analysts. The multifaceted critique is available at: www.accuracy.org/un2 Among the analysts who are available for interviews: JAMES PAUL Executive director of the Global Policy Forum, which monitors policy-making at the United Nations, Paul is author of a series of papers including “Iraq: The Struggle for Oil.” He said today: “This resolution takes a hard-line approach that will almost certainly lead to war. Thirteen members of the Security Council were opposed to this…

  • Veterans’ Day: Interviews Available

    DAVID CLINE Currently national president of Veterans for Peace and a longtime coordinator of Vietnam Veterans Against the War, Cline is a disabled combat veteran. He said today: “Bush is using the terrorist attacks of September 11 to wage endless war abroad and reduce freedom here at home. The veterans are one of the groups who have some sense of the reality of war. We’ve been used by our government to enforce unjust policies. We’re also used to justify future military attacks; the government doesn’t care about us much until they need us to wave the flags for a new…

  • Analysts Available on New UN Iraq Resolution

    As the Bush administration pushes for a UN Security Council resolution vote on Iraq, the following analysts are available for interviews: DENIS HALLIDAY Halliday is a former UN Assistant Secretary General and headed the UN’s food-for-oil program in Iraq. Available for limited interviews, Halliday said today: “Even if the Iraqis wanted to comply — and it’s not clear to me that they do — I doubt that they could comply with this resolution. It has components that are simply geared toward Mr. Bush’s war. If the Iraqis close the door on an inspector in a bike shop at 3 in…

  • Bombing Afghanistan

    JOHN QUIGLEY Professor of international law at Ohio State University, Quigley said today: “We have to ask, ‘Will this protect the U.S. from further attacks?’…. Military action should have been done through the Security Council at the United Nations. As it is — a U.S. and U.K. military action — it is illegal under international…

  • First Casualties of War

    ROGER NORMAND Executive director of the Center for Economic and Social Rights, which has recently put out several fact sheets on Afghanistan, Normand said today: “Afghanistan was one of the world’s poorest and most devastated countries even before this crisis. The UN has abandoned its relief operations, and all neighboring countries have sealed their borders.…

  • Foreign Policy and Terrorism

    ZIEBA SHORISH-SHAMLEY Founder and director of the Women’s Alliance for Peace and Human Rights in Afghanistan, Shorish-Shamley said today: “It is unfortunate that it took a tragedy of this magnitude for the world to take notice of the ongoing tragedy in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Several years ago, I quit my position as a university professor…

  • Opponents of Terrorism and War

    THOMAS GUMBLETON A Catholic Bishop from Detroit, Gumbleton said today: “The Pope has called for ‘peaceful negotiations and dialogue’ in the current crisis…. Some have rushed to portray us who are opposed to the Bush administration’s plans as naïve and lacking realism. But if you look at the facts, it is clear that it is…

  • Preventing Further Disaster

    HARVEY WASSERMAN A specialist in nuclear issues, Wasserman warns of the possibility of a terrorist attack on a nuclear facility. More Information CHRIS TOENSING Toensing is editor of Middle East Report. More Information PERVEZ HOODBHOY Hoodbhoy is a professor at Quaid-e-Azam University in Islamabad, Pakistan. More Information REV. GRAYLAN S. HAGLER Pastor at the Plymouth…

  • “Not in Our Names”

    Some family members of the victims killed in the September 11 attacks are speaking out in opposition to the administration’s apparent military plans. Judy Keane, who lost her husband Richard, said: “Bombing Afghanistan is just going to create more widows, more homeless, fatherless children.” [CNN, 9/25] Jill Gartenberg, whose husband Jim was killed, said that…

  • Legal Issues: * Where’s the Evidence? * Civil Liberties

    On Monday, President Bush said: “We’re acting based on clear evidence, much of which is classified, so it will not be disclosed.” Today, Attorney General Ashcroft testified in favor of granting the government new powers. The following legal analysts are available for interviews: JOHN QUIGLEY Professor of international law at Ohio State University, Quigley said…

  • The Economy: Now What?

    ROBERT POLLIN Professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, Pollin wrote “Economic Slide Makes Spending Respectable” in today’s Los Angeles Times. He said today: “U.S. economic policymakers have failed for almost a year to respond adequately to the looming global recession. As the stock market plunge makes clear, the calamitous events of…

  • Critical Voices

    PHYLLIS BENNIS Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies and co-editor of Beyond the Storm: A Gulf Crisis Reader, Bennis said today: “In Bush’s speech we got no doctrine, no strategy, no evidence. What we did get was a lot of Wild West rhetoric — dead or alive material. In Afghanistan, 25 percent of the…

  • Military Options: Where Would They Lead?

    AS’AD ABUKHALIL Associate professor of political science at California State University at Stanislaus and fellow at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at the University of California at Berkeley, AbuKhalil is author of the article “Islam and the Study of Central Asia.” He said today: “Learning about Islam is not terribly instructive here, just as…

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