Appalling effects of the US’ invasion of Iraq still being felt

THIS year marks the 15th anniversary of the most reprehensible act in the history of American foreign policy: the invasion of Iraq.

The Bush administration fell back on a humanitarian and human rights rationale to justify its invasion of Iraq when no weapons of mass destruction were found and no ties to al-qaeda were established.

Iraqis killed as a result of the US war, directly or indirectly, according to a study by the British medical journal The Lancet, estimate Iraqi deaths as 1.2 to

1.4 million.

The US military tortured, sexually degraded and abused thousands of Iraqi prisoners. At Abu Ghraib prison, US troops stripped prisoners naked and terrorised them with dogs. No US government or military official has been charged, much less convicted.

Unicef’s recent report, “A Heavy Price for Children”, stated that

3.6 million children in Iraq (1 in 5) are at serious risk of death, injury, sexual violence and recruitment into armed groups.

The report finds that 4.7 million Iraqi children (a third of all of Iraq’s children) require some form of humanitarian aid.

In 2004, the US military carried out two massive sieges of the city of Fallujah, in which it used depleted uranium ammunition. Aside from the destructive impact on the city and the thousands of Iraqis killed, the use of radioactive ammunition has left a terrible legacy. Fallujah now suffers from extremely high rates of cancer and birth defects. The invasion of Iraq was an act of state terrorism. SAJIDA TIMOL

Overport