Benjamin Geer on Sat, 28 Aug 2004 02:57:34 +0200 (CEST)


[Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]

Re: <nettime> Dealing with state terrorism


ericbj@club-internet.fr wrote:

> The U.N. oil-embargo permitted Iraq sufficient oil sales for
> the revenues to feed its population and maintain
> essential services.  Moreover the regime sold a lot more
> oil than permitted, exporting it as contraband, via
> Syria for instance.  However the oil revenues went
> mainly to military expenditure and into the private bank
> accounts of members of the regime.  It was therefore the
> regime that killed hundreds of thousands of civilians,

Yes and no.  The embargo kept out a lot of necessary supplies because 
they were classified as "dual-use".  For example, Iraq was forbidden to 
import chlorine, which was needed in water-treatment plants, on the 
grounds that it could also be used to make chemical weapons.  As a 
result, a lot of children died from water-borne diseases.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines02/0804-04.htm

Ben

#  distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission
#  <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism,
#  collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets
#  more info: majordomo@bbs.thing.net and "info nettime-l" in the msg body
#  archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net