Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-03-01-Speech-4-012"
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"en.20010301.1.4-012"2
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"Mr President, I visited Kuwait recently where I met a man whose childhood friend has been killed during the assault by Iraq upon Kuwait. He went out into the street and saw his friend’s body. When he put his hands down he saw that he was dead. He found that he was touching almost a piece of jelly. The Iraqi soldiers had broken every single bone in that man’s body.
When we talk about the Iraqi people let us not forget the 750 or so Kuwaiti prisoners of war still inside Iraqi prisons. We do not know what has happened to them. We have to keep looking.
I visited Iran. I have talked to the families of prisoners who are still in Iraq from the Iran/Iraq war of 1981-1988. A million people were killed because of Saddam’s assault and predatory efforts inside Iran. Maybe 25 to 30,000 prisoners from Iran are still inside Iraqi prisons. Let us not forget those people either.
I have been to Kurdistan. I have seen the results of the chemical weapons. Do not let us forget the half million Kurdistani people whose lives have been taken away from them by Baghdad since they were invaded in the north with chemical weapons in August 1988 shortly after Saddam was driven out of Iran.
I have been to the marshlands of Iraq many times, the antique heritage of the world, the marshlands of Mesopotamia. I have seen year after year the steady drainage, the reduction of the water, and the fact now that over half a million marsh dwellers, reaching right back beyond the beginnings of civilisation of our world, have now had their livelihood, their lives destroyed, their place removed from under their feet by the Iraqi marsh drainage. And why? So that Saddam can get his tanks closer to Iran and closer to Kuwait so that he can invade more easily next time.
The no-fly zones have been effective in protecting the lives of at least some of those people but we should do more; we must do more. It is within our power to restore the marshes of Iraq.
This man is a monster. When we talk about the no-fly zone, when we talk about the collateral damage, do not let us forget that point. In 1989, he earned USD 15 billion from oil and he spent 13 billion on arms. In 1999 he earned USD 16 billion and at least, legally, he could not spend any on arms.
I recommend that we look at taking the food distribution of the “oil for food programme” out of his hands, that we look at tearing down those dams that have wrecked the marshes and that we work to set up a criminal court where he can be tried at least in abstentia. When we talk of a policy on Iraq, Commissioner Patten spoke about the recklessness of the Iraq regime. It is not recklessness it is ruthlessness. This man is indeed a modern Hitler."@en1
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