US Policy and Iraq: A Case of Genocide?
Denis J. Halliday
This article,1 based on a speech made in Spain to an international conference in November 1999 on the United Nations’ regime of economic sanctions on the people of Iraq, briefly addresses the concern that those sanctions constitute genocide – a crime against humanity. It also touches on the incompatibility of such sanctions with the provisions of the United Nations Charter and similar instruments of international law calling out for the establishment of some means of oversight and control in regard to the work of the Security Council.
During a visit to Paris in January 1999, to speak publicly about the terrible impact of United Nations economic sanctions on the people of Iraq, I used the term ‘genocide’ for the first time. This was done at a briefing for the press corps to describe the catastrophic situation that from direct personal experience of thirteen months in Baghdad I had come to consider nothing less than genocidal. The term was picked up by some journalists and used for headlines in the Paris newspapers and then similarly by one or two international wire services. Thereafter, during that visit, I was made to feel by some that I had crossed an invisible line of impropriety! I was criticized by a few for using the term in regard to the impact of economic sanctions themselves. It seemed also that it was deemed particularly inappropriate in respect of the Arab and Islamic people of Iraq. Since then I have observed that the term ‘genocide’ offends many in our Western media and establishment circles when it is used to describe the killing of others for which we are responsible, such as in Iraq. Perhaps for most, the term ‘genocide’ is too emotive and too intimate to our democratic obligation to accept responsibility for even the most disagreeable actions undertaken by our respective governments. For others, it was no more than overdue recognition of the crimes against innocent humanity ongoing throughout Iraq, including the 3 million Kurds of the three northern provinces.
Former US Attorney-General Ramsey Clark, the British author Geoff Simons, and a number of British Members of Parliament critical of British government economic sanctions and military policy have employed the term ‘genocide’ to convey their perception of the Iraq situation. Since the spring of 1999, the term has been used frequently by the establishment in the UK and the US together with mass media to describe the plight of Albanians in Kosovo and the killing of the people of East Timor. Clearly for these deadly situations, despite our historical involvement, the establishment spokespersons using the term ‘genocide’ did not feel in any way responsible. It seems that only others commit genocide, we Western democracies do not! How ironic coming from those nations that inter alia managed the transatlantic slave trade, the massacre of American Indians and the slaughter of the Aboriginal peoples of Australia.
In the fall semester of 1999, in a class I teach at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, we discussed the appropriateness of using the term ‘genocide’ to describe the human crisis in Iraq. We reviewed with some care the definition as set out by the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948. We noted the clear reference to the expression ‘intent’ as being essential in any determination of genocide. In considering UN Security Council Resolution 687, we did not find ‘intent’ spelled out in the text of 1991. Nevertheless, we noted the justification provided some years ago by the then ambassador to the UN and now Secretary of State for the sustained killing of some 500,000 Iraqi children.
Given the stark reality of death in Iraq under economic sanctions, the choice for the class in respect of the consequences of UN Resolution 687 was one between de jure and de facto genocide, or, as one student suggested, a choice between first-degree murder or manslaughter. The class looked between the lines of the Resolution, but the majority of students gave the original drafters the benefit of the doubt, and likewise to those member states that support the imposition of the uniquely comprehensive and devastating economic sanctions that Resolution 687 represents – sanctions that are particularly devastating, coming as they do on top of the illegal civilian-targeted bombing and missile attacks by the US and UK allies of the Gulf War. However, some including myself consider that by the deliberate continuation of the UN economic sanctions regime on Iraq, in full knowledge of their deadly impact as frequently reported by the Secretary-General and others, the member states of the Security Council are indeed guilty of intentionally sustaining a regime of genocide. It is this view that was supported overwhelmingly by international lawyers at the conference in Spain organized by the Spanish Campaign for the Lifting of Sanctions on Iraq.
The information provided by the various organizations of the United Nations system – FAO, WFP, UNICEF, and WHO – who have carried out surveys using international experts on infant and child mortality rates in Iraq under economic sanctions – underlines that we have de facto genocide. They have provided data showing the very significant increase in mortality rates over the years since Resolution 687 was imposed. We have also been given data by WHO showing significant increases in the deaths of adults, particularly among the aged in need of sophisticated drugs no long available in Iraq. We have figures showing extraordinary increases in the incidence of various cancers, including leukemia in children, since the use of depleted uranium by the UK and US during the Gulf War. We know the sad human cost today in Iraq of the deliberate destruction by Gulf War allies of the means for treatment and distribution of clean water, adequate electric power generation and effective urban sanitation systems. This damage was reported initially by the mission of then undersecretary-general and now president of Finland, Martti Ahtisaari, in 1991, and many times since by UNICEF and WHO.
The informally termed Oil-for-Food program, which is fully funded by Iraq through limited oil sales under UN auspices, was designed to prevent further deterioration, no more than that. The Security Council-approved but heavily constrained importation of limited and basic foodstuffs, medicines, and drugs into the country has done little more than maintain high mortality rates and massive malnutrition, as the recent UNICEF report has advised. Apart from considerable nutritional shortfalls, including lack of adequate animal proteins, minerals and vitamins within that program, we have not seen the Security Council allow oil revenues substantially to repair the damage caused by the bombing of civilian infrastructure in 1991, 1996 and as recently as December 1998, in breach of the Geneva Conventions. By this denial and by controlling the ceiling on Iraqi oil revenues, the Security Council has determined with deliberation to block adequate repair of water, power and sewerage systems so critical in the battle to save the lives of countless infants and children. In other words, the Council has sustained a source for water-borne diseases leading to thousands of deaths monthly, particularly of infants and children. Likewise, adequate hard currency has not been available for re-equipping of hospitals and other healthcare facilities; and agricultural food production capacity remains starved of essential imported requirements. In short, the Security Council has denied Iraq its right to import adequately, and at the same time its right to repair and rebuild that civilian infrastructure so critical for human well-being, indeed for life itself.
The Security Council has in effect illegally violated international law twice over. First, and contrary to the provisions of the Geneva Conventions, the targeting of men, women and children, noncombatants and civilians, via missile attacks and bombing of civilians and civilian infrastructure in 1991 and thereafter. And second, in an even more deadly, quiet and sustained manner of warfare, the killing of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children, and adults, by the ongoing regime of comprehensive economic sanctions, an embargo backed up by the massive military presence of the USA throughout the Middle East. A military presence not only intimidating to the women and children of Iraq, but equally intimidating to many millions of peoples and their governments throughout the region. Whether one wishes to term economic sanctions on Iraq a form of warfare or not, crimes against humanity or not, the imposition of genocide or not, the sustained imposition of these sanctions constitutes the punishment of millions, and the deaths of hundreds of thousands of innocent human beings. Whatever the terminology, whatever the semantics used, the results are indisputably contrary to the spirit and the word of numerous international legal instruments.
With, or without original intent, the impact of economic sanctions constitutes genocide. Whether it is de jure or de facto genocide, the semantics are irrelevant to those people of Iraq who have seen their children die, their parents die, and their own health and the health of most deteriorate into a state of physical malnutrition, a condition of near national depression and an environment of social collapse.
The question, ‘Does the genocidal impact of economic sanctions on Iraq represent first degree murder as in intent, or manslaughter as in negligence resulting nevertheless in death?’, has been answered.
However, there remains another tragic consequence of the genocide in Iraq, and that is the irreparable damage it has done to the integrity and credibility of the United Nations itself. By sustaining economic sanctions on Iraq in full knowledge of the deadly consequences, the member states of the Security Council have undermined the very legal basis of the organization itself – the Charter. That is not to deny that the device of economic sanctions is provided for in Chapter 7 of the Charter – it is. One could query the intentions in the minds of the victors of World War II when these provisions were drafted in 1945, at a time when the infant UN was proportionally more heavily made up of large and powerful than small and weaker member states. Then, as today, the concept of economic sanctions, bilateral but also multilateral, is more attractive and viable to the powerful, the ‘bully boy’ states, than to the smaller potential victims.
Regardless of 1945 goals, the prolonged and uniquely comprehensive nature of the economic sanctions on Iraq, and economic sanctions regimes imposed elsewhere in the world, have undermined the very purposes and principles (Articles 1 and 2) of the United Nations Charter – the preamble of which calls inter alia for the well-being of all humanity. Likewise, prolonged economic sanctions neglect the rights spelled out in Articles 25 and 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In reality, there are numerous international conventions neglected by the deliberate continuation of economic sanctions regardless of human cost, not least of which is the Convention on the Rights of the Child. These rights are intentionally denied every time an Iraqi child is without nutritious and plentiful food, a place in which to live decently, adequate medical attention, and a good education. A sanctions generation of deprivation has been created by the Security Council. The denial by the Security Council of the rights of an Iraqi child to have opportunities for the future, to life itself, destroys what the United Nations is mandated to enhance and sustain throughout the world.
The conventional Western response to the human crisis in Iraq is that it is solely the fault of their once convenient and former ally of the Iran–Iraq war era, President Saddam Hussein. This is simplistic, dishonest and irresponsible. Further, the history of the Ba’ath party (assisted into power by the CIA) shows that social welfare, including education and healthcare, are top priorities. The party certainly diminished political and civil rights, but basic human rights were enhanced between 1958 and 1990. Regardless of the illegal invasion of Kuwait, there is no possible justification for the murder of Iraqi children and adults, innocent of that invasion, by the US, UK and other powers simply because they cannot punish the leadership of Iraq. That is morally and legally unacceptable on all counts.
Combating this incompatibility between the Charter and instruments of international law with the impact of Security Council decisions such as Resolution 687 would appear to call for several actions. One might be an initiative by the larger, fully representative, and more democratic General Assembly to seek the advice of the International Court of Justice, and by so doing begin to assert meaningfully its oversight function in respect of the work of the powerful yet small and undemocratic Security Council. Another might be the establishment of an NGO to watch the impact of Security Council resolutions worldwide and to monitor their incompatibility with the Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and other international legal instruments. Another might be radical reform of the Council so that it is no longer ‘North’ manipulated, but representative of the states and their peoples thoughout the world on whom its decisions impact.
In conclusion, the genocidal impact of the regime of economic sanctions on the people of Iraq violates the legal instruments that are fundamental to the credible continuation of the United Nations. The Organization urgently needs the protection of an oversight device or devices in regard to the output of the dangerously out-of-control Security Council. The Council is desperately in need of reform to introduce permanent North/South balance and representation. The Council must begin to act in conformity with the essential provisions of the UN Charter itself. In the meantime, men and women of conscience, with moral posture and integrity, must continue to demand the termination of crimes against humanity committed by the member states of the present Security Council in respect to the people of Iraq.