Victims of Saddam-era poison gas attack on Kurds demand French investigation into suppliers

[muriel_volestrangler]

Source: Washington Post

Twenty victims of Saddam Hussein’s 1988 chemical weapons attack on the Kurdish town of Halabja, requested a judicial investigation of French suppliers on Monday, saying executives knew what they were sending to the Iraqi dictator and bore some responsibility.

An Iraqi official said the case serves as a warning to anyone who may still try to sell chemicals to tyrants, touching on a central concern in Syria’s civil war.

The March 1988 attacks in Halabja, Iraq, which killed up to 5,000 people, marked the deadliest chemical weapons attack against civilians. Saddam ordered the poison gas strikes to crush a Kurdish rebellion in the north, which was seen as aiding Iran in the final months of its war with Iraq.

Kamil Abdulqadir Wais Mohammed, who was 14 at the time, said his father and five sisters died in the gas attack. He himself was left with about 20 percent lung capacity, he said at a news conference after filing the complaint. He and others who fled Halabja were blinded as they ran away, recovering their eyesight only months later. He described hearing the sounds of chaos around him — even after he finally reached help, he said, he could still hear bombs hitting his city.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/victims-of-saddam-era-poison-gas-attack-on-kurds-demand-french-investigation-into-suppliers/2013/06/10/9fd77048-d1c9-11e2-9577-df9f1c3348f5_story.html

[geek tragedy]

1. Poppy Bush tried to blame that on the Iranians in order to provide cover

for his good buddy Saddam.

[Politicalboi]

2. I believe they have to look no farther than

<a href="http://imgur.com/7ton91d"><img src="" title="Hosted by imgur.com"/></a>

Donald Rumsfailed.

[Comrade Grumpy]

3. And France is among those shouting the loudest about chemical weapons in Syria.

Ironique.

[geek tragedy]

4. The US was only the #5 arms supplier to Saddam.

The top 4 were, in a miraculous coincidence, the other 4 permanent security council members.

[John2]

5. The information

that I read, claims the U.S.,China and Soviet Union sold weapons to both Iran and Iraq. It doesn't say either of those three Governments sold chemical weapons or even helped Saddam with developing chemical weapons. On the other hand though, it does state private U.S. companies helped Saddam develop chemical weapons.

The Iraq\Iran War was also during 1980-1988. That was under the Reagan era, not Bush. Bush was his vice president though. The U.N. Security Council was also going to issue a resolution against Saddam for using chemical weapons also, but one member vetoed it. That member was the United States under the Reagan Administration. The Reagan Administration also claimed, Iran and Iraq both used chemical weapons which was later disproved by U.N. investigators.

Furthermore Iraq was already an ally of the Soviet Union. So there was a reason the Soviet Union was their supplier. The Soviet UNion did not began to have relations with Iran until the Iranian Revolution and the ouster of the Shah who was an ally of the United States. When that happened, the United States courted Saddam. And the biggest financial backers of Saddam was the Gulf Arab states of Saudia Arabia, Kuwaite and the Arab Emirates. Saddam tried to get them to write off his debts but they refused. So Saddam thought he had the O.K. from the Bush Administration to attack Kuwaite.

[bananas]

7. Read Robert Parry

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2010/012610b.html

From The Archives:

Bush Silences a Dangerous Witness

By Robert Parry
January 26, 2010 (Originally published December 30, 2006)

Editor’s Note: The hanging of Ali Hassan al-Majid, known as “Chemical Ali” for his role in using chemical weapons in Iraqi wars of the 1980s and early 1990s, silenced yet one more witness who otherwise could have filled in the blanks of the Reagan-Bush-I roles in secretly assisting Saddam Hussein’s armies, the so-called Iraq-gate scandal.

If Majid had been turned over to the International Criminal Court – rather than prosecuted by kangaroo tribunals set up in Iraq by George W. Bush’s administration – he could have been systematically debriefed about what U.S. officials, including George H.W. Bush, did to facilitate Iraq’s acquisition of dangerous chemical weapons.

Instead, Majid – wearing a red jump suit, his head covered by a black sack and a noose around his neck – was dropped through the trap door of a scaffold on Monday. His potential to embarrass the Bush Family was eliminated, just as was done to Saddam Hussein three years ago, as this Dec. 30, 2006, article (slightly modified) recounts:

<snip>

[pediatricmedic]

6. This is not popular here, most are convinced Iraq never had WMD's or ever used them.