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Some More News On Iraq



Iraq refuses to receive UN human rights mission, Arab News - Nov 6, 1999

UAE/Iraq ferry gets UN backing for more routes-INA / Reuters - Nov 08,
1999 10:29 a.m. Eastern
Iraq and Yugoslavia vow to resist Western siege, Reuters - Nov 08, 1999
08:42 a.m. Eastern
British MP attacks UN bids to ease Iraq sanctions, Reuters - Nov 08,
1999 01:34 p.m Eastern

++++++++++

 Iraq refuses to receive UN human rights mission
AN - Nov 6, 1999

Iraq refused yesterday to allow the UN's special rapporteur on human
rights
into Iraq to investigate allegations concerning the human rights in
Iraq.

Iraqi Deputy Foreign Minister Nizar Hamdoun said that Iraq is ready to
receive someone other than Max van der Stoel, saying, "He visited Iraq,
yet
his behavior and dealing with Iraq proved his bias and lack of
objectivity."

Hamdoun added, "Iraq will take care of the human rights issue, and it
does
not wait for anybody to improve the relation with the Iraqis," adding
that
Iraq is "free of any weapons of mass destruction and that all statements
by
the USA are allegations aimed at terminating the Iraqi people and
government."
 

++++++++++

UAE/Iraq ferry gets UN backing for more routes-INA
Reuters - Nov 08, 1999 10:29 a.m. Eastern

BAGHDAD, Nov 8 (Reuters) - The United Nations has approved the expansion
of
a ferry service which now runs between Iraq and the United Arab Emirates
to
include Qatar and Bahrain, the official Iraqi News Agency (INA) quoted
the
ferry operator as saying on Monday.

Salem Mubarak, general manager of the Dubai-based Naif Marine Services,
said
the U.N. Sanctions Committee had approved using his company's Jabal Ali
1
ferry to transport passengers and goods between Iraq, Qatar and Bahrain.

Mubarak said his company would use a new ferry bought from Greece to run

between the Iraqi port of Umm Qasr and Port Rashid in Dubai. The ferry
is
due to arrive in Dubai and will go into service early next year.

Company officials in Dubai, the UAE's commercial hub, could not confirm
the
U.N. approval but said discussions were still ongoing with the Bahraini
and
Qatari governments about starting the service to Iraq. They said Mubarak
was
currently in Iraq.

``We have not got a firm commitment from the two governments, or
authorisation, to go ahead with the plan,'' one official told Reuters.

The ferry service began weekly trips between Dubai in the UAE and Umm
Qasr
late last year after its owners secured U.N. approval for the service.

According to INA the ferry has so far carried out 50 trips carrying
13,842
passengers from the UAE to Iraq and vice versa.

Iraq has been largely cut off from the outside world under sanctions
imposed
by the United Nations over its 1990 invasion of Kuwait. The UAE has been
at
the forefront of calls to bring Iraq out of its isolation and back into
the
Arab fold

++++++++++

Iraq and Yugoslavia vow to resist Western siege
Reuters - Nov 08, 1999 08:42 a.m. Eastern

By Hassan Hafidh

BAGHDAD, Nov 8 (Reuters) - Iraq and Yugoslavia, both internationally
isolated and under sanctions, pledged to work together to resist the
United
States and its Western allies.

``Iraq and Yugoslavia have to work together...against the aggression
which
is still continuing,'' Monday's Baghdad press quoted Yugoslav Foreign
Trade
Minister Borislav Vukovic as saying during a meeting with President
Saddam
Hussein.

Baghdad has rolled out the red carpet for Vukovic and Yugoslav deputy
prime
minister Maja Gojkovic. They are visiting the Arab state to strike trade

contracts under Baghdad's oil-for-food deal with the United Nations.

Vukovic was the only official received by President Saddam Hussein among

several visitors from other countries attending the current
international
Baghdad trade fair.

The Iraqi News Agency INA quoting Vukovic as telling Saddam during the
meeting on Sunday that Iraq and Yugoslavia should work together in order
to
end international sanctions on their respective countries.

Both Iraq and Yugoslavia suffer sanctions, Baghdad because of the 1990
invasion of Kuwait and Belgrade over its role in a series of Balkan wars

over the past decade.

INA said Vukovic delivered to Saddam a message from Yugoslav leader
Slobodan
Milosevic ``on bilateral relations and means to develop them.''

``We are with you... and both Baghdad and Belgrade are fighting
imperialism,'' Saddam said in a clear reference to the United States and
its
Western allies.

Parallels were drawn between the Yugoslav crisis and Iraq's own
confrontations with the United States. ``In their aggression against
Iraq
and Yugoslavia, the aggressors have used the same tactics,'' Saddam told
the
Yugoslav visitor.

U.S.-led multinational forces drove Iraqi troops out of Kuwait in 1991.
In
December last year the United States and Britain unleashed a
four-day-long
air campaign against Iraq over weapons inspections, similar to NATO
bombings
of Yugoslavia.

Baghdad newspapers quoted Iraq's Vice-President Taha Yassin Ramadan as
saying the bombing of Iraq and air strikes against Yugoslavia were
intended
to impose control of the two countries.

The papers said Ramadan made the remark while receiving Gojkovic.

On Sunday, INA said Iraq and Yugoslavia started trade talks to cement
economic cooperation.

Many Yugoslav firms were involved in industrial and construction
projects in
Iraq before its 1990 invasion of Kuwait.

Earlier this year the Belgrade press said Yugoslavia had signed
contracts
with Iraq worth $18 million to supply food in exchange for oil.

``The Iraqi market is open wide for Yugoslav companies to resume
business in
Iraq,'' the Iraqi press quoted Saleh as saying.

++++++++++

British MP attacks UN bids to ease Iraq sanctions
Reuters - Nov 08, 1999 01:34 p.m Eastern

BAGHDAD, Nov 8 (Reuters) - A British member of parliament on Monday
dismissed efforts at the U.N. Security Council to ease the embargo on
Iraq
as a cover-up for what he called the ``crime'' of sanctions.

Efforts to ease the sanctions were intended to conceal their continuing
impact on Iraq, George Galloway of Britain's ruling Labour Party, said.

``This is why they are engaged in this grisly dance in the Security
Council
in New York to try to repackage this crime in a way which the world will

find more attractive,'' Galloway said.

The U.N. ambassadors of the United States, Britain, France, Russia and
China
-- the five permanent members of the Security Council -- met in New York
on
Friday to discuss a potential resolution.

Galloway arrived in Baghdad on Saturday at the head of a convoy of
supporters after a two-month journey across Europe, North Africa and the

Middle East on a double-decker London bus to drum up support for the
lifting
of the U.N. embargo.

The stringent economic sanctions were imposed on Iraq after its 1990
invasion of Kuwait.

Galloway spoke to reporters after briefing the Iraqi parliament on his
trip.

The convoy, which left London in early September, is dubbed the ``Mariam

Convoy'' after Mariam Hamza, a six-year-old Iraqi girl whom Galloway
arranged to be taken to Scotland in 1997 for leukaemia treatment.

She returned home last year after recovering but suffered a relapse in
August. Blinded and apparently suffering brain damage, she was sent to
Amman
for treatment last month.

``One of the purposes to bring Mariam Hamza to Britain was to show the
British people that Iraqis are people just like us and their children
are
like ours,'' Galloway said.

Iraq says the U.N. sanctions have caused well over one million deaths.
It
says it has complied fully with resolutions related to the ceasefire
that
ended the 1991 Gulf War over Kuwait and that the sanctions should be
scrapped entirely.

Galloway visited a Baghdad hospital on Sunday and was told that the U.N.

embargo killed three children every day. He also visited the Amiriya
Shelter
in Baghdad where hundreds of people were killed when U.S. forces bombed
it
during the Gulf war.

++++++++++


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