News Releases

  • U.S. Demanding an “Occupation Arrangement”?

    JAMES PAUL Executive director of Global Policy Forum and author of several recent papers on Iraq, Paul said today: “The U.S./U.K. draft of a proposed U.N. Security Council resolution, leaked to The New York Times [published in the Oct. 2 edition], says that ‘Iraq shall provide … immediate, unconditional and unrestricted access to any and all areas, facilities,…’ and ‘Any permanent member of the Security Council may request to be represented on any inspection team with the same right and protections….’ This is one of several booby traps in the text to make sure that the Iraqis don’t accept it.…


  • Missions to Baghdad: Value in Dialogue?

    JAMES ABOUREZK Members of Congress have been attacked for speaking out against U.S. policy while in Iraq. Former Sen. James Abourezk, who visited Iraq in mid-September, said today: “We’ve arrived at a very scary state in this country where people opposed to the administration are accused of not being patriotic. The real act of patriotism is not to fall into line behind a president who is desperately trying to get us into a war — but to raise questions to save lives and our national morality.” EDWARD L. PECK Peck is a former chief of mission to Iraq and deputy…


  • Interviews Available: New Congressional Visit to Iraq

    BERT SACKS Currently in Baghdad, Sacks is accompanying Rep. Jim McDermott, D-Wash., who has begun a visit to Iraq along with two other members of Congress. Sacks is an activist with the Interfaith Network of Concern for the People of Iraq, based in Seattle. Also in Baghdad at: [email protected] More Information RAMZI KYSIA and DANNY MULLER of the Iraq Peace Team BARBARA LUBIN, director of the Middle East Children’s Alliance More Information LEAH WELLS Wells is peace education coordinator of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. Voices in the Wilderness is a humanitarian group opposed to sanctions and bombing of Iraq.…


  • Interviews Available as D.C. Protests Get Underway: World Bank and IMF: Problem or Solution?

    CAROLA KINASHA Kinasha is with the Tanzania Gender Networking Program. She said today: “The World Bank continues to support ‘user fees’ on primary health care in Tanzania, despite the opposition of women’s groups to this policy, and despite the fact that this policy blocks access to health care for the poor.” More Information SHELLY RAO Coordinator of the Economic and Social Justice Program at the Ecumenical Center for Research, Education and Advocacy in Fiji, Rao said today: “We have been told by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank that our countries’ debts are ‘sustainable,’ but our people lack…


  • Interviews Available: The U.S. Economy and War

    DEAN BAKER Co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Baker said today: “The economy is facing the largest economic crisis since the great depression. The collapse of the stock market bubble destroyed more than $5 trillion of paper wealth, and the impending collapse of the housing bubble will destroy almost as much wealth….” More Information DIANA ZUCKERMAN President of the National Center for Policy Research for Women & Families, Zuckerman said today: “The threat of war has sent the stock market reeling, undermined consumer confidence, and is putting enormous pressure on Congress to cut health and safety net…


  • Interviews on Iraq: Another UN Resolution?

    SCOTT RITTER Ritter, who was a chief UN weapons inspector in Iraq, is available for a very limited number of interviews. He said today: “It is clear that the U.S. government doesn’t want a peaceful resolution to this. It is bent on war. The move for a new Security Council resolution is a deliberate provocation to scuttle inspectors. The Iraqis acceded to the international community’s demands on the weapons inspectors. They should be held accountable; they will be held accountable. The inspectors should do their job, Iraq should comply and the UN should ensure that the inspectors are not misused…


  • Delegation to Iraq: Interviews Available

    On Thursday two more members of a delegation organized by the Institute for Public Accuracy returned to the United States from Iraq. The delegation included Rep. Nick Rahall, D-WV, who returned on Tuesday. Other delegation members now available for interviews are: JAMES ABOUREZK A former senator and author of Advise & Dissent: Memoirs of South Dakota and the U.S. Senate, Abourezk said today: “I am pleased that the Iraqi government has decided to again admit UN inspectors. We hope it will lead to a genuine reduction of tensions, not just a postponement of military action. In any case, a new…


  • Interviews Available on Iraq: Truth and Consequences

    JOHN C. BERG Professor and director of graduate studies of the government department at Suffolk University, Berg said today: “The current plans by Congressional leaders to give the president a blank check in advance would be an abdication of their constitutional responsibility. The whole history of Congressional attempts to authorize military action with conditions is that the conditions are meaningless — this was true of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution in 1965; with the intervention in Lebanon in the 1980s; and with the many attempts to limit military aid to repressive governments in Central America. It is not enough to say…


  • “We Have Seen This Game Before”

    DENIS HALLIDAY Halliday is former head of the UN oil-for-food program and a former UN Assistant Secretary General. Currently in his native Ireland, he said today: “Now the challenge is for the member states of the Security Council to do the right thing. By this I mean keep American military aggression at bay until the UN inspectors have a genuine opportunity to work and for Iraq to demonstrate fullest cooperation. Whereas the military might of the U.S. has forced movement, let us not allow that same might to corrupt the UN into decisions or actions in breech of human rights…


  • Members of U.S. Delegation to Baghdad Available for Interviews

    Interviews are available with members of a U.S. delegation to Iraq sponsored by the Institute for Public Accuracy. Members of the delegation met with Tariq Aziz and other Iraqi officials over the weekend. In Damascus: Rep. NICK RAHALL and former Sen. JAMES ABOUREZK, en route back to the U.S. from their visit to Baghdad. In a story in the Washington Post today entitled “Congressman Sees Hope For Return of Inspectors: Bush’s Call for Ousting Hussein Cited as Obstacle,” the Post reports that “[Rahall said] there was a ‘strong possibility’ Iraq would agree to unrestricted U.N. weapons inspections if President Bush…


  • Analysts Available on Stock Downturn

    As Wall Street ends a week of plummeting stocks, economists who have warned of a massive price bubble are available for interviews: DEAN BAKER Dean Baker has written extensively about the over-valuation in the stock market the last three years, including a recent article in Dollars and Sense entitled “The New Economy: A Millennial Myth.”…

  • IMF and Debt: Analysts Available

    As thousands gather in Washington to protest the policies of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, the following analysts are available for interviews: DENNIS KUCINICH A member of the U.S. House of Representatives, Kucinich (D-Ohio) said today: “Unless debt relief is delinked from a requirement of countries to follow IMF economic policies, the…

  • Critics — Some Unexpected — of IMF and World Bank

    Critics of the IMF and World Bank include Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Harvard Institute for International Development and an advisor to countries around the world. Today he told “Inside Capital” that the IMF, “with the very heavy backing of the U.S. government, really tries to run countries all over the world, and they don’t…

  • World Bank: Helping the Poor?

    With protests set for Washington in the next few days, these analysts on the World Bank are available for interviews. BEVERLY BELL Director of the Center for Economic Justice, Bell said today: “Throughout the global South, World Bank policies are devastating communities, environments, livelihoods, human rights, women’s status…” KEVIN DANAHER Co-editor of the new book…

  • Elian: Some Context

    These analysts are available for interviews on context in the Elian Gonzalez case: ELENA FREYRE Executive director of the Miami office of the Cuban Committee for Democracy, Freyre said today: “The Cuban American community is not monolithic. Returning Elian is part of broader reconciliation that needs to take place between Cubans. Part of the message…

  • Why Challenge the IMF and World Bank?

    With protests planned in mid-April for Washington, D.C., when the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund meet in the nation’s capital, the following analysts are now available for interviews about those institutions: DENNIS BRUTUS Now professor emeritus of Africana Studies at the University of Pittsburgh, Brutus was a political prisoner with Nelson Mandela. A…

  • Microsoft Decision

    Federal Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson ruled on Monday evening that Microsoft has violated antitrust law. The following analysts are available for interviews beginning Tuesday: NORMAN HAWKER A law professor at Western Michigan University, Hawker said: “Judge Jackson crossed the Rubicon in the antitrust case against Microsoft.” Hawker, who has published numerous articles on antitrust law…

  • Martin Luther King — and “Globalization”

    A year to the day before his assassination on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. gave a landmark speech in which he denounced the Vietnam War — and challenged global economic relations. Now, 32 years later, hundreds of organizations are preparing to protest the policies of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund…

  • Trustees’ Report Shows Social Security Rock Solid

    The following analysts are available for interviews about the just-released Trustees’ report on Social Security and Medicare: MARK WEISBROT Co-author of Social Security: The Phony Crisis and co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Weisbrot said today: “Social Security is financially rock solid — something that one would never know from listening to…

  • Police Brutality

    New occurrences of misconduct by police officers are in the national news. The following critics of abuses are available for interviews: RON DANIELS Daniels is executive director of the Center for Constitutional Rights and author of the essay “The Crisis of Police Brutality and Misconduct in America: The Causes and the Cure” in the forthcoming…

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