It is ironic that Yellow Dog Democrats are so ungrateful to Iraqi guerrillas, whose actions are the chief guarantor of their hoped-for defeat of Bush in 2004. :->
Of course, it is natural, however, that well-intentioned liberal imperialists are distressed at the possibility of having to leave Iraq without giving Iraqis gifts of police and armed forces who will take as good care of political activists, trade unionists, and other trouble-makers as they used to under Saddam Hussein:
***** Swans Commentary » swans.com Special Issue on Iraq - February 2, 2004 RESISTANCE: IN THE EYE OF THE AMERICAN HEGEMON "Freeing" Iraq's Economy - For Its Occupiers* Rania Masri
. . . Amidst all these metamorphic changes imposed on the Iraqi economy, Bremer issued this statement in his second Public Notice: "To the extent consistent with its obligation to maintain security and civil order, the Coalition Provisional Authority respects Iraqi laws." (21) Changing Iraq's economic structure has nothing to do with maintaining "security and civil order," and everything to do with what one US Army Reserve Colonel referred to as the US national goal of privatizing industry. Miami Today News, November 27, 2003).')" onmouseout="nd();">(22)
What Bremer was talking about in his Public Notice was Iraqi workers' right to organize. In 1987, Saddam Hussein reclassified most Iraqi workers -- those who worked in the huge state enterprises -- as civil servants, and, as such, they were prohibited from forming unions and bargaining. This is the law that Bremer respects, a law that is itself a violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Bremer is right to worry about "security and civil order." He is correct in worrying about agitating workers as he strips away their protections, their jobs, and their future security. Already, despite the violation of their civil rights, workers are being organized and are protesting. In October, for example, workers of the Southern Oil Company Trade Unionists staged a two-day strike after Indian and Pakistani laborers were employed by Kuwaiti subcontractors. As reported by Ewa Jasiewicz of the Occupation Watch Center, "They physically threw out the foreign workers and demanded a portion of the 70% unemployed population of Iraq be employed instead." (23)
Bremer intensified the anti-union arsenal when he issued a decree called Public Notice Number One, prohibiting "pronouncements and material that incite civil disorder, rioting or damage to property." (24) "The phrase can easily be interpreted to mean strikes or other organized labor protest," writes labor journalist David Bacon. "Those who violate the decree 'will be subject to immediate detention by Coalition security forces and held as a security internee under the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949' -- in other words, as a prisoner of war." (25)
Bremer further issued Order 19, limiting protests, assemblies, and marches, and outlawing public gatherings without permission from the CPA. (26) Thus, in effect, outlawing protests for workers' rights, since, naturally, the CPA won't authorize such protests when it is also harassing, arresting, and detaining union leaders (such as the leaders of the growing Union of the Unemployed). (27) . . .
<http://www.swans.com/library/art10/iraq/masri.html> ***** -- Yoshie
* Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/> * Calendars of Events in Columbus: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/calendar.html>, <http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/> * Student International Forum: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/> * Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio> * Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>