Inter Press Service
Dahr Jamail

ROME, Feb 14 (IPS) - A peoples tribunal has held much of Western media guilty of inciting violence and deceiving people in its reporting of Iraq.

The World Tribunal on Iraq (WTI), an international peoples initiative seeking the truth about the war and occupation in Iraq made its pronouncement Sunday after a three- day meeting. The tribunal heard testimony from independent journalists, media professors, activists, and member of the European Parliament Michele Santoro.

The Rome session of the WTI followed others in Brussels, London, Mumbai, New York, Hiroshima-Tokyo, Copenhagen, Stockholm and Lisbon. The Rome meeting focused on the media role.

The informal panel of WTI judges accused the United States and the British governments of impeding journalists in performing their task, and intentionally producing lies and misinformation.

By Dahr Jamail

My friend from Baquba visited me yesterday. He brought the usual giant lunch of home cooked food he always brings when he comes to see me. I’m still eating it, actually. I had it again for dinner tonight. Ah, the typical Iraqi meal.

He owns four large tents, and rents them to people in his city to use at funeral wakes, marriage parties, tribal negotiation meetings and to cover gardens, among other things.

During the Anglo-American invasion of his country back in the spring of 2003, when refugees from Baghdad sought shelter from the falling bombs, many of the families inundated his city. After his house was filled with refugees, he let others use his tents, for free of course.

Refugees from Fallujah are using them now.

By Dahr Jamail

Kidnapping has become the crime of choice amongst Iraqi criminal gangs. With 70% unemployment in “liberated” Iraq, crime is running rampant, with organized crime enjoying a free hand amidst the terrible security situation.

The families of the kidnapped are at times forced to pay up to several million dollars ransom—unless they want to receive pieces of their loved ones, or even their dead bodies.

While media attention has focused heavily on the kidnapping of Westerners, the kidnapping of Iraqis, in particular Iraqi women, is much more common.

As far back as July 2003, Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported that “the poor security situation in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities is causing women and girls to severely restrict their movements for fear of rape and abduction.”

By Dahr Jamail

Last night I peered out my hotel room window into the vast darkness of Baghdad. Aside from random lights powered by generators, the blackened capital city seemed to lay dormant under high winds and a cold, driving rain.

This morning as we’re driving under clear, crisp skies on the harrowing streets Abu Talat tells me, “We have had neither water nor electricity at our house since 9am yesterday morning. It is as if we are camping in our house!”

He laughs his usual deep laugh as I shake my head. I noticed he hadn’t shaved in a couple of days.

By Dahr Jamail

The thundering blast rocks me awake at 7:05am. The first thing my eyes see are the curtains of my room flowing in, as if a strong wind is blowing into my room.

‘Holy shit, they hit the embassy,’ I think to myself, ‘the blast was so close.’

I leave my windows cracked and curtains drawn for just this reason-while my door was blasted open, splintering the frame where it was locked shut, none of my windows shattered. Aside from small chunks from the ceiling of my room strewn about the floor, I am alright.