Reply #71: Naomi Klein interviews Sgrena: "Shot from behind, on a secure US route." [View All]

[Salome Maloney]

On Democracy Now, Naomi Klein has just interviewed Giuliana Sgrena. This is the first interview since the sole available surviving witness to the attacks was released from hospital. Ms. Sgrena says the car was:

a) shot from behind;

b) on a specially secured road reserved exclusively for ambassadors and top military officials;

c) without warning.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/03/25/1516242

(Naomi Klein's interview really deserves a whole separate thread to itself, but as this is my first post, I can't start one. It should also be sent to every mainstream journalist in the Western world. Maybe I'm unduly optimistic, or too furious to see clearly, but I think this story could actually bring down the Bush Gang, if it's not allowed to die. They are ever more blatantly criminal, but they might just have gone too far this time.)

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NAOMI KLEIN: One of the things that we keep hearing is that she was fired on on the road to the airport, which is a notoriously dangerous road. In fact, it's often described as the most dangerous road in the world. So this is treated as a fairly common and understandable incident that there would be a shooting like this on that road. And I was on that road myself, and it is a really treacherous place with explosions going off all the time and a lot of checkpoints.

What Giuliana told me that I had not realized before is that she wasn't on that road at all. She was on a completely different road that I actually didn't know existed. It's a secured road that you can only enter through the Green Zone and is reserved exclusively for ambassadors and top military officials. So, when Calipari, the Italian security intelligence officer, released her from captivity, they drove directly to the Green Zone, went through the elaborate checkpoint process which everyone must go through to enter the Green Zone, which involves checking in obviously with U.S. forces, and then they drove onto this secured road.

And the other thing that Giuliana told me that she's quite frustrated about is the description of the vehicle that fired on her as being part of a checkpoint. She says it wasn't a checkpoint at all. It was simply a tank that was parked on the side of the road that opened fire on them. There was no process of trying to stop the car, she said, or any signals. From her perspective, they were just -- it was just opening fire by a tank.

The other thing she told me that was surprising to me was that they were fired on from behind. Because I think part of what we're hearing is that the U.S. soldiers opened fire on their car, because they didn't know who they were, and they were afraid. It was self-defense, they were afraid. The fear, of course, is that their car might blow up or that they might come under attack themselves.

And what Giuliana Sgrena really stressed with me was that she -- the bullet that injured her so badly and that killed Calipari, came from behind, entered the back seat of the car. And the only person who was not severely injured in the car was the driver, and she said that this is because the shots weren't coming from the front or even from the side. They were coming from behind, i.e. they were driving away. So, the idea that this was an act of self-defense, I think becomes much more questionable. And that detail may explain why there's some reticence to give up the vehicle for inspection. Because if indeed the majority of the gunfire is coming from behind, then clearly, they were firing from -- they were firing at a car that was driving away from them.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/03/25/1516242