[casi] The Mother of All Ironies

[James Parke <jp@DELETETHISmrc-dunn.cam.ac.uk>]

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<http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=21&ItemID=2028>

The Mother Of All Ironies
John Sweeney Of The Observer And The BBC ON Mass Death In Iraq

by David Edwards

The fate of Iraq lies in the balance. US Republican Hawks are seeking to
launch a further massive attack against the people of Iraq. It won't happen
if politicians sense sufficient public opposition - journalists play a key
role in influencing that public opinion.

In an Observer article, John Sweeney describes "Saddam's efforts to
portray... children as victims of Western sanctions, which he claims have
cost hundreds of thousands of young lives." ('How Saddam 'staged' fake baby
funerals', The Observer, June 23, 2002)

Media Lens readers will recognise this classic mainstream tendency to
misattribute arguments from earlier Media Alerts. Nick Cohen, also of The
Observer, wrote:

"I look forward to seeing how Noam Chomsky and John Pilger manage to oppose
a war which would end the sanctions they claim have slaughtered hundreds of
thousands of children who otherwise would have had happy, healthy lives in
a prison state (don't fret, they'll get there)." ('Blair's just a Bush
baby', The Observer, March 10, 2002)

These, as we pointed out, were not Chomsky and Pilger's "claims" at all.

The BBC's Ben Brown said:

"He [Saddam] claims UN sanctions have reduced many of his citizens to near
starvation - pictures like these [of a malnourished baby and despairing
mother] have been a powerful propaganda weapon for Saddam, which he'll now
have to give up." (Ben Brown, BBC News, June 20, 1996)

ITN's John Draper said:

"The idea now is targeted or 'smart' sanctions to help ordinary people
while at the same time preventing the Iraqi leader from blaming the West
for the hardships they're suffering." (John Draper, ITN, 10:30 News,
February 20, 2001)

One way of dismissing damning evidence of Western responsibility for mass
death is to trace the origins of that evidence to an utterly incredible
source, such as Saddam Hussein.

Sweeney employs this same smear tactic repeatedly, for example in his
sub-title:

"The Iraqi dictator says his country's children are dying in their
thousands because of the West's embargoes. John Sweeney, in a TV
documentary to be shown tonight, says the figures are bogus".

Further into the article, Sweeney repeats the claim, while managing to hint
at the truth:

"It is an absolute of the government of Iraq - and others - that thousands
of Iraqi children are dying every month because of sanctions".

The mysterious phrase "and others" in fact refers to the individuals and
organisations that are the reason Sweeney and other mainstream journalists
are addressing the issue at all - it is quite obvious that no one would
feel any need to refute claims made by the Iraqi dictator. Since he became
an official enemy of the West, no Western media entity has ever reported
Saddam 's claims with anything other than derision, and no rational person
would dream of taking seriously claims made by him on these issues.

Sweeney manages to cite just one of the missing sources of credible
argument and evidence when he refers to Unicef:

"In 1999 Unicef, in co-operation with the Iraqi government, made a
retrospective projection of 500,000 excess child deaths in the 1990s. The
projection is open to question. It was based on data from within a regime
that tortures children with impunity. All but one of the researchers used
by Unicef were employees of the Ministry of Health, according to the
Lancet."

Hans von Sponeck, who ran the UN's oil for food programme in Iraq, has this
to say of Sweeney's piece:

"Sweeney's article is exactly the kind of journalism that is Orwellian,
double-speak. No doubt, the Iraq Government has manipulated data to suit
its own purposes, everyone of the protagonists unfortunately does this. A
journalist should not. UNICEF has used large numbers of international
researchers and applied sophisticated methods to get these important
figures. Yes, the Ministry of Health personnel cooperated with UNICEF but
ultimately it was UNICEF and UNICEF alone which carried out the data
analysis exactly because they did not want to politicize their work... This
article is a very serious misrepresentation." (Email to Media Lens Editors,
June 24, 2002)

Reverting back to the deceptive idea that Saddam is at the heart of
accusations of mass death in Iraq, Sweeney continues with one truly
stunning misinterpretation of what is being argued by, in fact, the UN and
human rights organisations:

"The dead babies are blamed by Saddam's regime on cancer and birth defects
which first appeared in 1991 and were, it says, caused by depleted
uranium."

Remarkably, Sweeney - having returned to ignoring serious resources and
focusing on Saddam - is here claiming that the 500,000 excess child deaths
are attributed to "cancer and birth defects". Anyone who knows anything
about the tragedy in Iraq knows that this is completely false.

The argument, in fact, is that sanctions have prevented the free flow of
food and medicines, and that they have prevented the reconstruction of the
huge quantities of Iraqi infrastructure destroyed by US bombing during the
Gulf War - the water, sewerage, power-generation, transport, health care,
agriculture and communication systems that are vital for the prevention of
disease, the preservation of life, and for the basic functioning of
society.

Curiously, in his BBC2 Correspondent programme on the same day, 'The Mother
of all Ironies', Sweeney contradicted his Observer article, coming closer
to the truth by questioning how lack of resources (not cancer) could be
responsible for ongoing mass deaths. Sweeney said of the UN's oil for food
programme:

"The strong man's [Saddam's] sums don't add up. Billions from oil are going
into the economy, but the child mortality figures haven't changed... So how
can 7,000 children be dying every month in the midst of all this milk and
honey?" (Sweeney, 'The Mother of all Ironies', Correspondent, BBC2, June
23, 2002)

Again, these are, conveniently, "the strong man's sums", not those of
credible Western human rights organisations. Sweeney sought answers to his
question from someone called Barham Salah, described as Prime Minister,
Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, who said:

"The oil for food programme is a good programme, it must continue. It is
the best thing that has happened to Iraq since the foundation of the Iraqi
state. By the way, not only for the Kurdish areas but also for the rest of
Iraq, because we never had it so good - all Iraqis, not just Kurds."

Sweeney also sought answers from someone called 'Ali', citing a funeral
taxi driver!

Why, in his search for answers, did Sweeney not consult Denis Halliday, who
actually ran the UN's oil for food programme, or his successor, Hans von
Sponeck, who both resigned from the UN describing Western policy as
"genocidal"? Halliday explained the problems with oil for food two years
ago:

"Of the $20 billion that has been provided through the 'oil-for-food'
programme, about a third, or $7 billion, has been spent on UN 'expenses',
reparations to Kuwait and assorted compensation claims. That leaves $13
billion available to the Iraqi government. If you divide that figure by the
population of Iraq, which is 22 million, it leaves some $190 per head of
population per year over 3 years - that is pitifully inadequate."
(Interview with David Edwards, March 2000, www.medialens.org)

Further clarification is provided by other sources ignored by Sweeney. Eric
Hoskins - a Canadian doctor and coordinator of a Harvard study team on Iraq
- reported that the allied Gulf War bombardment "effectively terminated
everything vital to human survival in Iraq - electricity, water, sewage
systems, agriculture, industry and health care". (Quoted, Mark Curtis, 'The
Ambiguities of Power - British Foreign Policy since 1945', Zed Books, 1995,
pp.189-190)

The restriction of resources as a result of sanctions has made the
large-scale reconstruction of this infrastructure impossible. In March 1999
an expert 'Humanitarian Panel' convened by the Security Council concluded
the UN's 'oil-for-food' programme could not meet the needs of the Iraqi
people, "regardless of the improvements that might be brought about in the
implementation of" the relief programme. (Quoted, Voices in the Wilderness
website, March 2002: www.viwuk.freeserve.co.uk)

The Panel continued:

"Regardless of the improvements that might be brought about - in terms of
approval procedures, better performance by the Iraqi Government, or funding
levels - the magnitude of the humanitarian needs is such that they cannot
be met within the context of [the oil-for-food programme]... Nor was the
programme intended to meet all the needs of the Iraqi people... Given the
present state of the infrastructure, the revenue required for its
rehabilitation is far above the level available under the programme."
(ibid)

Their conclusion being that:

"The humanitarian situation in Iraq will continue to be a dire one in the
absence of a sustained revival of the Iraqi economy which in turn cannot be
achieved solely through remedial humanitarian efforts".

This clearly sheds real light on the issue, and yet was ignored by Sweeney.
Instead, Mr. Salah continued:

"Never in our history we had [sic] our government obliged by international
law to spend the revenues of oil on the well-being of Iraqi people,
civilian needs of the Iraqi people. In the past oil revenues were being
squandered on weapons of mass destruction, on repression and on war."

No sane person would deny that Saddam Hussein is a murderous dictator, but
Mr Salah's account of Iraqi history is simply false. According to the
Economist Intelligence Unit's Country Report for Iraq, prior to the
imposition of sanctions the Iraqi welfare state was "among the most
comprehensive and generous in the Arab world". (Iraq: Country Report
1995-96)

In a December 1999 report the International Committee of the Red Cross
noted that "Just a decade ago, Iraq boasted one of the most modern
infrastructures and highest standards of living in the Middle East", with a
"modern, complex health care system" and "sophisticated water-treatment and
pumping facilities." (ICRC, 'Iraq: A Decade of Sanctions', December 1999)

According to the Centre for Economic and Social Rights:

"Over 90% of the population had access to primary health-care, including
laboratory diagnosis and immunisations for childhood diseases such as polio
and diphtheria. During the 1970s and 80s, British and Japanese companies
built scores of large, modern hospitals throughout Iraq, with advanced
technologies for diagnosis, operations and treatment. Secondary and
tertiary services, including surgical care and laboratory investigative
support, were available to most of the Iraqi population at nominal charges.
Iraqi medical and nursing schools emphasised education of women and
attracted students from throughout the Middle East. A majority of Iraqi
physicians were trained in Europe or the United States, and one-quarter
were board-certified specialists." (UN Sanctioned Suffering, May 1996
www.cesr.org)

Why did Sweeney ignore all of these credible and expert sources and
authorities in seeking answers for the causes of continuing mass death in
Iraq? Does he seriously believe that Kurdish opposition groups and
individuals based in Northern Iraq - with obvious and understandable
motives for wanting to paint as grim a picture of the Iraqi regime as
possible - are more credible than these independent and objective
authorities? If not, why did he seek answers just from them?

SUGGESTED ACTION

The goal of Media Lens is to promote rationality, compassion and respect
for others. In writing letters to journalists, we strongly urge readers to
maintain a polite, non-aggressive and non-abusive tone.

Write to John Sweeney at the BBC:

Email: john.sweeney@bbc.co.uk

Ask John Sweeney why, in seeking answers to the question of mass child
deaths in Iraq, he failed to interview recognised and credible sources such
as Denis Halliday, Hans von Sponeck, Unicef, and a range of human rights
groups. Why not seek out these more objective and impartial individuals and
organisations, rather than opposition groups involved in an armed struggle
with the Iraqi regime? Why did he continuously refer to the mass deaths of
children in Iraq as the claims of Saddam, rather than of these credible
individuals and agencies?

Copy your letters to the Observer's editor, Roger Alton.

Email: roger.alton@observer.co.uk

Copy your letters to editor@medialens.org.

Feel free to respond to Media Lens alerts (editor@medialens.org).

Visit the Media Lens website: http://www.MediaLens.org


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