Kurds destroy Halabja memorial in protest

[Barrett808]

Kurds destroy Halabja memorial in protest
By Marwan Mohammed

HALABJA, Iraq, March 16 (Reuters) - Hundreds of Kurdish protesters destroyed a memorial to the 1988 gas attack in the Iraqi town of Halabja on Thursday, setting the museum ablaze on the 18th anniversary of the deaths of 5,000 local people.

...

A local journalist working for Reuters said he saw police and Kurdish Peshmerga militiamen fire warning shots to disperse the protesters as they stormed the one-storey, circular museum that serves as a potent reminder of the 1988 attack.

...

"The Kurdish government exploited Halabja to draw world attention to the plight of the Kurds and get donations that have never reached us," one angry protester told Reuters.

Witnesses said residents had gathered outside the museum to remember the attack but began shouting angrily when Shahu Mohammad Saed, a representative of the Kurdish government, appeared.

Residents, who complain many buildings in Halabja are dilapidated and that electricity and water supplies are poor, had met the previous day to decide to bar government officials from attending the ceremony.

When Saed tried to placate the crowd, people grew angrier and stormed into the museum, setting fires that destroyed displays reconstructing the gas attack, photographs of the victims and glass cases containing the clothes of some of the dead.

(more)

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L16697070.htm

[bemildred]

1. Thanks. That's something different. nt

[saigon68]

2. Guess the Hungry masses are rioting

For food

[wordpix2]

3. and the Kurdish region is supposed to the success story of the war

[David__77]

4. PKK and PUK have gone terribly astray.

They are not only corrupt but also subservient to a foreign power. They will lose the trust they built among the Kurdish people.

[flamingyouth]

5. kick

[ECH1969]

6. Kurds go on rampage in Iraq

Thousands of angry Kurdish demonstrators went on a rampage Thursday and badly damaged a monument to 5,000 residents killed in a poison gas attack on the city by the Iraqi army 18 years ago.

Police fired live ammunition into the air, killing one person and wounding at least eight, in a bid to stop the mayhem by residents, angry over what they see as the regional government's failure to rebuild the area.

The demonstrators marched through the streets of Halabja chanting: "Down, down with the government.

In addition to killing an estimated 5,000 residents, Iraqi poison gas bombs left nearly 10,000 wounded and suffering after-affects. The attack was part of a campaign to crush a Kurdish rebellion in northern Iraq.

http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&pubid=968163964505&cid=1142549413142&col=968705899037&call_page=TS_News&call_pageid=968332188492&call_pagepath=News/News

[uppityperson]

7. More sectarians?

this is all really bad.

[Teaser]

9. They're pissed because

the Kurdish "government" has been spending money alotted for Kurdish welfare and relief on symbolic items like their "halabja massacre museum."

[uppityperson]

11. I'd be pissed too. Food, shelter, health comes first.

Kurds need their own country.

[liberalpragmatist]

26. Well, it's their OWN Kurdish government they're lashing out at

Ideally, yes, they'd have their own country. And given the way things are going, they probably will. But it's not going to be easy, given that populations are heavily mixed and given that Iran, TUrkey, and Syria ALL violently oppose a Kurdish state.

[alcuno]

12. I wonder whose idea that was?

Oh yeah. Ours.

[bpilgrim]

8. Nuke'm - chimpy

more...
http://GLobalFreePress.com

peace

[Erika]

10. The Kurd's are now yelling "down with the government"

It was thought they were the one stabilizing force in Iraq.

[Botany]

13. In Feb of 03 I heard a man on NPR say that in Iraq their was 103 .....

... different sides. Welcome to hell

[HysteryDiagnosis]

15. Shouldn't that population number be a ticker like the cost of war

ticker... but running backwards instead??

[Botany]

16. Well according to Lancet in Oct of 04 they estimated 100,000

..... Iraqi dead .... and I imagine that the births have dropped off in many areas .... best guess id that
the population # is stagnant .......

For the love of God what the hell are we doing there?

[bpilgrim]

19. actually, over a quater million in the FIRST 18 months of the INVASION...

“Please understand how extremely conservative we were: we did a survey estimating that 285,000 people have died due to the first 18 months of invasion and occupation and we reported it as at least 100,000.” - Roberts, Johns Hopkins

more...
http://www.zmag.org/ZMagSite/Feb2006/davies0206.html

fyi

peace

[Oversea Visitor]

14. Nah

just angry people
Iraq has no fund for redevelopment
US does not intend to do it in fact US cannot do it "BROKE LAH "
So how then does one do it

With the help of the world
But sorry US staying put
WHY?
Maybe like the pain of choas

Big fubar going to happen and it will be soon
Forget about the oil
It gone
Iraq be in flame angry people will be fighting
Poor US soldiers dying for nothing
Getting blame and getting kill
In the name of BUSH BRILLIANT
How it end I do not know
But this I know
US will forvever be hated by the Iraqies people
You sow the seed you reap the harvest.

[madmunchie]

18. Where are you from?

Could you be more specific about "Big fubar" and when?

[Oversea Visitor]

21. Hey info all here

Look at death toll of civilians
Look at increase in bombing.... air mission
Look at increase voilence in Afghan

Big powder keg all sitting on
Last throes wheee
Anyway I look at it I see throes getting stronger
So when is the last throes :rofl:

Even they use that line anymore :rofl:

Just UNITED FOR VICTORY
Whee need more support to stay the course
We do not fear the future
Whee all fine and rosy dont think

Bottomline I dont see a solution in staying in Iraq
Cant win the heart and mind of people with guns and bombs
You can enforce peace at a barrel of a gun
But to really earn peace you need go other course
Do some real work to help the people there
That US no doing
So Kaboom soon matter of time
Either change for worse or good
But change it will have to

[John Q. Citizen]

17. What's with this....

From the article - "Police fired live ammunition into the air, killing one person and wounding at least eight....."

Were those who were killed and wounded flying through the air?

[daleo]

20. Well, there's always some air

Even if you shoot straight into a crowd, you still have to "fire into the air". The media have become masters at lying with the truth, so this could be the explanation.

[Oversea Visitor]

22. Shhhhhh

it is a hunting accident

[ECH1969]

23. Democracy is impossible in the Middle East

Its time for the troops to come home.

[Oversea Visitor]

24. It was never about

Democracy

maybe Demoncrazy

[Rose Siding]

25. Nov '04: "Kurds Enjoy Peaceful Corner of Iraq"

Truck drivers here say they are not worried about ambushes; shopkeepers report that security is not an issue; and local residents shrug off questions about violence and kidnappings. "We have not closed our shutters at night in seven years," Abdul Wahid Hassan said inside his shop filled with brand-new refrigerators, televisions and air conditioners. While cities like Baghdad and Falluja are riven by insurgency, this dusty, sprawling city is part of the other Iraq, a region that stays out of headlines and where life resembles something closer to normalcy.
.....
.....Today it provides a glimmer of hope for the rest of Iraq: parents and their children linger at restaurants and shops long after darkness sets in, foreign aid workers walk unarmed through the streets, and the police and most soldiers wear soft hats.

While it might be tempting for President George W. Bush to cite Iraqi Kurdistan as an example of what has gone right in Iraq, the relative peace here is not a result of the U.S.-led invasion. Iraqi Kurdistan has been autonomous since the end of the first Gulf war in 1991 and thus has had a lot more time to stabilize and rebuild. Much of the area was protected by the no-flight zone patrolled by U.S. and British aircraft after that war and was largely free from the grip of Saddam Hussein during that period.
.....
Iraqi Kurdistan has not been entirely peaceful. In February, two simultaneous suicide attacks at the offices of Kurdish political parties in Erbil killed more than 65 people. Since then, however, there have been no reported attacks in the region, a stark contrast to the dozens of daily attacks against U.S. forces and civilians in the central and southern parts of the country.

http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/occupation/2004/1102kurds.htm