Source: American Academy of Neurology
Date: May 2, 2007
Science Daily — Veterans of the first Gulf War who returned with multiple health symptom complaints show significant differences in brain structures from their fellow returnees without high numbers of health symptoms, according to research that will be presented at the American Academy of Neurology's 59th Annual Meeting in Boston, April 28 -- May 5, 2007.
The study involved 36 veterans of the first Gulf War (1990-1991). Half of the veterans had a high number (more than five) of symptoms, such as joint pain, fatigue, forgetfulness, headaches, skin rash, nausea, and difficulty concentrating. The other half of the veterans had a lower number (five or fewer) of symptoms.
Researchers found that two areas of the brain involved in thinking and memory were significantly smaller in the veterans with a high number of symptoms than in the veterans with fewer symptoms. The overall cortex was five percent smaller in those with more symptoms, and the rostral anterior cingulated gyrus was six percent smaller.
Those with more symptoms also did not perform as well on tests of learning and memory. On one test, those with more symptoms scored 15 percent lower than those with fewer symptoms; the score was 12 percent lower on another test. The researchers found that the smaller the brain volume was in those areas, the worse the veterans performed on the memory tests.
"We don't know the cause of these differences in the veterans' brain volumes, but the hypothesis is that they are related to exposure to hazardous substances during the first Gulf War," said study author Roberta White, PhD, of Boston University School of Public Health. "Many troops were exposed to hazardous substances such as pesticides, and other studies have shown that exposures to these substances affect the central nervous system."
The study was supported by a Veterans Affairs Merit Grant.
Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by American Academy of Neurology.
Showing posts with label health. Show all posts
Showing posts with label health. Show all posts
Friday, May 4, 2007
Wednesday, May 2, 2007
Feds: Millions have eaten chickens fed tainted pet food
•Chickens in possibly hundreds of farms may have been fed tainted food
• Likelihood of human illness after eating such chicken is "very low"
• No human illness linked to the tainted feed reported to FDA, USDA
• Likelihood of human illness after eating such chicken is "very low"
• No human illness linked to the tainted feed reported to FDA, USDA
NEW YORK (CNN) -- People have eaten millions of chickens that were given feed tainted with recalled pet food, federal officials said Tuesday, though they said the threat to human health is minimal.
The announcement came after an investigation of chicken farms in Indiana found that 38 of the facilities had given contaminated feed to poultry raised for human consumption, and that 2.5 million to 3 million people ate them.
The officials added that they expect to discover that chickens on possibly hundreds of farms in other states were also given tainted feed.
In a teleconference with reporters, an official with the Food and Drug Administration said no recall has been issued because "the likelihood of illness after eating chicken fed the contaminated product is very low." (Blog: Melamine 'dilution' means human risk is probably lower )
No human illnesses have been reported related to the feed, officials with the FDA and the U.S. Department of Agriculture said.
Last week, as part of its investigation into the nationwide pet food recall, the FDA ordered that all vegetable protein imports from China used in human and animal food be detained.
The products include wheat gluten, rice gluten, rice protein, rice protein concentrate, corn gluten, corn gluten meal, corn byproducts, soy protein, soy gluten proteins and mung bean protein.
FDA officials said Tuesday that they have found no evidence that tainted wheat gluten was added directly to any food products sold in the United States.
Two FDA investigators are in China and a third was en route working with the Chinese government's General Administration for Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine to investigate the sources of the contaminated products. (Watch more on concerns about China's food safety
)
It was unclear how long tainted food additives from China have been entering the United States.
"Clearly that is a concern if that has been going on for a long period of time," said Dr. David Acheson, who had been appointed earlier in the day to the newly created position of FDA assistant commissioner for food protection.
The FDA's investigation began in March after at least 17 cats and dogs died of kidney failure linked to the tainted pet food. The urine of cats that ate the food tested positive for melamine, an industrial chemical used in the manufacturing of plastic utensils and fertilizer.
Investigators suspect that melamine, in combination with a rice protein additive imported from China and found to contain cyanuric acid, may cause crystals to form in the kidneys, shutting them down. Cyanuric acid is used as a stabilizer in outdoor swimming pools and hot tubs.
"We had one case recently where the cat's kidneys were completely obstructed and when we went to surgery to relieve the obstruction there was no normal stone, instead the ureters were completely full of these melamine-type crystals," said Dr. Louise Murray, director of medicine at New York's Bergh Memorial Animal Hospital.
The National Chicken Council, which represents U.S. poultry producers, marketers and processors, said Tuesday in a written statement: "We are confident that any poultry producers involved will work expeditiously with the government to resolve this matter to the satisfaction of the government agencies."
Leftovers link possible
NCC spokesman Richard Lobb said Chinese producers appear to have been spiking their feed with the contaminants to make it appear that it contains more protein than it does. Some tests for protein content measure nitrogen content, an ingredient of melamine and cyanuric acid.
Lobb said the chicken feed may have been contaminated as a result of a practice common among pet food manufacturers -- they sometimes sell their leftover material to manufacturers of chicken and pig feed.
"It's like cooking cupcakes -- you get some of the dough on the pan, you scrape it off and throw it away. What they're saying is that somebody bought that material and it got mixed in corn and soybean that gets manufactured in poultry feed," he said.
"The dilution factor is enormous. You have a relatively small amount of pet food byproducts used," Lobb said. "It's a safe and wholesome product to use."
Representatives of Perdue and Tyson Foods -- two of the largest U.S. chicken producers -- said Tuesday in letters to supermarkets that they do not use protein ingredients from China in their feeds.
Last week, FDA officials said 6,000 hogs that may have ingested tainted pet food entered the human food supply. Pork producers in seven states -- California, Kansas, North Carolina, New York, South Carolina and Utah -- are being investigated for buying adulterated feed.
The agency also reported last week that it has received more than 17,000 consumer complaints related to the recall, including reports of approximately 4,150 dog and cat pet deaths.
More than 150 brands and 5,300 pet food products have been recalled. Companies that produced affected items include Menu Foods, Hill's Pet Nutrition, P&G Pet Care, Nestle Purina PetCare, Del Monte Pet Products and Sunshine Mills have been recalled in cooperation with the FDA. The first recall was initiated March 16 by Menu Foods.
CNN's Katy Byron, Joe Johns, Miriam Falco and Elizabeth Cohen contributed to this report.
Joan Baez Banned at Walter Reed Hospital
Joan Baez Unwelcome At Concert For Troops
Singer Was to Perform With Mellencamp at Walter Reed
Singer Was to Perform With Mellencamp at Walter Reed
By Teresa Wiltz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 2, 2007; C01
When rocker John Mellencamp performed for the recovering soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center on Friday night, a couple of things were missing. He squelched his typically blistering rhetoric against the war in Iraq. Also MIA, as it turned out, was folkie and antiwar activist Joan Baez, who says she was disinvited from the event by Army officials.
In a letter that appears today in The Washington Post, Baez says Mellencamp had wanted her to perform with him and that she had accepted his invitation.
"I have always been an advocate for nonviolence," she writes, "and I have stood as firmly against the Iraq war as I did the Vietnam War 40 years ago. . . . I realize now that I might have contributed to a better welcome home for those soldiers fresh from Vietnam. Maybe that's why I didn't hesitate to accept the invitation to sing for those returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.
"In the end, four days before the concert, I was not 'approved' by the Army to take part. Strange irony."
Reached by telephone yesterday at her home in Menlo Park, Calif., Baez, 66, said she wasn't told why she was given the boot, but speculated, "There might have been one, there might have been 50 [soldiers] that thought I was a traitor."
Baez, who said Mellencamp had asked her to sing two songs with him, has been an avowed anti-violence activist ever since she refused to participate in an air raid drill at her Southern California high school. In the '60s, her name became synonymous with the antiwar movement, though many of the protest songs she was famous for performing, such as "Blowin' in the Wind," were covers of Bob Dylan and Pete Seeger songs. In 1964 she protested the Vietnam War by refusing to pay 60 percent of her income taxes. In 1968, she married activist David Harris -- the two met in jail following a protest -- and moved with him into his draft resistance commune.
Walter Reed officials did not respond to several requests for comment yesterday. But in an e-mailed statement published Monday on RollingStone.com, spokesman Steve Sanderson said the medical center received the requests for participation by Baez and broadcaster Dan Rather just two days before the concert. (Rather now works for HDNet, which broadcast the Mellencamp concert.)
"These additional requirements were not in the agreement/contract and would have required a modification," Sanderson told the magazine's Web site.
Not so, says Baez's manager, Mark Spector; Mellencamp's management invited Baez to perform in March with the understanding that things could take a while "because of the red tape of Army bureaucracy." Mellencamp's management handled all the arrangements, according to Spector. And up until April 23, when Baez was turned down, everything was "still inching forward," he said: "They'd booked her flight; they'd booked her hotel."
Mellencamp's manager, Randy Hoffman, did not return calls requesting comment, and Mellencamp was ill and unavailable yesterday, according to his publicist. But Mellencamp told RollingStone.com: "They didn't give me a reason why she couldn't come. We asked why and they said, 'She can't fit here, period.' "
"One of my more cynical friends said, 'They let the rats in, why not you?' " Baez said, laughing, referring to a recent exposé of living conditions at Walter Reed.
It wasn't the first time that a performer has been blocked from Walter Reed. In 2004, Oscar-winning actress Patty Duke was refused permission to tour the wards. She'd been scheduled to visit troops as part of an Arts Advocacy Day in Washington. USO officials later said they didn't have enough time to let the patients know that a celebrity would be visiting -- although Michael Jackson was spotted in the ward the same night that Duke would have popped in for a visit.
An HDNet spokeswoman said Rather had planned to interview Mellencamp at the hospital, but "schedule-wise we couldn't make it happen."
After the concert, Baez said, Mellencamp left her a message to say, "I hope you're not mad at me." Her response: " 'Of course not. It's an honor to be turned down by the Army.' . . . But I would have been happier getting in . . . I thought times had changed enough."
So what exactly happened?
The answer -- since Walter Reed's officials aren't talking -- is blowin' in the wind. (Sorry, we couldn't resist.)
Millions Of Chickens Fed Tainted Pet Food
Related
Do you want fries with that? - EMERGENCY UPDATE
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Risk to Consumers Minimal, FDA Says
Do you want fries with that? - EMERGENCY UPDATE
---
Risk to Consumers Minimal, FDA Says
By Rick Weiss
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 2, 2007; A01
At least 2.5 million broiler chickens from an Indiana producer were fed pet food scraps contaminated with the chemical melamine and subsequently sold for human consumption, federal health officials reported yesterday.
Hundreds of other producers may have similarly sold an unknown amount of contaminated poultry in recent months, they added, painting a picture of much broader consumption of contaminated feed and food than had previously been acknowledged in the widening pet food scandal.
Officials emphasized that they do not believe the tainted chickens -- or the smaller number of contaminated pigs that were reported to have entered the human food supply -- pose risks to people who ate them.
"We do not believe there is any significant threat of human illness from this," said David Acheson, the Food and Drug Administration's chief medical officer. FDA Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach named Acheson yesterday the agency's new "food czar" -- officially, assistant commissioner for food protection.
None of the farm animals is known to have become sick from the food, and very little of the contaminant is suspected of having accumulated in their tissue. Thus, no recall of any products that may still be on store shelves or in people's freezers is planned, officials said.
Nonetheless, 100,000 Indiana chickens that ate the melamine-laced food and are still alive have been quarantined and will be destroyed as a precautionary measure -- as will any other animals that turn up as the investigation continues to expand.
The revelations are the latest in a rapidly widening scandal that started out with reports of a few deaths of pets. It has mushroomed into a major debacle that, even if no human injuries emerge, has exposed significant gaps in the nation's food-safety system.
In the first volley of what Hill watchers expect to be a series of proposed fixes, Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) yesterday introduced legislation that would give the FDA the power to order mandatory recalls of adulterated foods, establish an early warning and notification system for tainted human or pet food, and allow fines for companies that do not promptly report contaminated products.
Meanwhile, the FDA expanded the number of plant-based protein products from China on its "do not import" list, pending the completion of further tests on various kinds of glutens, protein concentrates and other products.
At the center of the problem are pet foods spiked with melamine, a mildly toxic chemical that can make food appear to have more protein than it does. Most of the food went to pets, but scraps were sold in February to the Indiana poultry producer, officials said. The contaminated material may have made up about 5 percent of the chickens' total food supply.
That small fraction, and the fact that people, unlike pets, do not eat the same thing day after day, suggests that consumers who ate contaminated pork or chicken would probably have ingested extremely small doses of melamine, well below the threshold for causing health effects, officials said. Experts conceded, however, that they know little about how the toxin interacts with other compounds in food.
Investigators are tracking streams of the contaminated food through several states.
"Our sense is that the investigation will lead to additional farms where contaminated feed may have been fed to either animals or poultry," said Kenneth Petersen of the Agriculture Department Food Safety and Inspection Service.
Officials said the FDA has received 17,000 reports of pets that owners believe were sickened or killed by contaminated food. About 8,000 reports, roughly half of them involving animals that died, have been formally entered into the FDA's tracking system for further analysis.
U.S. investigators have arrived in China, officials said, but inspections of production facilities there have been hampered by the start yesterday of a week-long national vacation.
"Essentially, all the officials are on holiday," said Walter Batts, part of the FDA's China team, adding that one Chinese official had stayed behind to help.
Monday, April 23, 2007
UN Official Says Humanitarian Crisis in Palestine
22 April 2007By Sonia Nettnin
Chicago- Director of the Representative Office of UNRWA, Andrew Whitley spoke about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the West Bank.
This week a number of governments, led by the Canadians, will meet in Berlin where they will discuss political futures and options for refugees. Whitley talked about the living conditions of Palestinian refugees.
Who is Andrew Whitley? He works for UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East, located in New York. For over three years Whitley lived in Gaza, and he has worked on the subject of the Occupied Palestinian Territories for over 25 years. In Tehran and New York he worked as an academic; as a foreign correspondent specializing in Middle East, South Asia and Latin America, with the BBC and the Financial Times; and in human rights. He was the founding director of Middle East Watch – now Human Rights Watch/Middle East and North Africa.
The theme for his lecture, “Humanitarian Crisis in Palestine: A Gathering Storm,” focused on Gaza, which is one of the 59 officially-recognized refugee camps.
“We have become very alarmed by the fragmentation of Palestinian society particularly in the West Bank,” Whitley said.
With at least 530 barriers and checkpoints in place, peoples’ lives are completely disrupted. Moreover, Palestinian villages have been torn asunder by movement restrictions because they do not have normal economic life. He compared the size of the West Bank to the state of Connecticut, and with words he painted a picture of people living in atomized areas. Israel’s construction of a wall that is projected to be 700 km is 60 per cent complete. There is a degree of permanence to the sectioning because the Jordan Valley has been carved off for Israeli settlements and the West Bank has been divided into a northern and a southern area. As a result, the West Bank is now a trisection containing enclaves of Palestinian cities and villages.
Although the Israeli Army established checkpoints in the name of security, “I would argue the means to tackle these threats…leads to a sense of nihilism, pent up anger that …brings about the results they are trying to avoid,” Whitley explained.
Palestinians are Hungry – Weak Blood and Eyes Hurting
For the Palestinians, the situation is grave. In Gaza there are an estimated 1.4 million Palestinians and approximately 80 per cent of the population lives below the official poverty line at US $2.05 per day per capita. The Palestinian Gross Domestic Product collapsed by 23 per cent in the last year. One million, or 70 per cent of these people, are registered as refugees and 1.05 million people depend on international assistance.
“We keep (including the World Food Program) these people alive these days and the degree they have become dependent on the international community for lack of resources is troubling indeed,” Whitley said.
Since the parliamentary elections in January 2006, the Palestinians have been placed under economic siege. The strategy is to inflict political defeat on Hamas by inflicting the Palestinian population.
On February 16, 2006 it was Israeli Prime Ministerial Advisor Dov Weisglass who said: “The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger.”
According to Whitley, an estimated 40 per cent of Gaza’s population does not get an adequate supply of food, even with international assistance. The hospitals are approximately 20 per cent short of the necessary drugs and supplies needed for medical treatment. Although malnutrition has been a long-term problem with women and children, growth stunting and a worsening diet means “…children are not growing normally in all of their faculties…we will see long-term results within a decade but evidence is quite clear,” Whitley added.
In a video shot in Gaza recently, the UN conducted interviews with the people.
“Most children have bad health kids have weak blood they are weak and their eyes are hurting,” one man says.
Within the last year an estimated 450 business owners closed down. People try to trade their gold for cash, but they are turned away because there is no cash.
“People don’t have food. Life is difficult. People need food but they are hungry,” another person said.
One girl explained that she can see her father cannot bring home food.
Another boy said: “I feel all this but no one cares about us.”
In March 2006, Erez border crossing was closed to Palestinian laborers who work in Israel. The Israeli Government has imposed a gradual policy of zero Palestinian laborers in Israel.
The Karni border crossing closures have caused the delay of goods and cargo from moving in and out of Gaza. In 2006, Israel closed Karni 50 per cent of the working days. This means the thrust of the Palestinian economy in Gaza - agricultural products such as fruits, vegetables and flowers – rotted at the border crossing. In 2006 the UN paid one million in fees to Israeli companies because of the Karni crossing closures. Most of this one million came from European and US taxpayers.
Why did the UN have to pay these fees? Hundreds of full and empty shipping containers move in and out of Gaza. If the border crossing closes, cargo and goods are stored at Israeli ports and terminals. Therefore, trucks sit in park.
When the UN was trying to move their goods, they experienced the same situation and paid fees for crossing closures out of their control.
The overall impression is that the UN faces an acute moral dilemma. They want to help the refugees, but there are many political, social and economic factors preventing them from doing so. Perhaps the organization is being used. Although the humanitarian organization works in highly-politicized environments, one of their challenges is to preserve political neutrality.
When asked what he would say if he had the chance to talk with world leaders, Whitley made several statements. One of them was: “I would tell them that their policies are counterproductive.”
Recent Report on the Situation:
Oxfam survey: Financial boycott pushes Palestinians into poverty, April 13, 2007
Chicago- Director of the Representative Office of UNRWA, Andrew Whitley spoke about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the West Bank.
This week a number of governments, led by the Canadians, will meet in Berlin where they will discuss political futures and options for refugees. Whitley talked about the living conditions of Palestinian refugees.
Who is Andrew Whitley? He works for UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East, located in New York. For over three years Whitley lived in Gaza, and he has worked on the subject of the Occupied Palestinian Territories for over 25 years. In Tehran and New York he worked as an academic; as a foreign correspondent specializing in Middle East, South Asia and Latin America, with the BBC and the Financial Times; and in human rights. He was the founding director of Middle East Watch – now Human Rights Watch/Middle East and North Africa.
The theme for his lecture, “Humanitarian Crisis in Palestine: A Gathering Storm,” focused on Gaza, which is one of the 59 officially-recognized refugee camps.
“We have become very alarmed by the fragmentation of Palestinian society particularly in the West Bank,” Whitley said.
With at least 530 barriers and checkpoints in place, peoples’ lives are completely disrupted. Moreover, Palestinian villages have been torn asunder by movement restrictions because they do not have normal economic life. He compared the size of the West Bank to the state of Connecticut, and with words he painted a picture of people living in atomized areas. Israel’s construction of a wall that is projected to be 700 km is 60 per cent complete. There is a degree of permanence to the sectioning because the Jordan Valley has been carved off for Israeli settlements and the West Bank has been divided into a northern and a southern area. As a result, the West Bank is now a trisection containing enclaves of Palestinian cities and villages.
Although the Israeli Army established checkpoints in the name of security, “I would argue the means to tackle these threats…leads to a sense of nihilism, pent up anger that …brings about the results they are trying to avoid,” Whitley explained.
Palestinians are Hungry – Weak Blood and Eyes Hurting
For the Palestinians, the situation is grave. In Gaza there are an estimated 1.4 million Palestinians and approximately 80 per cent of the population lives below the official poverty line at US $2.05 per day per capita. The Palestinian Gross Domestic Product collapsed by 23 per cent in the last year. One million, or 70 per cent of these people, are registered as refugees and 1.05 million people depend on international assistance.
“We keep (including the World Food Program) these people alive these days and the degree they have become dependent on the international community for lack of resources is troubling indeed,” Whitley said.
Since the parliamentary elections in January 2006, the Palestinians have been placed under economic siege. The strategy is to inflict political defeat on Hamas by inflicting the Palestinian population.
On February 16, 2006 it was Israeli Prime Ministerial Advisor Dov Weisglass who said: “The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger.”
According to Whitley, an estimated 40 per cent of Gaza’s population does not get an adequate supply of food, even with international assistance. The hospitals are approximately 20 per cent short of the necessary drugs and supplies needed for medical treatment. Although malnutrition has been a long-term problem with women and children, growth stunting and a worsening diet means “…children are not growing normally in all of their faculties…we will see long-term results within a decade but evidence is quite clear,” Whitley added.
In a video shot in Gaza recently, the UN conducted interviews with the people.
“Most children have bad health kids have weak blood they are weak and their eyes are hurting,” one man says.
Within the last year an estimated 450 business owners closed down. People try to trade their gold for cash, but they are turned away because there is no cash.
“People don’t have food. Life is difficult. People need food but they are hungry,” another person said.
One girl explained that she can see her father cannot bring home food.
Another boy said: “I feel all this but no one cares about us.”
In March 2006, Erez border crossing was closed to Palestinian laborers who work in Israel. The Israeli Government has imposed a gradual policy of zero Palestinian laborers in Israel.
The Karni border crossing closures have caused the delay of goods and cargo from moving in and out of Gaza. In 2006, Israel closed Karni 50 per cent of the working days. This means the thrust of the Palestinian economy in Gaza - agricultural products such as fruits, vegetables and flowers – rotted at the border crossing. In 2006 the UN paid one million in fees to Israeli companies because of the Karni crossing closures. Most of this one million came from European and US taxpayers.
Why did the UN have to pay these fees? Hundreds of full and empty shipping containers move in and out of Gaza. If the border crossing closes, cargo and goods are stored at Israeli ports and terminals. Therefore, trucks sit in park.
When the UN was trying to move their goods, they experienced the same situation and paid fees for crossing closures out of their control.
The overall impression is that the UN faces an acute moral dilemma. They want to help the refugees, but there are many political, social and economic factors preventing them from doing so. Perhaps the organization is being used. Although the humanitarian organization works in highly-politicized environments, one of their challenges is to preserve political neutrality.
When asked what he would say if he had the chance to talk with world leaders, Whitley made several statements. One of them was: “I would tell them that their policies are counterproductive.”
Recent Report on the Situation:
Oxfam survey: Financial boycott pushes Palestinians into poverty, April 13, 2007
FDA Was Aware of Dangers To Food
Outbreaks Were Not Preventable, Officials Say
By Elizabeth Williamson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 23, 2007; A01
The Food and Drug Administration has known for years about contamination problems at a Georgia peanut butter plant and on California spinach farms that led to disease outbreaks that killed three people, sickened hundreds, and forced one of the biggest product recalls in U.S. history, documents and interviews show.
Overwhelmed by huge growth in the number of food processors and imports, however, the agency took only limited steps to address the problems and relied on producers to police themselves, according to agency documents.
Congressional critics and consumer advocates said both episodes show that the agency is incapable of adequately protecting the safety of the food supply.
FDA officials conceded that the agency's system needs to be overhauled to meet today's demands, but contended that the agency could not have done anything to prevent either contamination episode.
Last week, the FDA notified California state health officials that hogs on a farm in the state had likely eaten feed laced with melamine, an industrial chemical blamed for the deaths of dozens of pets in recent weeks. Officials are trying to determine whether the chemical's presence in the hogs represents a threat to humans.
Pork from animals raised on the farm has been recalled. The FDA has said its inspectors probably would not have found the contaminated food before problems arose. The tainted additive caused a recall of more than 100 different brands of pet food.
The outbreaks point to a need to change the way the agency does business, said Robert E. Brackett, director of the FDA's food-safety arm, which is responsible for safeguarding 80 percent of the nation's food supply.
"We have 60,000 to 80,000 facilities that we're responsible for in any given year," Brackett said. Explosive growth in the number of processors and the amount of imported foods means that manufacturers "have to build safety into their products rather than us chasing after them," Brackett said. "We have to get out of the 1950s paradigm."
Tomorrow, a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee will hold a hearing on the unprecedented spate of recalls.
"This administration does not like regulation, this administration does not like spending money, and it has a hostility toward government. The poisonous result is that a program like the FDA is going to suffer at every turn of the road," said Rep. John D. Dingell (D-Mich.), chairman of the full House committee. Dingell is considering introducing legislation to boost the agency's accountability, regulatory authority and budget.
In the peanut butter case, an agency report shows that FDA inspectors checked into complaints about salmonella contamination in a ConAgra Foods factory in Georgia in 2005. But when company managers refused to provide documents the inspectors requested, the inspectors left and did not follow up.
A salmonella outbreak that began last August and was traced to the plant's Peter Pan and Great Value peanut butter brands sickened more than 400 people in 44 states. The likely cause, ConAgra said, was moisture from a roof leak and a malfunctioning sprinkler system that activated dormant salmonella. The plant has since been closed.
The 2005 report shows that FDA inspectors were looking into "an alleged episode of positive findings of salmonella in peanut butter in October of 2004 that was related to new equipment and that the firm didn't react to, . . . insects in some equipment, water leaking onto product, and inability to track some product."
During the inspection, the report says, ConAgra admitted it had destroyed some product in October 2004 but would not say why.
"They asked for some of our documentation and we made the request to them that they put it in writing due to concerns about proprietary information," ConAgra spokeswoman Stephanie Childs said last week. "We did not receive a written request, . . . they filed the report and that was that."
Until February of this year. That's when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notified the FDA of a spike in salmonella cases in states near the ConAgra plant. The agencies contacted the company, which initiated a recall and shut the plant for upgrades.
Brackett said that if the FDA inspector had seen anything truly dangerous the agency would have taken further action. But, he said, the agency cannot force a disclosure, a recall or a plant closure except in extreme circumstances, such as finding a hazardous batch of product.
The problem in 2005, he added, "doesn't necessarily connect to the salmonella outbreak right now. It's not unusual to have it in raw agricultural commodities."
The FDA has known even longer about illnesses among people who ate spinach and other greens from California's Salinas Valley, the source of outbreaks over the past six months that have killed three people and sickened more than 200 in 26 states. The subsequent recall was the largest ever for leafy vegetables.
In a letter sent to California growers in late 2005, Brackett wrote, "FDA is aware of 18 outbreaks of foodborne illness since 1995 caused by [E. coli bacteria] for which fresh or fresh-cut lettuce was implicated. . . . In one additional case, fresh-cut spinach was implicated. These 19 outbreaks account for approximately 409 reported cases of illness and two deaths."
"We know that there are still problems out in those fields," Brackett said in an interview last week. "We knew there had been a problem, but we never and probably still could not pinpoint where the problem was. We could have that capability, but not at this point."
According to Caroline Smith DeWaal, who heads the Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer-advocacy group, "When budgets are tight . . . the food program at FDA gets hit the hardest."
In next year's budget, passed amid discovery of contamination problems in spinach, tomatoes and lettuce, Congress has voted the FDA a $10 million increase to improve food safety, DeWaal said. The Agriculture Department, which monitors meat, poultry and eggs and keeps inspectors in every processing plant, got an increase 10 times that amount to help pay for its inspection programs. The FDA visits problem food plants about once a year and the rest far less frequently, Brackett said.
William Hubbard, who retired as associate commissioner of the FDA in 2005 and founded the advocacy group Coalition for a Stronger FDA, said that when he joined the agency in the 1970s, its food safety arm claimed half its budget and personnel.
"Now it's about a quarter . . . at a time in which the problems have grown, the size of the industry has grown and imports of food have skyrocketed," Hubbard said.
One third of US casualties have brain injuries
Related
IEDs cause ‘Divers Bends’ damage in brain
Doctors battle the new shell shock
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FEATURE-Iraq war brain trauma victims turn to private care
23 Apr 2007 13:03:29 GMT
By Kim Dixon
CHICAGO, April 23 (Reuters) - Sgt. Eric Edmundson arrived at the U.S. Army's Walter Reed hospital in October 2005 with a severe head concussion, a victim of one of the many roadside bombs that are a part of daily life for soldiers in Iraq.
Six months later, after intense physical rehab and an infection that made control of his limbs futile, his morale hit bottom. The Department of Veterans Affairs gave him the choice of a nursing home or returning home from a Richmond, Virginia facility, his family said.
"We felt the VA had a 'wait and see' attitude, and our belief was that time was our enemy," said Eric's father Edward, who left his job at Conagra Foods in North Carolina to be his son's full-time health advocate. "So we took him home."
Unsatisfied with the outcome, Eric and his family eventually found treatment at a private hospital, and began a slow path to recovery. But his story is unusual. Wounded vets are seldom treated at private hospitals, which say they offer expertise for severe brain injuries like Eric's. The VA is resisting using their services, setting up a clash over care for some the war's most seriously wounded veterans.
Of the nearly 24,000 wounded soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, about a third suffer from some degree of traumatic brain injury, or TBI, according to the General Accounting Office.
The government has been on the defensive about veterans' medical care after a probe found shoddy living conditions of recovering wounded at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, considered the jewel in the military's health care system.
A newly-appointed Commission on Care for America's Returning Wounded Warriors was formed by U.S. President George Bush in response. A major topic is whether the civilian sector could be used more in treating traumatic brain injury, one of the fastest growing injuries of the war.
"That is a $64,000 question, and one that the Commission will be studying," as it holds hearings in advance of drawing up recommendations for Bush, said Edward Eckenhoff, president of the National Rehabilitation Hospital in Washington and a member of the commission.
CASE BY CASE
The VA has four hospitals to treat severe brain injuries, in Minneapolis, California, Florida and Virginia. Critics say the total of 48 hospital beds in the entire VA system devoted to the brain injuries is inadequate to meet demand.
Barbara Sigford, the VA's National Director for Physical Medicine and Rehab, said the agency's expertise in spinal cord injuries and amputations, often intertwined with brain trauma, has been growing for the past 20 years.
"This isn't new for us by any means," she said. "I would say that seldom is it in someone's best interest to transfer them to another (civilian) program."
Sigford said there is no issue of overcrowding since the four VA trauma centers are running at about 80 percent capacity.
For their part, private hospitals said they have been building expertise by treating tough brain injuries for decades, whether for construction accidents or car crash victims. The VA by contrast has been caring for mostly chronic illness in Vietnam and World War II veterans, they say.
Jeremy Chwat, executive vice president of the advocacy group, the Wounded Warrior project, said the VA does a good job of caring for critical patients once they arrive, but that it could use assistance in the long road of rehabilitation.
"We've been urging them to collaborate with the private sector. It's about choice; we want veterans to choose the VA but not be captive by it," he said.
NOVEL INJURY
Traumatic brain injury, caused by a blow or jolt to the head, often results in severe disability, at times permanent brain damage. It is being called the signature injury of this war, as improved armor and medical advances save many more lives than in prior conflicts.
"In Vietnam, if you got your leg blown off, you bled to death. Now if they can get you to a hospital, you are not going to die," said Ronald Glasser, a Minneapolis specialist in nephrology and rheumatology, who has written several books on veteran care and was a physician during the Vietnam war.
Symptoms include blurred vision, slurred speech, and physical paralysis, among many others, and it is often coupled with amputation and spinal cord problems.
The VA estimates about 400 cases over four years were severe enough to require significant rehab, while some critics say the numbers are several times that.
Often-times lack of physical symptoms may cause slow reporting of the injury, experts said.
"The presence or absence of particularly a closed-head injury where there is not an obvious breach of the skull" is hard to diagnose, said Col. Joyce Grissom, medical director for the Defense Department's Tricare health program.
STANDING UP
Private rehab hospitals are dealing with financial pressures, including a need to fill beds because of more stringent Medicare requirements, Chwat noted.
"Obviously dollars and sense do come into play. To say there is not a financial motive involved would be naive, but unless the family can choose to go somewhere else, you can't say they are choosing the VA."
The private sector officials say there have been encouraging signs recently. One of the private institutions, the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, is where Eric Edmundson wound up two months ago after his father discovered he could use a civilian facility and have it paid by GI benefits.
It was worth it, he says. About a month ago, Eric stood up by himself for the first time since 2005.
"When we first got to Walter Reed. They took us together in a room and said he'd be a vegetable his whole life," his father said.
IEDs cause ‘Divers Bends’ damage in brain
Doctors battle the new shell shock
---
FEATURE-Iraq war brain trauma victims turn to private care
23 Apr 2007 13:03:29 GMT
By Kim Dixon
CHICAGO, April 23 (Reuters) - Sgt. Eric Edmundson arrived at the U.S. Army's Walter Reed hospital in October 2005 with a severe head concussion, a victim of one of the many roadside bombs that are a part of daily life for soldiers in Iraq.
Six months later, after intense physical rehab and an infection that made control of his limbs futile, his morale hit bottom. The Department of Veterans Affairs gave him the choice of a nursing home or returning home from a Richmond, Virginia facility, his family said.
"We felt the VA had a 'wait and see' attitude, and our belief was that time was our enemy," said Eric's father Edward, who left his job at Conagra Foods in North Carolina to be his son's full-time health advocate. "So we took him home."
Unsatisfied with the outcome, Eric and his family eventually found treatment at a private hospital, and began a slow path to recovery. But his story is unusual. Wounded vets are seldom treated at private hospitals, which say they offer expertise for severe brain injuries like Eric's. The VA is resisting using their services, setting up a clash over care for some the war's most seriously wounded veterans.
Of the nearly 24,000 wounded soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, about a third suffer from some degree of traumatic brain injury, or TBI, according to the General Accounting Office.
The government has been on the defensive about veterans' medical care after a probe found shoddy living conditions of recovering wounded at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, considered the jewel in the military's health care system.
A newly-appointed Commission on Care for America's Returning Wounded Warriors was formed by U.S. President George Bush in response. A major topic is whether the civilian sector could be used more in treating traumatic brain injury, one of the fastest growing injuries of the war.
"That is a $64,000 question, and one that the Commission will be studying," as it holds hearings in advance of drawing up recommendations for Bush, said Edward Eckenhoff, president of the National Rehabilitation Hospital in Washington and a member of the commission.
CASE BY CASE
The VA has four hospitals to treat severe brain injuries, in Minneapolis, California, Florida and Virginia. Critics say the total of 48 hospital beds in the entire VA system devoted to the brain injuries is inadequate to meet demand.
Barbara Sigford, the VA's National Director for Physical Medicine and Rehab, said the agency's expertise in spinal cord injuries and amputations, often intertwined with brain trauma, has been growing for the past 20 years.
"This isn't new for us by any means," she said. "I would say that seldom is it in someone's best interest to transfer them to another (civilian) program."
Sigford said there is no issue of overcrowding since the four VA trauma centers are running at about 80 percent capacity.
For their part, private hospitals said they have been building expertise by treating tough brain injuries for decades, whether for construction accidents or car crash victims. The VA by contrast has been caring for mostly chronic illness in Vietnam and World War II veterans, they say.
Jeremy Chwat, executive vice president of the advocacy group, the Wounded Warrior project, said the VA does a good job of caring for critical patients once they arrive, but that it could use assistance in the long road of rehabilitation.
"We've been urging them to collaborate with the private sector. It's about choice; we want veterans to choose the VA but not be captive by it," he said.
NOVEL INJURY
Traumatic brain injury, caused by a blow or jolt to the head, often results in severe disability, at times permanent brain damage. It is being called the signature injury of this war, as improved armor and medical advances save many more lives than in prior conflicts.
"In Vietnam, if you got your leg blown off, you bled to death. Now if they can get you to a hospital, you are not going to die," said Ronald Glasser, a Minneapolis specialist in nephrology and rheumatology, who has written several books on veteran care and was a physician during the Vietnam war.
Symptoms include blurred vision, slurred speech, and physical paralysis, among many others, and it is often coupled with amputation and spinal cord problems.
The VA estimates about 400 cases over four years were severe enough to require significant rehab, while some critics say the numbers are several times that.
Often-times lack of physical symptoms may cause slow reporting of the injury, experts said.
"The presence or absence of particularly a closed-head injury where there is not an obvious breach of the skull" is hard to diagnose, said Col. Joyce Grissom, medical director for the Defense Department's Tricare health program.
STANDING UP
Private rehab hospitals are dealing with financial pressures, including a need to fill beds because of more stringent Medicare requirements, Chwat noted.
"Obviously dollars and sense do come into play. To say there is not a financial motive involved would be naive, but unless the family can choose to go somewhere else, you can't say they are choosing the VA."
The private sector officials say there have been encouraging signs recently. One of the private institutions, the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago, is where Eric Edmundson wound up two months ago after his father discovered he could use a civilian facility and have it paid by GI benefits.
It was worth it, he says. About a month ago, Eric stood up by himself for the first time since 2005.
"When we first got to Walter Reed. They took us together in a room and said he'd be a vegetable his whole life," his father said.
Saturday, April 21, 2007
CRIMINAL Probe Opened in Pet Food Scare: YOUR Food Affected
Friday, 20 April 2007
Keep An Eye on Pet Food Recall Stories
UPDATE: "Criminal Probe Opened in Pet Food Scare: FDA Says Charges Possible; Tainted Pork Confirmed in Calif.," Washington Post, April 22: "The Food and Drug Administration has opened a criminal investigation in the widening pet food contamination scandal, officials said yesterday, as it was confirmed that tainted pork might have made its way onto human dinner plates in California." (I'm feeling prescient. This is just the TIP of the iceberg since labs still haven't gotten to the bottom of what's sickening pets and could sicken people. I suspect the Chinese add melamine (and more?) to cheaply boost protein numbers in glutens, and also that their factories are filthy cesspools of cross-contamination.)
ORIGINAL: Even if you don't have a pet, you'll be concerned by growing evidence that human foods could be contaminated. Further, the FDA is being barred by the Chinese government from investigating the Chinese plants that produced the tainted wheat gluten. This is KEY because the same Chinese plant that sold tainted wheat gluten (an additive in countless processed foods) also exports "carrots, garlic, ginger, corn protein powder, vegetables and feed." And now we've learned that rice and corn glutens are contaminated. Here's more new information:
- "Humans at risk from tainted pet food?," Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Federal officials confirmed Thursday they are investigating whether pork products intended for humans are contaminated with the same industrial chemical that prompted a massive pet food recall and sickened cats and dogs nationwide. Researchers also have identified three other contaminants in the urine and kidneys of animals sickened or killed after eating the recalled foods, including cyanuric acid, a chemical commonly used in pool chlorination, three researchers told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. Cyanuric acid is what most likely sickened pets, one researcher said.Melamine previously was found in the recalled pet food and two ingredients -- wheat gluten and rice protein concentrate -- as well as in the urine, blood, kidneys and tissues of infected animals. [...]
The Trib learned yesterday that melamine-contaminated feed was fed to hogs.The FDA, U.S. Department of Agriculture and the California Department of Food and Agriculture are investigating. [...]
[Some hogs] were slaughtered and sold as food before authorities learned their feed had been contaminated. ...
[T]he urine of some pigs at the 1,500-animal American Hog Farm in Ceres, Calif., tested positive for melamine, ...
The contaminated feed was bought April 3 and 13 as salvage pet food from Diamond Pet Foods Inc., which received contaminated rice protein concentrate. ...
Diamond Pet Foods Inc. is a large mass-producer of pet foods like Menu Foods. Diamond makes the Kirkland family of pet foods sold to Costco.
Melamine has been "found in South African Royal Canin products containing corn gluten from Chinese source." Via Itchmo blog, from SouthAfrica.com about the 30 pet deaths reported so far in South Africa:
An independent pathologist, Professor Fred Reyers said the outbreak may not be an isolated incident. He believed there was sufficient evidence to suggest a link between this outbreak and a similar one in Cape Town as well as one in the United States.
Itchmo blog's Ben adds:
We were tracking cases of the South African pet deaths before and have heard rumors of corn gluten contamination.At this point, we believe that all corn gluten should be considered at risk for contamination and should be tested by every pet food manufacturer and the FDA.
The FDA "has yet to test corn gluten after South Africa’s findings of melamine in corn gluten from China," agency representatives conceded at yesterday's press conference.
The specific product recalls -- with more daily -- are too numerous to list here. The best thing to do is check Itchmo's site frequently because Ben has reliably and quickly posted all significant news. You can also sign up for Ben's safety alerts.
Howl911 is also doing a great job tracking recall news, and its staff has created a list of recalled products that is more accurate, and easier to follow, than the FDA's.
The Pittsburgh Tribune Review also has this report on the recalcitrance of the Chinese, "Chinese criticized in pet food probe."
The Chinese government and the company that supplied a contaminated ingredient are slowing the federal investigation into the nationwide recall of pet food, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration official said Tuesday.[...]
Michael Rogers, director of the FDA's field investigations division, told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review the agency has asked the Chinese government for help investigating the gluten and the supplier, Xuzhou Anying Biologic Technology Development Co. Ltd., based in Jiangsu province.
The FDA is disappointed with slow and incomplete Chinese responses, Rogers said.
"I usually don't speak in terms of cooperative or not cooperative," he said.
Federal investigators haven't determined whether Xuzhou Anying shipped other food products to the United States, or what other Chinese companies it sold wheat gluten to that, in turn, might have been shipped here, Rogers said.
Xuzhou Anying's Web site said it also exports carrots, garlic, ginger, corn protein powder, vegetables and feed. Rogers said Chinese officials have not responded to the U.S. government's question about whether any products other than wheat gluten were shipped here.
"We're certainly reviewing all products from this source," he said. Since the recall, the company has shipped only wheat gluten to the United States, but U.S. officials still are unsure what might have been shipped prior to the recall, Rogers said.
"From an operational standpoint, we still have questions about this company," he said.
The FDA is screening all wheat gluten imported from China and the Netherlands at U.S. ports and seizing all wheat gluten from Xuzhou Anying.
[...]
The FDA, Cornell and other researchers found melamine in high concentrations in the gluten -- up to 6.6 percent of the product.
Even so, they do not believe the melamine made the animals sick, although they said it is a marker for tracking the outbreak, because the crystal found in the melamine and in animals' urine and tissue is distinctive to this outbreak.
In other words, nobody knows yet what is killing cats and dogs, or may be harming humans.
The best advice I've seen, from reading many articles and blog posts, is to buy locally and organically.
Even reading labels isn't a guarantee because there is little oversight over what companies list in their labels.
Sen. Dick Durbin has been a leader in calling for greater oversight by the FDA over imported foods. From his Web site:
U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) met with U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach on Wednesday, April 18, 2007 in Durbin's Capitol office to discuss the latest recall of pet food, this time caused by contaminated rice protein imported from China.
In his press release on the meeting, Durbin says:
In the meeting, Durbin and DeLauro learned that the Chinese Government has blocked requests from the FDA to send personnel to China to inspect the facilities suspected of producing the contaminated products. The FDA first contacted the Chinese Government on April 4, 2007, but have not been granted permission to send food inspectors into the country. In response, Durbin and DeLauro sent a letter to the Chinese Ambassador to the United States, Zhou Wenzong, urging the Chinese Government to issue visas to U.S. food inspectors as quickly as possible."It is unacceptable that the Chinese government is blocking our food safety inspectors from entering their country and examining facilities that are suspected of providing contaminated pet food to American consumers," said Durbin. "We have asked for two things in our letter today -- that the Chinese government allow our inspectors in and that the Chinese ambassador to the United States meet with Congresswoman DeLauro and me to discuss the larger issue of contaminated food being sent to the U.S. These are reasonable requests and we hope that we can find a level of cooperation with the Chinese."
"At time when China is exporting more foods into the U.S., the Chinese are refusing to allow our inspectors in to the country to investigate the source of the pet food contamination. The FDA needs to be allowed to investigate this so we can better protect our pets and identify the source of the source of the problem. While we have a significant trade relationship with the Chinese, the investigation of the contaminated product comes first," said DeLauro.
Durbin calls for a single agency to oversee food safety:
Durbin and DeLauro have been actively engaged on food safety issues for over a decade. This Congress they introduced legislation that calls for the development of a single food safety agency and the implementation of a food safety program to standardize American food safety activities (The Safe Food Act - S. 654 and H.R. 1148 in the Senate and House respectively). The Illinois senator said legislation he has introduced to consolidate all federal food safety responsibilities into a single, independent agency has taken on new urgency because of a possibly heightened need to respond quickly and effectively to any acts of bioterrorism or agroterrorism. Currently, there are at least 12 different federal agencies and 35 different laws governing food safety. With overlapping jurisdictions, federal agencies often lack accountability on food safety-related issues.The non-partisan U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) has been unequivocal in its recommendation for consolidation of federal food safety programs. In February of this year, the GAO deemed federal oversight of food safety as "high risk" to the economy and public health and safety. Over the past two decades, GAO has also issued numerous reports on topics such as food recalls, food safety inspections and the transport of animal feeds. Each of these reports highlights the current fragmentation and inconsistent organization of the various agencies involved in food safety oversight.
Friday, April 20, 2007
Thursday, April 19, 2007
8 Million Iraqis Need Urgent Aid: UN
Wednesday, 18 April 2007
The United Nations warned on Tuesday, April 17, that nearly eight million Iraqis were in dire need of aid, while international relief groups urged world countries, particularly war allies Washington and London, to accommodate millions of Iraqis fleeing their violence-ravaged country.
---
"Up to eight million Iraqi civilians are in urgent need of humanitarian relief," UN humanitarian chief John Holmes told a conference on Iraq's displacement crisis in Geneva, reported Agence France Presse (AFP).
---
"That is around four million more than those who are internally or externally displaced."
There are also four million Iraqi refugees and displaced people, about 2 million in Syria and Jordan and 1.9 million inside the war-torn country.
Holmes asserted that millions of people are facing "a basic survival crisis" in oil-rich Iraq, urging the world to shoulder its responsibility towards traumatized Iraqis.
"Iraq is not just a deeply controversial political and security issue, but a profound and no doubt lasting humanitarian crisis affecting millions of civilians."
A poll conducted jointly by ABC News, the BBC, and German TV network ARD showed on Monday, March 19 that four year after the invasion, two-thirds of Iraqis see a gloomy picture for their future and have lost all confidence in their "liberators".
It found that basic necessities were lacking in Iraq, with 88 percent of respondents saying the availability of electricity was either "quite bad" or "very bad".
About 69 percent gave similar responses for the availability of clean water, and 88 percent for the availability of driving or cooking fuel.
The UN Development Program (UNDP) and an Iraqi government agency said on Sunday, February 18, that a third of Iraq's 26 million people live in poverty.
It added that the living standards of Iraqis have been deteriorating after a thriving economy in the 1970s and 80s.
Open Borders
In a related development, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged world countries Tuesday to keep their borders open to the growing flood of Iraqi refugees.
"I hope this conference will galvanize international support to provide them with more protection and assistance and I hope it will mobilize resources in establishing much needed protection space," Ban said in a video message.
"For neighboring countries this means keeping borders open and upholding the principle of no forced return," he elaborated.
Some 800,000 Iraqis have fled their homes since February 2006, according to the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR). Up to 50,000 Iraqis their country every month.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the World's largest relief agency, praised Syria and Jordan for generous reception to Iraqis refugees.
But it warned that infrastructures in those countries have reached their limits.
The Human Rights Watch (HRW) warned Tuesday that some of Iraq's neighbors were "closing off escape routes" for refugees by introducing restrictions, including a seven-billion-dollar high-tech barrier Saudi Arabian was building on the border.
About 95 percent of fleeing Iraqis remain in the Middle East, but the number of Iraqis reaching industrialized countries, mainly Europe, surged by 77 percent (22,200) in 2006, according to UNHCR data.
The US-based HRW singled out the US and Britain for harsher criticism.
"The United States and the United Kingdom bear a particular responsibility to help people displaced in and out of Iraq," said Bill Frelick, refugee director at HRW.
"They undertook a war that has directly caused thousands of deaths, widespread fear and suffering, and forced displacement."
AMSI Net- Agencies
The United Nations warned on Tuesday, April 17, that nearly eight million Iraqis were in dire need of aid, while international relief groups urged world countries, particularly war allies Washington and London, to accommodate millions of Iraqis fleeing their violence-ravaged country.
---
"Up to eight million Iraqi civilians are in urgent need of humanitarian relief," UN humanitarian chief John Holmes told a conference on Iraq's displacement crisis in Geneva, reported Agence France Presse (AFP).
---
"That is around four million more than those who are internally or externally displaced."
There are also four million Iraqi refugees and displaced people, about 2 million in Syria and Jordan and 1.9 million inside the war-torn country.
Holmes asserted that millions of people are facing "a basic survival crisis" in oil-rich Iraq, urging the world to shoulder its responsibility towards traumatized Iraqis.
"Iraq is not just a deeply controversial political and security issue, but a profound and no doubt lasting humanitarian crisis affecting millions of civilians."
A poll conducted jointly by ABC News, the BBC, and German TV network ARD showed on Monday, March 19 that four year after the invasion, two-thirds of Iraqis see a gloomy picture for their future and have lost all confidence in their "liberators".
It found that basic necessities were lacking in Iraq, with 88 percent of respondents saying the availability of electricity was either "quite bad" or "very bad".
About 69 percent gave similar responses for the availability of clean water, and 88 percent for the availability of driving or cooking fuel.
The UN Development Program (UNDP) and an Iraqi government agency said on Sunday, February 18, that a third of Iraq's 26 million people live in poverty.
It added that the living standards of Iraqis have been deteriorating after a thriving economy in the 1970s and 80s.
Open Borders
In a related development, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged world countries Tuesday to keep their borders open to the growing flood of Iraqi refugees.
"I hope this conference will galvanize international support to provide them with more protection and assistance and I hope it will mobilize resources in establishing much needed protection space," Ban said in a video message.
"For neighboring countries this means keeping borders open and upholding the principle of no forced return," he elaborated.
Some 800,000 Iraqis have fled their homes since February 2006, according to the UN High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR). Up to 50,000 Iraqis their country every month.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the World's largest relief agency, praised Syria and Jordan for generous reception to Iraqis refugees.
But it warned that infrastructures in those countries have reached their limits.
The Human Rights Watch (HRW) warned Tuesday that some of Iraq's neighbors were "closing off escape routes" for refugees by introducing restrictions, including a seven-billion-dollar high-tech barrier Saudi Arabian was building on the border.
About 95 percent of fleeing Iraqis remain in the Middle East, but the number of Iraqis reaching industrialized countries, mainly Europe, surged by 77 percent (22,200) in 2006, according to UNHCR data.
The US-based HRW singled out the US and Britain for harsher criticism.
"The United States and the United Kingdom bear a particular responsibility to help people displaced in and out of Iraq," said Bill Frelick, refugee director at HRW.
"They undertook a war that has directly caused thousands of deaths, widespread fear and suffering, and forced displacement."
AMSI Net- Agencies
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
INDEX ON IRAQ: A JOURNEY IN HELL
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
by Sarah Meyer
Girls look through a fence at a refugee camp in Mosul April 5, 2007.About 250 families moved from Tal Afar town to camps in Mosul since
last weeks' violence attacks. Photo: REUTERS/Khaled al-Mousuly
"Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate" Dante, Inferno.
1. General
2. Children of Iraq
3. Cities in Iraq
4. Health in Iraq
5. Refugees in Iraq
6. Human Rights in Iraq
7. Death in Iraq
8. Resistance in Iraq
9. Videos
GENERAL
Video. Iraq street scenes before Shock and Awe.
Life in Hell: A Baghdad Diary.
06.08.06. A. Ghosh, Time / Truth Out.
In Baghdad, the American Army Erects Walls Between Communities.
16.08.06. R. Ourdan, le Monde / Truth Out.
THE CHILDREN OF IRAQ
IRAQ: Children living without limbs lack support.
04.02.07. Irin. According to Save the Children, a UK-based NGO, many children were killed or injured in the initial US-led invasion of Iraq in April and March 2003. The NGO said the injured children continue to suffer the effects of the conflict, have become more vulnerable to chronic diseases and lack assistance. … The exact number of children living without limbs in Iraq, as a result of the war and the daily violence countrywide, is not known. However, local NGOs estimate that they must be in the thousands.
"Every explosion, air strike, fighting or targeting in Iraq makes a child injured. In addition, we cannot forget the remaining UXOs [unexploded ordnance] whose victims are mostly children," Khalid Ala'a, spokesman for local NGO Keeping Children Alive (KCA), said. "If you make a summation of all these children, they are going to be thousands and we cannot forget that the number of them killed since April 2003 by diseases, explosions or bullets, has reached 260,000," Ala'a added.
IRAQ: 4.5 million children undernourished.
05.03.07. Reuters / Irin.
60,000 Marriages broken by Iraq, Including Mine.
05.03.07. Stacy Bannerman, Alternet.
Third of Iraqi children now malnourished four years after US invasion.
16.03.07. Caritas Report
70% of Iraqi schoolchildren show symptoms of trauma.
17.04.07. USA Today.
CITIES IN IRAQ
In Baghdad, the American Army Erects Walls Between Communities.
16.08.06. R. Ourdan, le Monde / Truth Out.
Insecurity prevents clean-up of Iraq pollution.
07.02.07. Reuters. "We have identified more than 350 priority polluted areas, which include amounts of hazardous chemicals and depleted uranium," Environment Minister Nermeen Othman said on the sidelines of a major U.N. environment conference in Kenya. Environmentalists and anti-nuclear activists have linked depleted uranium used in U.S. and British munitions to higher Iraqi cancer rates and birth defects after the 1991 war and called for swift clean up campaigns. … polluted "hot spots", like the Khan Dhari petrochemicals site west of Baghdad that was partly burned down by looters during the war in March 2003.
The Locusts
26.02.07. Felicity Arbuthnot, Global Research. Killing Civilization in Mesopotamia. After the illegal invasion, the US military did the unthinkable. They made a camp in the great turquoise memorial to the half million lost souls of the Iran-Iraq warThe locusts in uniform, who have destroyed Iraq, humanity, sustenance, its history, predating the time of Christ and the Prophet Mohammed, are never, it seems, satiated or satisfied. From the early defiling (ongoing) of Mosques, cemeteries (Muslim, Christian, Yazidi ...) even the sacred tributes to the memory of the martyrs are being destroyed and defiled.
Iraq: New Martial Law Powers Threaten Basic Rights
01.03.07. uruknet. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's new security plan for Baghdad grants military commanders sweeping powers to arrest people and restrict their basic freedoms of speech and association, Human Rights Watch said today.
BAGHDAD CHAOS PLAN.
03.03.07. McClatchy. Iraqi government call it (BAGHDAD SECURITY PLAN) and we call it (BAGHDAD CHAOS PLAN) every single member in the security system taking money from the people to be released like for example I have paid in one day 30,000 Iraqi dinars to the traffic police and the peace keeping forces to be forgiven for the mistake that I did, my mistake was that I was driving my car in the street to go to my work in the time that I not suppose to be driving I mean the government have sill! y law obligate me to drive three days a week in the street in Baghdad because the numbers of the car as you know the (odds and even ) numbers my car was odd and I was driving in the even day so can you imagine he took 15,000 Iraqi dinars to him self instead giving me the 30,000 Iraqi dinars penalty recede from the government and the keeping peace forces guy did the same thing at the time that it is non of his responsibility….
Full electricity in Baghdad 6 years off.
03.03.07. Baltimore Sun. ( is that a promise?) Getting full-time electric power turned on in Baghdad, a key wartime goal toward which the United States has spent $4.2 billion dollars, won't be accomplished until the year 2013, U.S. officials said yesterday, in what others called a significant setback for the new U.S. initiatives to quell Iraq's bloody insurgency.
US asks us to pick up litter while city is in ruins, says mayor of Baghdad.
04.03.07. Damien McElroy, Telegraph.
HEALTH IN IRAQ
Four years into the occupation: No health for Iraq.
22.03.07. Dr. Bert De Belder, Globalreserch.ca/uruknet. Iraq’s health status, four years into the occupation, is nothing short of disastrous. Iraq’s health index has deteriorated to a level not seen since the 1950s, says Joseph Chamie, former director of the United Nation’s Population Division and an Iraq specialist. People’s health status is determined by social, economic and environmental factors much more than by the availability of healthcare. Not surprisingly, all these factor! s have deteriorated in the course of the occupation...
Shortage of safe water risks cholera in Iraq -U.N..
22.03.07. Suleiman al-KhalidiReuters / uruknet. United Nations agencies working in Iraq warned on Thursday a chronic shortage of safe drinking water risks causing more child deaths and an outbreak of waterborne disease such as cholera during the summer.
Thousands without food and supplies due to failing distribution system.
17.04.07. Report, IRIN. "The effectiveness and efficiency of the PDS ... have declined significantly," said the report issued on 10 April by the Washington-based NGO Refugees International (RI), an advocacy group.
REFUGEES OF IRAQ
Iraqis on the Run.
04.02.07. P. Cockburn, Counterpunch / ICHBlog. Iraq is experiencing the biggest exodus in the Middle East since Palestinians were forced to flee in 1948 upon the creation of Israel. "We were forced to leave our house six months ago and since then we have moved more than eight times," said Abu Mustafa, a 56-year-old man from Baghdad. "Sectarian violence has now even reached the displacement camps but we are tired of running away. Sometimes I have asked myself if it is not better to die than to live like a Bedouin all my life."
War in Iraq Propelling A Massive Migration.
04.02.07. Washington Post. As the fourth year of war nears its end, the Middle East's largest refugee crisis since the Palestinian exodus from Israel in 1948 is unfolding in a climate of fear, persecution and tragedy.
Nearly 2 million Iraqis -- about 8 percent of the prewar population -- have embarked on a desperate migration, mostly to Jordan, Syria and Lebanon, according to the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees. The refugees include large numbers of doctors, academics and other professionals vital for Iraq's recovery. Another 1.7 million have been forced to move to safer towns and villages inside Iraq, and as many as 50,000 Iraqis a month flee their homes, the U.N. agency said in January.
The State Department's Rosy Deception on Iraq Refugees.
09.02.07. Electronic iraq. The message from the State Department paints a picture that is filled with the positivity of good works being carried out in the name of America. From Jordan the view is different.
Iraq: The facts on displaced persons and refugees">Iraq: The facts on displaced persons and refugees.
28.02.07. Relief Web. The situation currently facing Iraqi refugees and internally displaced persons has very quickly become one of the most pressing humanitarian crises in the world.
Leaving Iraq: Tales from a new diaspora.
04.03.07. The Star. REFUGEES | Nearly 2 million Iraqis, about 8 per cent of the pre-war population, are fuelling a desperate migration.
UN Plans to Open Iraqi Refugee Office in Jordan.
06.03.07. Democracy Now.
Europe Struggles with Inlfux of Iraqi Refugees.
06.03.07. NPR/ICH. After four years of chaos and violence, nearly two million Iraqis remain outside their country, according to the UN agency for refugees.
Video Report.. Iraq’s growing refugee crisis. Channel 4 News (12.03.07)
No Child Left Behind? Iraqi Edition.
13.03.07. R. Palta, Mother Jones / uruknet. 'few of the estimated 172,000 to 230,000 school-aged Iraq War refugees living Jordan are enrolled in school. Those children, many of whom are from middle class Iraqi families, lack the proper residency status to qualify for public school, and their families lack the finances to enroll their children in private institutions. As a result, over a hundred thousand Iraqi children have been out of school for as many as 4 years now--and that's just counting those in Jordan. '
U.N. seeks $1.7M to feed Iraqi refugees.
15.03.07. AP. 'The World Food Program has launched an appeal for $1.7 million to help feed tens of thousands of Iraqi refugees who are continue to arrive in Syria and increasingly without the resources to sustain themselves.'
More Iraqi refugees expected in Europe.
16.03.07. AP / The State. The number of Iraqi refugees arriving in Europe is expected to double to 40,000 in 2007 based on trends from the first two months of the year, the U.N. refugee agency said Friday
World 'ignoring Iraqi refugees'.
20.03.07. BBC/legitgov. The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) says there has been an "abject denial" around the world of the humanitarian impact of invading Iraq. Syria says it is home to 1.2m Iraqi refugees, with up to 800,000 in Jordan.
Thousands without food and supplies due to failing distribution system.
22.03.07. REFUGEES INTERNATIONAL
Iraqi Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons: A Deepening Humanitarian Crisis?.
23.03.07. CRS REPORT.
Iraq: Time to Acknowledge and Address the Displacement Crisis.
03.04.07. Kristele Younes, Refugees International /alertnet. 'The humanitarian and displacement crisis in Iraq is growing in intensity and gravity. The UN estimates that more than two million Iraqis are now refugees in neighboring countries and more than 1.9 million have fled for safer areas within Iraq. Of these internally displaced people (IDPs), more than 730,000 have fled since the Samarra Shrine bombing of February 2006, which intensified the sectarian violence that is tearing Iraq apart.'
Child Refugees from Iraq Require Targeted Assistance in Host Countries.
09.04.07. Reuters. ' As violence in Iraq continues to add to the largest refugee crisis in the Middle East in half a century, World Vision has launched a combined advocacy and relief effort to assist children and families fleeing to neighboring countries. Some 2 million Iraqis have left their volatile homeland and many are struggling to cope without access to health care, legal employment or education for their children in host countries.'
Refugees Speak of Escape from Hell.
11.04.07. Dahr Jamail, IPS / uruknet. 'Refugees from Iraq scattered around Damascus describe hellish conditions in the country they managed to leave behind.'
Iraq: New humanitarian crisis looms as more than three million Iraqis displaced by war.
16.04.07. Amnesty International Press Release.
UN Refugee Agency Turns Spotlight on Iraqis.
17.04.07. Khody Akhavi,, Electronic Iraq. Nearly four million Iraqis have been displaced in and outside their country since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, making it the largest exodus of people in the Middle East since the creation of Israel in 1948. The United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, on Tuesday will convene a two-day conference in Geneva to address Iraq's deepening humanitarian crisis.
US and UK Bear Special Duty to Aid Refugees.
17.04.07. Statement, Human Rights Watch. Iraq's neighbors are closing off escape routes to Iraqi asylum seekers, just as the international community has begun to respond to the 2 million refugees from the war, Human Rights Watch said in a briefing paper released today. ... The briefing paper focuses on new restrictive measures taken by Jordan and Egypt to prevent more refugees from coming. Syria, which is hosting about 1 million Iraqis, denied visas to Human Rights Watch researchers seeking to document their situation. Saudi Arabia is building a US$7 billion high-tech barrier on its border with Iraq to keep Iraqis out, while Kuwait is categorically rejecting Iraqi asylum seekers.
HUMAN RIGHTS IN IRAQ
War Crimes Committed by the United States in Iraq and Mechanisms for Accountability
10.10.06. Report, Consumers for Peace. This report was prepared by Consumers for Peace.org with the advice of Karen Parker, noted lawyer in human rights and humanitarian law. Ms. Parker is President of the San Francisco-based Association of Humanitarian Lawyers www.humanlaw.org) and Chief Delegate to the United Nations for the Los Angeles-based International Educational Development/Humanitarian Law Project (IED/AHL), an accredited non-governmental organization on the U.N. Secretary-General’s list.
See also http://informationclearinghouse.info/article15261.htm
Routine Practices of Torture by US Forces in Iraq: Testimony of Abbas Z. Abid to the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission
23.02.07. Global Research.ca.
Rape Cases emerge From the Shadows
01.03.07. Dahr Jamail. Reports of the gang-rape of 20-year-old Sabrine al-Janabi by three policemen has set off new demands for justice from Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government.
Iraq: An ever-worsening crisis.
11.04.07. International Red Cross (ICRC) news. In a report issued today in Geneva, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) expresses alarm about the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Iraq and calls for urgent action to better protect civilians against the continuing violence.
FULL ICRC REPORT. IRAQ: CIVILIANS WITHOUT PROTECTION.
Outrage over Imminent Execution of Iraqi Women
02.03.07. Dahr Jamail. Three young women accused of joining the Iraqi insurgency movement and engaging in "terrorism" have been sentenced to death, provoking protest from rights organisations fearing that this could be the start of more executions of women in post-Saddam Hussein's Iraq.
DEATH IN IRAQ
REPORTS
The Human Cost of the War in Iraq: A Mortality Study, 2002-2006
09.10.06. Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland; School of Medicine, Al Mustansiriya University, Baghdad, Iraq; in cooperation with the Center for International Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts. See also related Appendix
ACLU Releases Files on Civilian Casualties in Afghanistan and Iraq
12.04.07. ACLU. Americans Have a Right to Unfiltered Information About the Human Costs of War, ACLU Says. NEW YORK - The American Civil Liberties Union today made public hundreds of claims for damages by family members of civilians killed or injured by Coalition Forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. The ACLU received the records in response to a Freedom of Information Act request it filed in June 2006.
IRAQ: Violence distressing mental state of population.
31.01.07. Irin. Bullets and bombs are killing thousands of civilians every month in Iraq while the psychological impact of the ongoing violence is affecting the mental health of millions and is a major cause for concern for future generations, psychologists say. See Guardian headlines: here.
ARTICLES
Almost 2,000 bodies taken to Baghdad morgue (July).
09.08.06. Reuters.
U.S. count of Baghdad deaths excludes car bombs, mortar attacks
08.09.06. M Brunswick / Z. Obeid, McClatchy.
4,000 Iraq Police Killed in Past 2 Years
06.10.06. AP / Forbes.
Medics Beg For Help As Iraqis Die Needlessly
20.10.06. J. Laurance, Independent. Medical facts for Iraq.
Another US crime in Ashaqi Photographic evidence
08.12.06. Roads to Iraq, uruknet.
For hanging of Saddam Hussein, see ‘Updates, Index on US Bases, Baghdad
Unacceptable death toll in Iraq, say Americans
28.02.07. Angus Reid. 77% of respondents believe the number of U.S. military casualties and Iraqi civilian casualties has been unacceptable.
Occupation killed a family of seven members in Iraq
25.02.07. Roads to Iraq. - Residents in Aana city in Anbar-province reported that US occupation forces destroyed the Communication and Post Center building. ... An eyewitness said that US soldiers put explosives in the building and destroy it, no one injured in the process but part of the city hospital which is close to the building was damaged.
- Reported on Qudspress, an Iraqi ambulance man, reported that US military killed a family of seven people with their taxi driver, in their way to leave Iraq for Jordan. ... The eyewitness Ahmed Khalaf Aljoaani said: American forces opened fire on the car "GMC" with a family in it, a father, the mother and five children and the taxi driver in their way to Jordan to escape the deteriorating situation, all killed. The American forces blocked the area of the incident, which was on the international highway, near Al-Qaim city for an hour, re-opening after the removal of the bodies, and prevented two photo-journalists from photographing the accident.
Another Casualty: Coverage of the Iraq War
24.03.07. Dahr Jamail. 'Iraq is the most dangerous place in the world for journalists. Along with names and dates, the Brussels Tribunal has listed the circumstances under which Iraqi media personnel have been killed since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003. This extremely credible report cites 195 as dead. If non-Iraqi media representatives are included, the figure goes beyond 200. Both figures are well in excess of the media fatalities suffered in Vietnam or during World War II"
(from Foreign Policy in Focus ). 'The primary reason why reporting from Iraq is dangerous for all journalists is the horrific security situation. Iraqi journalists reporting from the streets are in perpetual danger. If any of the countless militias does not want a certain story made public, it will make sure that the journalist has filed his or her last story. Not to mention the scores of reporter deaths which have been the combined handiwork of the Iraqi government, occupation forces and/or criminal gangs. . Despite President Bush’s assertion that life in Iraq is improving, a senior Iraqi journalist was found dead in the capital on March 3, 2007. On the same day the body of the managing editor of Baghdad’s al-Safir newspaper, Jamal al-Zubaidi, was found shot in the head.'
Counting the cost
27.03.07. R. Horton, Guardian. Richard Horton. It's time we held our leaders to account for the 650,000 Iraqi dead. 'Our collective failure has been to take our political leaders at their word. This week, the BBC reported that the government's own scientists advised ministers that the Johns Hopkins study on Iraq civilian mortality was accurate and reliable. This paper was published in the Lancet last October. It estimated that 650,000 Iraqi civilians had died since the American- and British-led invasion in March 2003.'
Fallujah Fears a 'Genocidal Strategy'
30.03.07. Ali al-Fadhily, Dahr Jamail website, Interpress. Iraqis in the volatile al-Anbar province west of Baghdad are reporting regular killings carried out by U.S. forces that many believe are part of a 'genocidal' strategy.
US compensation files for Iraqi, Afghan civilian deaths released under FOIA
12.04.07. The Jurist. A searchable database documenting civilian casualties. There are 479 files from Iraq and 17 from Afghanistan. 'While some claims were denied because the incidents arose from enemy action or occurred during combat situations, other incidents resulted in cash payments. When the military admits fault, the payments are labeled as "compensation." "Condolence" payments, which the military offers as expressions of sympathy, can be awarded without military admission of fault and are capped at $2500.'
Iraq: US Data on Civilian Casualties Raises Serious Concerns
12.04.07. Human Rights Watch. US government documents made public by court order raise serious concerns about the number of civilian casualties caused by American soldiers and contractors in Iraq and the standards under which it pays compensation to Iraqi victims, Human Rights Watch said today. The records, which document compensation claims made by the families of Iraqis killed by US troops, were revealed today by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).
The assassination of two professors from Mosul University
04.07. Al mosul. Another wave of assassination of Academics in Mosul. Dr Talal Al-Jalili and Dr Jaffer. For further information on academic deaths, see The Brussels Tribunal website See thoughtful article by Joshua Holland, Violence like that at Virginia Tech is commonplace in Iraq's universities
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MEANWHILE: THE US/UK ARE ON ANOTHER PLANET
New York dinner raises $18m. for IDF (Friends of the Israeli Defense Forces). Bizarre and obscene?
One Picture Sits Over Differing Surveys.
26.03.07. Ali al-Fadhily, Inter Press Service. 'The Sunday Times of London published the results of a survey Mar. 18 carried out by the British firm Opinion Research Business that claimed that most Iraqis prefer life under the new government to life under Saddam Hussein.' Who paid for this “survey”?
RESISTANCE IN IRAQ
The Iraqi resistance only exists to end the occupation.
12.04.07. Haifa Zangana. 'It is important to recognise that the resistance was born not only of ideological, religious and patriotic convictions, but also as a response to the reality of the brutal actions of the occupation and its administration. It is a response to arbitrary break-ins, humiliating searches, arrests, detention and torture. According to the Red Cross, "the number of people arrested or interned by the multinational forces has increased by 40% since early 2006. The number of people held by the Iraqi authorities has also increased significantly ... Many of the security detainees are women who have been subjected to abuse and rape and who are often arrested as a means to force male relatives to confess to crimes they have not committed. According to the Iraqi MP Mohamed al-Dainey, there are 65 documented cases of women's rape in occupation detention centres in 2006. Four women currently face execution - the death penalty for women was outlawed in Iraq from 1965 until 2004 - for allegedly killing security force members. These are accusations they deny and Amnesty International has challenged. . There is only one solution to this disaster, and that is for the US and Britain to accept that the Iraqi resistance is fighting to end the occupation.’
Sadr's Rising Star to Eclipse Bush's Surge? .
17.04.07. Electronic Iraq writes: "The prospect of Sadr's appeal extending to a section of the
Sunni community, with the tacit support of grand ayatollah Ali Sistani, is the nightmare scenario that the Bush
administration most dreads. Yet it may come to pass." SUPERB MUST READ ARTICLE by Dilip Hiro. 'This indeed was the case with the demonstration on April 9 in Najaf. Over a million Iraqis, holding aloft thousands of national flags, marched, chanting, "Yes, yes, Iraq/No, no, America" and "No, no, American/Leave, leave occupier." Both the size of the demonstration and its composition were unprecedented. "There are people here from all different parties and sects," Hadhim al-Araji, Sadr's representative in Baghdad's Kadhimiya district, told reporters. "We are all carrying the national flag, a symbol of unity. And we are all united in calling for the withdrawal of the Americans."... Crucially, the mammoth demonstration reflected the view prevalent among Iraqi lawmakers. Last autumn, 170 of them in a 275-member Parliament, signed a motion, demanding to know the date of a future American withdrawal.' The demonstrators arrived from all over the country in response to a call by Muqtada al-Sadr, a radical Shiite cleric, to demand an end to foreign occupation on the fourth anniversary of the end of Baathist rule in Baghdad.
Sadr raises pressure for US to withdraw
17.04.07. Damien McElroy, The Telegraph. The United States faced a fresh challenge to its presence in Iraq yesterday when supporters of Moqtada al-Sadr's radical Shia Muslim movement quit the Baghdad government to demand a deadline for withdrawal of its troops.
VIDEOS
Video. U.S. soldiers shooting Iraqi civilians (23.03.07) 2 min.
Video. US soldiers destroyed civilians houses in Baghdad (25.03.07, Roads to Iraq / uruknet)...
Expat film maker charts Baghdad's dying past.
03.04.07. reuters.
Video. Je m'appelle Baghdad
Video. US_Soldiers_Run_an_Iraqi_Off_the_Road. It would probably be nice to check on the guy that you just caused to roll his truck. To see if he's, you know, dead or something.
Unspeakable Grief and Horror.
Thewe. Photos and stories.
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Sarah Meyer is a researcher living in the U.K.
The url to Index on Iraq: A Journey in Hell is: http://indexresearch.blogspot.com/2007/04/index-on-iraq-journey-in-hell.html
A short url is: http://tinyurl.com/2g6x7d
This blog will also appear on The BRussels Tribunal website .
Other blogs about Iraq by Sarah Meyer
US Bases in Iraq. Part I: Baghdad
US/UK Bases in Iraq. Part II. The South: Falcon-al-Sarq, Tallil, Shaibah
Iraqs US/UK Permanent Bases: Intentional Obfuscation
Iraq: The Occupation is the Disease
Iraq: Assassination of Academics: The Jalili Report
Prisons and Torture in Iraq
Victims of Violence
07.04.06. (Updated regularly) S. Meyer, Index Research. The results of ‘post-traumatic-stress on soldiers
Iraq: Security Companies and Training Camps
Totalitarianism and Obedience
13.02.07. Sarah Meyer, Index Research.
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Tags: Index Research, Iraq, Iraq Health, Iraq Cities, Refugees, Human Rights, Death in Iraq,
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