The following is an archived copy of a message sent to a Discussion List run by the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq.
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'Regime' is not a word with positive overtones, and Galloway would have chosen another if he looked on Saddam favorably. As for the nature of Saddam's rule, CASI should take no position on it. We are in a position to influence our 'own' governments that carry out murder in our name. We can do nothing, in Britain, to affect the nature of the Iraqi state, and to talk about it would be empty moralising. CASI members who want to campaign about human rights abuses in Iraq can join other organisations with more expertise than we have in this area. The problem with condemning Iraq is that we would be called upon to do it again and again by people like Blair who want to distract attention from the sanctions question. Eleanor's suggestion of dialogue with exiles might be helpful, so long as we stick to explaining why we oppose sanctions. We could dissipate a lot of energy deploring Saddam to a sceptical audience, and might find ourselves in bed with equally distasteful 'regimes' that lend support to this or that exile group. The fact that some exiles favour sanctions in no way commits us to follow them. -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This is a discussion list run by the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To be removed/added, email soc-casi-discuss-request@lists.cam.ac.uk, NOT the whole list. Please do not sent emails with attached files to the list *** Archived at http://linux.clare.cam.ac.uk/~saw27/casi/discuss.html ***