CAIRO, June 11, 2005 (IslamOnline.net) — A group of anti-Iraq war activists from around the globe will begin a fast at the United Nations headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, from June 16-30 to protest economic injustice suffered by the Iraqi people.

“As international social justice activists, including citizens of Iraq, the US and the UK, we stand united and resolved to seek an end to the ongoing economic exploitation of Iraq,” fast organizers, the Voices in the Wilderness and Jubilee Iraq, said in a statement e-mailed to IslamOnline.net.

American and British activists said they “bear a special responsibility” as citizens of countries “which created and held firm to the economic sanctions which devastated Iraq’s health care, education, water and electrical infrastructure”.

The move is designed to address key issues of reparations claims imposed against Iraq, debt cancellation and the reconstruction of the war-ravaged country.

Hans von Sponek, who resigned as director of the UN Humanitarian Assistance program in Iraq in 2000 in protest at the international economic sanctions, will join the fasters.

The fast will coincide with the final meeting of the UN Compensation Commission (UNCC), slated for June 28-30 in Geneva, to determine how much of a remaining $65 billion in war reparations claims will be imposed against Iraq.

Iraq has paid $19 billion in reparations claims over its invasion and brief occupation of Kuwait in 1990-91, including over $2 billion since the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime.

The UNCC imposed an additional $33 billion against Iraq which are yet to be paid.

Voices in the Wilderness was formed in 1996 to challenge and oppose the international economic sanctions imposed against the Iraqi people.

Jubilee Iraq was formed in March 2003 as a network of Iraqis and international activists, including lawyers, economists, politicians and aid workers, dedicated to ensuring that the Iraqi people are not unjustly forced to foot Saddam’s bills.

“Unjust”

The fasters will present key demands to achieve economic justice for Iraqis.

They call for an immediate moratorium on the backbreaking war reparations payments.

“It is neither right nor just that the Iraqi people be required to pay in perpetuity for the regime of Saddam Hussein,” the activists maintain.

They also demand a new UN Security Council resolution which cancels all unpaid war reparations already imposed against Iraq.

The activists further press for an elimination of “all odious debt”, comprising most of the more than $100bn of foreign debt incurred by Saddam’s regime.

They maintain that no economic conditions be imposed upon Iraq by such mechanisms as the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

The activists finally want a full funding for rebuilding war-battered Iraq with a sharp focus on meeting the needs of lay people.

On May 4, Stuart Bowen, the US special inspector-general for Iraq reconstruction, issued a report indicating that auditors have been unable to account for 96 million dollars earmarked for projects to rebuild Iraq.

Economic pundits have said that the prevailing corruption in state-run institutions and fraudulent American contractors have taken their toll on Iraq’s economy, scaring away many potential investors and businessmen.

The new government of Ibrahim Al-Jaafari has vowed to fight firmly the pervasive corruption phenomenon, triggering some ex-cabinet ministers to flee the countries fearing prosecution.

A joint Iraq-UN report released in May indicated that the Iraqi people were suffering from a desperate lack of jobs, housing, health care and electricity.

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Original Published on IslamOnline.net