by Naomi Klein
If every last soldier pulled out of the Gulf tomorrow and a
sovereign government came to power, Iraq would still be occupied: by
laws written in the interest of another country; by foreign
corporations controlling its essential services; by 70% unemployment
sparked by public sector layoffs.
Any movement serious about Iraqi self-determination must call not
only for an end to Iraq's military occupation, but to its economic
colonisation as well. That means reversing the shock therapy reforms
that US occupation chief Paul Bremer has fraudulently passed off as
"reconstruction", and cancelling all privatisation contracts that
are flowing from these reforms.
How can such an ambitious goal be achieved? Easy: by showing that
Bremer's reforms were illegal to begin with. They clearly violate
the international convention governing the behaviour of occupying
forces, the Hague regulations of 1907 (the companion to the 1949
Geneva conventions, both ratified by the United States), as well as
the US army's own code of war.
The Hague regulations state that an occupying power must respect
"unless absolutely prevented, the laws in force in the country". The
coalition provisional authority has shredded that simple rule with
gleeful defiance. Iraq's constitution outlaws the privatisation of
key state assets, and it bars foreigners from owning Iraqi firms.
FULL TEXT
---
Enver Masud, "An Open Letter to the People
of Iraq," The Wisdom Fund, April 22, 2003
Ghazi Sabir-Ali, "Let Iraqis Rebuild
Their Own Country," The Guardian, August 1, 2003
Enver Masud, "New Constitution a Pretext for
Exploiting Iraq," The Wisdom Fund, September 16, 2003
["We will write into that constitution exactly the kinds of
guarantees that were not in Saddam's constitution.," L. Paul Bremer
told ABC's "This Week" from Baghdad, the Iraqi capital.
"We'll have a bill of rights. We'll recognize equality for all
citizens. We'll recognize an independent judiciary. We'll talk about
a federal government.
"All of these things will be in the interim constitution which will
also provide in a limited time, probably two years, for a permanent
constitution to be written that also embodies those American
values."--"U.S. Will Help
Draft New Interim Constitution, Bremer Says," Associated Press,
November 16, 2003]
[What kind of government will Iraq have? What will be the role of Islam? How
much local rule will ethnic, tribal or religious groups have?
The deadline is Feb. 28 for agreement on these and other basic questions,
due to be codified in the recently renamed Transitional Administration Law,
the precursor to a constitution.
. . . One of the thorniest issues will be giving U.S. troops immunity from
prosecution for any action they may take-- Robin Wright and Rajiv
Chandrasekaran, "Power Transfer in Iraq
Starts This Week," Washington Post, January 4, 2004]
"Iraq
Co. to Run Oil Sector by July," Reuters, February 29, 2004
[Bremer passed yet another law further opening up Iraq's economy to foreign
ownership, a law that Iraq's next government is prohibited from changing
under the terms of the interim constitution. . . .
Bremer has issued an executive order stating that even after the interim
Iraqi government has been established, the Iraqi army will answer to US
commander Lt General Ricardo Sanchez.-- Naomi Klein, "Bremer
has destroyed my country," Guardian, April 3, 2004]
"Hypocrisy: The US
Government's Biggest Single Problem," CounterPunch, June 12, 2004
