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WASHINGTON — New questions are continuing to emerge about the actual terms of the Rambouillet text. Milosevic’s refusal to sign Rambouillet was the cited reason that NATO began the bombing of Yugoslavia. Today, the Washington Post published an exchange between NATO spokesman Jamie Shea and a representative of the Institute for Public Accuracy:

[The Washington Post, “For the Record,” Wednesday, April 28, 1999:]

From a NATO press conference at the National Press Club Monday with spokesman Jamie Shea:

Q: The Rambouillet Accords, appendix B in particular…called for the occupation of all of Yugoslavia…. Unrestricted passage throughout [its] air space, territorial waters, rail, airports, roads, bridges, ports without payment, the electromagnetic spectrum and so on. Was not the Rambouillet accord, which [Slobodan] Milosevic refused to sign, in fact, a desire to occupy all of Yugoslavia and not just simply Kosovo?

Mr. Shea: No, absolutely not…. We were looking…to be able to deploy an international security force, and that means, of course, being able to deploy the assets for that security force…. At the moment, all of our predeployed elements in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia have come in by the Greek port of Thessaloniki. And for that, obviously, one has to have an agreement with the Yugoslav government to be able to have access to those roads, those rail systems, the air space for the business of setting up an international security presence, and therefore NATO personnel who may have had at the time…to transit temporarily through Yugoslavia will have had to enjoy those kinds of immunities…

Q: That’s simply not the language, sir. It’s “free and unrestricted passage,” the ability to detain people, for example,… and total use of electromagnetic spectrum, sir.

A: I was not a negotiator at Rambouillet…but my understanding, sir, is that it refers to, as you say, passage, exactly transit. And that’s the point I’ve made.

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For more information and interviews on this subject and its implications, contact:

Robert Hayden
Director of the Center for Russian and East European Studies at the University of Pittsburgh

At the Institute for Public Accuracy: Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; David Zupan, (541) 484-9167.

The Rambouillet text is available at the State Department’s website.

 

ROBERT HAYDEN
Director of the Center for Russian and East European Studies at the University of Pittsburgh, Hayden said: “The administration’s Rambouillet plan was a public relations fraud rather than a diplomatic compromise. It provided for the independence of Kosovo in all but name and the military occupation by NATO of all of Yugoslavia — not just Kosovo. This was plainly a proposal that no government could accept… NATO’s bombing of the petrochemical plant at Baric only a few miles from Belgrade risked the life, health and safety of the civilian population of 2 million in the city of Belgrade. The attack released clouds of poison gas over Belgrade, and violated international humanitarian law. Fortunately, the winds kept the poison cloud above the city. Ironically, Clinton had just warned the Serbs against using chemical weapons.”

TARA THORNTON
Thornton is the Military Toxics Project’s international coordinator for the Ban Depleted Uranium Campaign. While the military still has not confirmed or denied that they are using depleted uranium, Thornton said: “As Earth Day 1999 [April 22] approaches, we in the U.S. are at war with two countries. We have used depleted uranium (DU) weaponry in Iraq which is both a toxic and radioactive weapon. DU dust created by firing these weapons has a half-life of 4.5 billion years. Many believe DU may be one of the causes of Gulf War Syndrome in our veterans and of the increased rates of cancers and childhood leukemia reported in southern Iraq. Depleted uranium can also contaminate the air, water, agriculture and livestock.”
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RANIA MASRI
Coordinator of the Iraq Action Coalition, an environmental scientist and a national board member of Peace Action, Masri said: “The bombing of Yugoslavia is reminiscent of the bombing of Iraq. That has proven to be devastating for both the Iraqi people and the environment. In 1991, the U.S. military used 300 tons of DU in Iraq. They bombed chemical and biological facilities, oil refineries, waste water treatment facilities, factories and agricultural fields. As a result of all this, compounded by almost nine years of sanctions, unidentified plant diseases have surfaced, over 15 million trees have died, cancer rates have increased three fold and the food chain has been contaminated. We cannot allow the same to happen to Yugoslavia.”

SETH ACKERMAN
A media analyst with Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting who monitors the European press, Ackerman said: “The Rambouillet talks were a farce. The U.S. consistently refused to negotiate; for example, Madeleine Albright told the Serbs, ‘We accept nothing less than a complete agreement, including a NATO-led force.’ There is evidence that a peaceful solution was possible, but the U.S. has blocked that route.”
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For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy: Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; David Zupan, (541) 484-9167

 

The Clinton administration has repeatedly claimed that bombing is necessary because Milosevic would not agree to negotiations, citing his refusal to accept the Rambouillet text. But did Rambouillet represent real negotiations or an ultimatum?

Some have said that the Serbian parliament “voted to be bombed” because it refused NATO troops as outlined in Rambouillet. But the New York Times has reported (April 8) that “just before the bombing, when [the Serbian parliament] rejected NATO troops in Kosovo, it also supported the idea of a United Nations force to monitor a political settlement there.” Did the administration start bombing because it rejected the idea of a UN force and insisted on a NATO one? Has that insistence blocked the recent German peace plan?

The Rambouillet text of Feb. 23, a month before NATO began bombing, contains provisions that seem to have provided for NATO to occupy the entire Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, not just Kosovo. Excerpts from Appendix (B):

7. NATO personnel shall be immune from any form of arrest, investigation, or detention by the authorities in the FRY.
8. NATO personnel shall enjoy… free and unrestricted passage and unimpeded access throughout the FRY including associated airspace and territorial waters.
11. NATO is granted the use of airports, roads, rails and ports without payment…
15. [NATO shall have] the right to use all of the electromagnetic spectrum…

Analysts available to discuss this key matter include:

ROBERT HAYDEN
Director of the Center for Russian and East European Studies at the University of Pittsburgh

SETH ACKERMAN
A media analyst with Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting who monitors the European press
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JAN OBERG
Director of the Transnational Foundation (TFF) in Sweden
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SAM HUSSEINI
Communications Director of the Institute for Public Accuracy

JULIANNE SMITH
Senior analyst at BASIC (British American Security Information Council)
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ALISTAIR MILLAR
Program director of the Fourth Freedom Forum, an independent research organization
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For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy: Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; David Zupan, (541) 484-9167

 

This morning, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who eulogized Colin Powell last year, is scheduled to be eulogized by President Joe Biden and Bill and Hillary Clinton at the National Cathedral.

SAM HUSSEINI, samhusseini@gmail.com, @samhusseini
Communications director for the Institute for Public Accuracy, Husseini just wrote the piece “Albright’s Funeral — The Sword and the Cross Come Together” on his Substack. He said today: “Albright’s policies of expanding NATO, bombing Yugoslavia and falsely claiming that the bombing of the Chinese embassy there was not intentional helped set the stage for the extraordinarily dangerous situation now with Russia and China, despite recent claims from the Clintons. These policies may have actually helped lead to the rise of Vladimir Putin — he was given an elevated position by then-President Boris Yeltsin just after the bombing of Yugoslavia started in March of 1999. Albright helped deceive the public regarding the negotiations with Yugoslavia at Rambouillet, setting them up to fail to justify the bombing.

“Regarding Iraq, some are aware that she said the price of hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqi children was ‘worth it,’ but even more insidious was her forcing a policy which maintained the sanctions regardless of the Iraqi government’s actions. This led to massive suffering, and ultimately, to the destruction of the UNSCOM weapons inspection regime. It also set the stage for the ultimate invasion of Iraq by her successor and friend, Colin Powell. And it helped propel an era where sanctions, which frequently target civilians, are quickly utilized. Albright worked hand in glove with Biden and the Clintons in all this, when the credibility of any were scrutinized, each would back up the other, regardless of the facts.”

JAMES CARDEN, james.carden@gmail.com
Columnist for the Asia Times and a former U.S. State Department advisor. He said today: “If President Clinton’s major mistake with regard to Russia was pushing NATO expansion, a close runner up would be his policy toward the former Yugoslavia. It was in this area that Clinton failed to take heed of the warning his predecessor Bush issued in Kiev on August 1, 1991 regarding ‘suicidal nationalism.’ It indeed might be fair to say that Clinton’s policy towards Serbia set the stage for what we are now seeing in Ukraine.

“The Clinton administration’s bombing of Serbia 1999 set the template for what George W. Bush attempted in Iraq, and, later, what Barack Obama attempted in Libya and Syria. In the absence of U.N. sanction, Clinton launched a 78-day bombardment of Serbia, ostensibly undertaken to prevent what was said to be the looming slaughter of Albanian Kosovars by Serbian forces.

“Kosovo, and later American interventions in Iraq, Syria, Libya, combined with the American-sponsored ‘color revolutions’ in Eastern Europe in the 2000s, all fed Russian president Putin’s paranoia about American intentions — and his fears of American-sponsored regime change in Moscow. As the novelist Joseph Heller once wrote: ‘Just because you’re paranoid, doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.’

“Russia’s reaction to Clinton’s policy, particularly with regard to its illegal war on Belgrade helped to feed the crisis from the other end: It is useful to recall that the precedent for Russia’s unilateral recognition of the breakaway republics of Dontesk and Luhansk was set by the U.S. in February 2008 when the it recognized the independence of Kosovo.

“To the end, Albright took immense, if perverse pride in her role in violently carving out a footprint for Saudi Arabia in the middle of Europe. In 2012, a small group of Serbians, who, after all, were the targets of the American aerial assault in 1999, showed up to protest Albright’s appearance at a bookstore in Prague in 2012. Albright arrogantly shouted ‘Get out disgusting Serbs!’ before slithering away from the protestors.”

 

March 24 marks the tenth anniversary of the start of the bombing of Yugoslavia by a U.S.-led NATO force. The bombing continued until June 10, 1999.

DAVID N. GIBBS
Author of the soon-to-be-released book First Do No Harm: Humanitarian Intervention and the Destruction of Yugoslavia, Gibbs is an associate professor of history and political science at the University of Arizona. He said today: “The 1999 Kosovo war is often remembered as the ‘good’ war which shows that American power can be used in a morally positive way and can alleviate humanitarian emergencies. In fact, the NATO air strikes failed to alleviate the humanitarian crisis in Kosovo; instead the strikes worsened the atrocities and heightened the scale of human suffering.

“The NATO states could have achieved a negotiated settlement of the Kosovo problem and resolved the humanitarian crisis — without war. However, the Clinton administration blocked a negotiated settlement at the Rambouillet conference, leading directly to the NATO bombing campaign. The U.S. government sought to use the Kosovo war as a means to reaffirm NATO’s function in the post-Cold War era. It was this NATO factor — rather than human rights — that was the main reason for the war.

“The Kosovo war had many features in common with George Bush’s 2003 invasion of Iraq. In both Kosovo and Iraq, American presidents avoided diplomatic avenues that might have settled the disputes without war, went to war by circumventing the UN Security Council, and engaged in extensive public deception.

“All this shows the negative aspect of so-called ‘humanitarian interventions,’ which are advocated by Samantha Power in her book ‘A Problem from Hell: America in the Age of Genocide.’ There is a tendency by many to simplify complex ethnic conflicts in ways that favor U.S. intervention, for example now in Darfur in the Sudan. There is also a tendency to ignore the danger that intervention, however well intended, runs the risk of worsening humanitarian crises.”

SAM HUSSEINI
Communications director of the Institute for Public Accuracy, Husseini wrote the piece “How Holbrooke Lied His Way into a War.” He said today: “When questioned by Charlie Rose during the bombing of Yugoslavia as to why the Serbs didn’t agree to the terms of the Rambouillet text, Amb. Richard Holbrooke, who delivered the final ultimatum to Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, stated that Serbs claimed that signing the Rambouillet text would amount to agreeing to a NATO occupation of their country. Holbrooke told Rose he insisted this ‘isn’t an occupation.’ In fact, an examination of the Rambouillet text shows that it did fundamentally call for an occupation of Yugoslavia. Further, several weeks later, when confronted by a journalist familiar with the Rambouillet text, Holbrooke claimed he never asserted the Rambouillet text wouldn’t amount to an occupation.” Relevant video and audio clips of Holbrooke are here.

Husseini added: “April 4 marks the sixtieth anniversary of NATO, now being used as a major instrument in the war in Afghanistan. Holbrooke of course is now the State Department’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan.”

The Rambouillet text (of Feb. 23, 1999) is available at the State Department web page.
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For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167

 

On Wednesday, Obama met with his newly named “Senior Working Group on National Security.”

The following are available for interviews:

STEPHEN ZUNES
Zunes is professor of politics at the University of San Francisco and a contributor to Foreign Policy in Focus. He said today: “Earlier in his campaign, Obama’s senior advisers included some of the more innovative and cutting-edge thinkers from the foreign policy establishment, such as Larry Korb, Joseph Cirincione, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Samantha Power, Robert Malley and Richard Clarke, all of whom opposed the invasion of Iraq and took a more holistic view of national security. Now, however, it appears he has surrounded himself with backers of failed foreign policies based upon contempt for international legal norms and military solutions to complex political problems.”
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BILL MOYER
Director of the Backbone Campaign, Moyer said today: “We’ve been working to highlight progressive leaders who have bold and visionary ideas for transforming this country and its foreign policy. Seeing this group of advisers, I think people who anticipate real change should feel betrayed. They’re being sold this package of ‘change’ and ‘innovation’ and what they’re getting is a warmed-over Clinton cabinet that does nothing to address fundamental problems haunting U.S. foreign policy, and will do nothing to reform U.S. grand strategy or redirect funds from empire building to building true security. We deserve better, and if Obama has any backbone at all, he’ll go back to the drawing board in his selection of advisers and potential cabinet members.”

Some background on “Senior Working Group on National Security” members:

MADELEINE ALBRIGHT
Albright was secretary of state and UN ambassador in the Clinton administration. When Lesley Stahl asked “We have heard that a half million children have died [in Iraq from the sanctions]. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. And — and you know, is the price worth it?” Albright replied: “I think this is a very hard choice, but the price — we think the price is worth it.” (CBS News, May 12, 1996).

During the Rambouillet talks prior to the bombing of Yugoslavia, Albright reportedly told Western media the U.S. government felt “the Serbs need a little bombing.” Albright insisted that Yugoslavia comply with demands at Rambouillet that basically would have allowed NATO to occupy Yugoslavia
See, from the Institute for Public Accuracy, “Troubling Questions About Rambouillet.”

Also, see “Albright’s State Deportment” by Ian Williams.

DAVID BOREN
Boren was chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Consortium News, in “Blackmail & Bobby Gates,” reports on Boren preventing meaningful investigation into allegations of an October Surprise.

Boren has been called “my lifetime mentor” by former CIA head George Tenet. (CIA speech, May 10, 2003)

See also SourceWatch.

WARREN CHRISTOPHER
In January 1993, as Bill Clinton was about to take office, Clinton stated about Iraq: “I am a Baptist. I believe in death-bed conversions. If he [Saddam Hussein] wants a different relationship with the United States and the United Nations, all he has to do is change his behavior.” Clinton was immediately and widely criticized for indicating he might lift sanctions and even normalize relations with Iraq if it complied with UN resolutions. Christopher, then Clinton’s incoming secretary of state, actually joined in the criticism: “I find it hard to share the Baptist belief in redemption. … I see no substantial change in the position and continuing total support for what the [Bush] administration has done.” Clinton quickly backtracked: “There is no difference between my policy and the policy of the present administration. … I have no intention of normalizing relations with him.” Thus the George H. W. Bush policy of maintaining the sanctions on Iraq regardless of Iraqi compliance with the weapons inspectors continued through the 1990s. See, from the Institute for Public Accuracy, “Autopsy Of A Disaster: The U.S. Sanctions Policy On Iraq.”

GREGORY CRAIG
Craig was director of the State Department Office of Policy Planning in the Clinton administration.

RICHARD DANZIG
Danzig was secretary of the Navy in the Clinton administration.

LEE HAMILTON
Former chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Hamilton also co-chaired the Iraq Study Group, the 9/11 Commission and the Iran-Contra congressional investigation. Consortium News writes: “Whenever the Republicans have a touchy national-security scandal to put to rest, their favorite Democratic investigator is Lee Hamilton. … Hamilton’s carefully honed skill for balancing truth against political comity has elevated him to the status of a Washington Wise Man.” See “Dr. Hamilton and Mr. Hyde,” which includes detailed information and suggested questions for Hamilton.

ERIC HOLDER
President Reagan nominated Holder to become an associate judge of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. In 1993, President Clinton nominated Holder to become the United States attorney for the District of Columbia. In 1997, President Clinton appointed Holder to serve as deputy attorney general.

TONY LAKE
In the Clinton administration, Lake was national security adviser as well as White House special envoy.

SAM NUNN
A former senator, Nunn was chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

WILLIAM PERRY
From “Not Quite a Dream Team: Some of John Kerry’s Foreign Policy Advisers Should Give Pause to Progressives” by Laura Flanders: “As Clinton-era secretary of defense, Perry spearheaded a post-cold war plan to restructure the defense industry, but the Perry plan wasn’t quite the ‘peace dividend’ Americans had in mind. Perry pushed a government program that paid military contractors to consolidate, arguing that only vast conglomerates would have what it takes to compete in the 21st century. The Pentagon provided partial underwriting for defense industry mergers. In what critic Bernie Sanders, I-VT, dubbed ‘payoffs for layoffs,’ Perry’s Pentagon picked up the costs of moving equipment, dismantling factories and providing golden parachutes for top executives. Foreign Policy in Focus reports that Perry had to get a conflict of interest waiver before he could greenlight the merger-subsidy program. He worked as a paid consultant for Martin Marietta immediately before joining the Clinton administration.

“Today, Lockheed Martin, which was created in a merger announced just months after the start of Perry’s policy, is the nation’s top weapons maker. Its component parts include Martin Marietta, Loral Defense and General Dynamics. The mergers shrank company payrolls, but hugely expanded their political influence. When he retired in ’98, Perry joined the board of one of the biggest — the Seattle-based Boeing Corporation. For those who are interested, Perry also joined the Carlyle group, the Saudi-based firm [correction below] whose partners include no end of world leaders, including former British Prime Minster John Major, former secretary of state James Baker and the first President Bush.” (Feb. 18, 2004)

SUSAN RICE
Assistant secretary of state in the Clinton administration, Rice has been a prominent foreign policy spokesperson for the Obama campaign. Here are some of her claims shortly before the invasion of Iraq: “I think he [then Secretary of State Colin Powell] has proved that Iraq has these weapons and is hiding them, and I don’t think many informed people doubted that.” (NPR, Feb. 6, 2003)

“We need to be ready for the possibility that the attack against the U.S. could come in some form against the homeland, not necessarily on the battlefield against our forces. And I think there, too, is an area where the American people need to be better prepared by our leadership. … It’s clear that Iraq poses a major threat. It’s clear that its weapons of mass destruction need to be dealt with forcefully, and that’s the path we’re on. I think the question becomes whether we can keep the diplomatic balls in the air and not drop any, even as we move forward, as we must, on the military side.” (NPR, Dec. 20, 2002)

“I think the United States government has been clear since the first Bush administration about the threat that Iraq and Saddam Hussein poses. The United States policy has been regime change for many, many years, going well back into the Clinton administration. So it’s a question of timing and tactics. … We do not necessarily need a further Council resolution before we can enforce this and previous resolutions. (NPR, Nov. 11, 2002)

TIM ROEMER
A member of the 9/11 Commission, while he was a congressional representative, the South Bend Tribune (Indiana) reported: “U.S. Rep. Tim Roemer joined a bipartisan majority in the House in voting to give President Bush authority to use military force against Saddam Hussein and Iraq. ‘The threat from Saddam is grave and growing and it’s something we’re going to have to address in the not-too-distant future,’ Roemer said from his office in Washington after the vote. The resolution passed by a vote of 296-133, a clear indication of strong support for plans to eliminate Iraq’s threat of chemical and biological weapons.” (Oct. 11, 2002)

JIM STEINBERG
Steinberg was deputy national security adviser in the Clinton administration.

For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167

[Added and emailed July 3]: Correction: A June 19 news release from the Institute for Public Accuracy excerpted from an article that referred to the Carlyle Group as a “Saudi-based firm.” The group is in fact not based in Saudi Arabia.

 

as Adopted on November 8, 2002

The Security Council, Recalling all its previous relevantresolutions, in particular its resolutions 661 (1990) of 6 August 1990, 678(1990) of 29 November 1990, 686 (1991) of 2 March 1991, 687 (1991) of 3 April1991, 688 (1991) of 5 April 1991, 707 (1991) of 15 August 1991, 715 (1991) of 11October 1991, 986 (1995) of 14 April 1995, and 1284 (1999) of 17 December 1999,and all the relevant statements of its President,

PhyllisBennis, fellow at the Institute for PolicyStudies and author of the newbook Before and After: U.S. Foreign Policy and the September 11thCrisis:”According to Secretary of State Colin Powell, ‘if Iraq violates thisresolution and fails to comply, then the Council has to take into immediateconsideration what should be done about that, while the United States and otherlike-minded nations might take a judgment about what we might do about it if theCouncil chooses not to act.’ In other words, if the Council decision does notmatch what the Bush administration has unilaterally decided, Washington willimplement its own decision regardless. This represents a thoroughlyinstrumentalized view of the United Nations that its relevance and authority aredefined by and limited to its proximity to Washington’s positions.”

DenisHalliday, a former UN Assistant SecretaryGeneral who headed of the UN’s food-for-oil program in Iraq: “Have we reallybought the fiction, the Washington propaganda, that Iraq is a threat? We allknow — the issue is oil, oil and more oil. And U.S. control thereof. The newresolution of the UN Security Council is a charade, a device to obscure.Nevertheless it is transparent enough that one can point out the trip wires,hoops and hurdles (combined with dangerous ambiguity) placed so that Iraq mustinevitably fail to avoid material breach. Then the Bush war can begin nicelycovered in UN respectability — although of course it has already begun, whatwith the 12 years of deadly embargo, the no-fly zone bombings and now placementof army, navy and air force resources on the ground in the Gulf, Kuwait, etc. Justas in the U.S. military preparations in advance of the 1990 Kuwait invasion, theU.S. is again in training and ready to go — having set up Baghdad yet again.The resolution is little more than a sop to other member states and a responseto the domestic pressures that took Bush to the General Assembly in Septemberwhen he outrageously threatened the entire membership. Pressure on Baghdad tocomply will not prevent war — only intense pressure on the Bush regime might.To pretend this resolution represents progress, or is hopeful, or a move in theright direction strikes me as naive and dangerous.”

James Paul, executive director of the Global PolicyForum which monitors global policy-making at the UnitedNations, is the author of a series of papersincluding “Iraq: the Struggle forOil”:”This resolution takes a hard-line approach that will almost certainly leadto war. Thirteen members of the Security Council were opposed to this resolutionor deeply skeptical, but Washington used intense pressure and eventually bentthem to its will. The U.S. used hardball diplomacy of the type deployed to gainthe first Gulf War resolution in 1990. The Secretary of State at that time,James Baker, later described in his autobiography how he lined up votes forresolution 678: ‘I met personally with all my Security Council counterpartsin an intricate process of cajoling, extracting, threatening, and occasionallybuying votes. Such are the politics of diplomacy.'” [For other recent quotes from Paul, see:www.accuracy.org/press_releases/PR092402.htm,www.accuracy.org/press_releases/PR100202.htm]

Francis Boyle, professor of international law at theUniversity of Illinois College of Law: “In 1990, France, the Soviet Unionand China all sold Iraq out at the Security Council…. Russia can be bought bygetting admitted to the WTO and being given a free hand on Georgia and Chechnya,as well as having its oil interests guaranteed in Iraq. China wants an end toproposed high-tech U.S. weapons sales to Taiwan. France wants its oil interestsin Iraq protected, as well as its sphere of influence in Francophone Africarespected. The serious bargaining has yet to begin. Meanwhile, Kofi Annan playsthe role of Pontius Pilate. Remember that under the UNCharter, the UN SecretaryGeneral is not supposed to be an errand boy for the Permanent 5. And yet he is.The bottom line here is that the Bush Jr. administration originally sought andhas now failed to obtain the same language from the UN Security Council thatthe Bush Sr. administration obtained in resolution 679 (1990), authorizing UNMember States ‘to use all necessary means’ to expel Iraq from Kuwait. So aunilateral attack by the United States and the United Kingdom against Iraqwithout further authorization from the Security Council would still remainillegal and therefore constitute aggression. In recognition of this fact,British government officials are already reportedly fearful of prosecution bythe International Criminal Court. And the Bush Jr. administration is doingeverything humanly possible to sabotage the ICC in order to avoid any prospectof ICC prosecution of high-level U.S. government officials over a war againstIraq. Lawyers call this ‘consciousness of guilt.'”

[more]

 

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. The idea is that the U.S. and the U.K. can put their people on the team and can be present anywhere, anytime in Iraq. When the Security Council created the new inspection regime, UNMOVIC [U.N. Monitoring, Verification, and Inspection Commission], it was seen as intended to be free of the taint of espionage and other covert operations, primarily by the U.S., that destroyed the credibility of UNSCOM. This resolution totally undermines that. The text also says: ‘Teams shall be accompanied at the bases by sufficient U.N. security forces,… shall have the right to declare for the purposes of this resolution no-fly/no-drive zones, exclusion zones, and/or ground- and air-transit corridors, which shall be enforced by U.N. security forces or by members of the Council;…’ What they are talking about is an occupation arrangement, similar to demands made at Rambouillet on Yugoslavia. Since the government of Iraq will not accept that, Iraqi rejection will be used as a pretext for war. The resolution further says that if Iraq does not comply, member states can use ‘all necessary means’ — a green light for the use of force.”
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JOHN QUIGLEY
Professor of international law at Ohio State University, Quigley said today: “The U.S. should not be seeking to disrupt an agreement between the U.N. and Iraq on how this should be resolved…. The U.S./U.K. resolution says that ‘failure by Iraq at any time to comply and cooperate fully in accordance with the provisions laid out in this resolution, shall constitute a further material breach of Iraq’s obligations, and that such breach authorizes member states to use all necessary means…’ It’s saying that any violation, even an insignificant or accidental one, could be used as a pretext for invasion. It also says that member states can make such determination. You should have some mechanism, such as further consideration by the Security Council. This is really just a blank check for an armed attack on Iraq.”

FRANCIS BOYLE
Professor of international law at the University of Illinois College of Law, Boyle said today: “The resolution is just a pretext for war. No way Iraq, or any other state, could accept such a resolution…. The U.S. government is [currently] violating the U.N. Charter … by using military force to allegedly ‘police’ the illegal ‘no-fly’ zones…”

For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167

 

(Latest publicly available version, October 23, 2002)

PP1 Recalling all its previous relevant resolutions, in particular its resolutions 661 (1990) of 6 August 1990, 686 (1991) of 2 March 1991, 678 (1990) of 29 November 1990, 687 (1991) of 3 April 1991, 688 (1991) of 5 April 1991, 986 (1995) of 14 April 1995, and 1284 (1999) of 17 December 1999, and all the relevant statements of its President,

PP2 Recognizing the threat Iraq’s noncompliance with Security Council resolutions and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and long-range missiles poses to international peace and security,

Rahul Mahajan [www.rahulmahajan.com], author of The New Crusade: America’s War on Terrorism [www.monthlyreview.org/newcrusade.htm]: “Claims of a threat posed by Iraq to international peace and security are entirely untenable. Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet refuted Bush’s claims in a letter to the Senate, where he said clearly the threat of an Iraqi WMD attack was virtually nonexistent, except possibly in the eventuality of a U.S. war for ‘regime change.’ Nobody claims Iraq has nuclear weapons, nobody has produced any evidence that Iraq is capable of weaponizing biological agents, and it’s quite clear that Iraq can have no more than a nominal chemical weapons capability. When Tony Blair produced a dossier [www.number10.gov.uk/output/Page6117.asp] purporting to establish the Iraqi threat, the Labor Party produced a counter-dossier [www.labouragainstthewar.org.uk/link5.html] and Glen Rangwala produced notes further to the counter-dossier [http://middleeast.reference.users.btopenworld.com/iraqncbfurther.html].

“Blair is nominally of the Labor Party, and the CIA is part of the Executive Branch, so Bush and Blair can’t even get their own people to back up this absurd claim. Even if Iraq had any WMD capacity, nobody has explained why it would risk certain, massive retribution if it either attacked directly or gave weapons to any terrorist organization.” [More about this is available at www.accuracy.org/bush ] [more]

 

JAN HARTSOUGH
Shortly after the bombing of Yugoslavia started a year ago today, Hartsough traveled to the Balkans with a social-change organization called Crabgrass. She also attended the Women in Black international conference in October 1999 in Montenegro. She said today: “A police force that can establish law and justice in Kosovo still has not been established. I’m concerned about the prospects of another outbreak of war in the Balkans, this time in Montenegro.”
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JEREMY SCAHILL
Pacifica Radio’s “Democracy Now” program. He reported from Yugoslavia during the bombing last spring. Today he said: “One year after the initiation of the bombing of Yugoslavia, the country’s southernmost province Kosovo is as ‘ethnically clean’ as it has ever been. Thanks in no small part to the tactics and actions of the U.S.-led KFOR forces, Serbs, Gypsies and moderate Albanians have been forced to flee their homes by violent and extremist Albanian forces backed by the UN. Currently, Albanian militias are invading areas of eastern Serbia (beyond Kosovo) on a regular basis.”
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ERIC GORDY
Author of “The Culture of Power in Serbia: Nationalism and the Destruction of Alternatives” and professor of sociology at Clark University. Gordy said: More Information

SAM HUSSEINI
Communications director of the Institute for Public Accuracy, Husseini said: “Appendix B of the Rambouillet text allowed for the occupation of all of Yugoslavia, not just Kosovo. The State Department’s insistence on that provision — which was dropped in the final agreement — indicates that top U.S. officials wanted war. The administration successfully triangulated human rights and sovereignty as global values.”
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SETH ACKERMAN
Media analyst with Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting, Ackerman regularly monitors the European media. He said: “NATO described its war as a humanitarian campaign — a war for human rights. So the media have tended to evaluate it in those terms. But what’s missing is the recognition that the U.S. had strategic goals in Europe that shaped the way it addressed the Kosovo problem… Secretary of State Albright’s goal at Rambouillet was provoking a Serbian ‘no’ and an Albanian ‘yes’ so that the Europeans would be forced to approve NATO air strikes.”
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For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy: Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020 or (202) 332-5055