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The Irish Anti-War Movement

Good thing about Bush visit is it will be his last

Susan McKayTUESDAY June 17 2008(COLUMNISTS)
 
Yet another round of smiles at Stormont as the world’s most dangerous leader, George Bush, fresh from tea with Queen Elizabeth II, jetted in to join our first and deputy first ministers, along with Gordon Brown and Brian Cowen in another bout of self-congratulation. No matter what goes wrong, we’ve always got Northern Ireland.

Never mind that nastiness and obduracy are already making their presence felt in the marbled halls. Self-styled first lady Iris, who last week donned her cardigan to declare that God was on her side in the holy war against homosexuality, will have made the Bushes feel quite at home.

Susan McKayTUESDAY June 17 2008(COLUMNISTS)
 
Yet another round of smiles at Stormont as the world’s most dangerous leader, George Bush, fresh from tea with Queen Elizabeth II, jetted in to join our first and deputy first ministers, along with Gordon Brown and Brian Cowen in another bout of self-congratulation. No matter what goes wrong, we’ve always got Northern Ireland.

Never mind that nastiness and obduracy are already making their presence felt in the marbled halls. Self-styled first lady Iris, who last week donned her cardigan to declare that God was on her side in the holy war against homosexuality, will have made the Bushes feel quite at home.

The prime minister, of course, has now had to climb into bed with the fundamentalists of Ulster in order to get his outrageous detention-without-charge law through parliament. No good can come of this liaison, even if he does pay.

The taoiseach, whose lips were once insulted by big mouth Ian Paisley, came north yesterday with a bloody nose. The defeat of the Lisbon Treaty has humiliated Cowen on the international stage on to which he had only just lumbered, delayed because the domestically disgraced Bertie was busy touring the world getting accolades for his role in the peace process.

It is a pity that only about a dozen people attended an Amnesty International protest against the Bush visit at Belfast’s City Hall on Sunday. Amnesty demanded that Irish and northern Irish politicians call on Bush to close the notorious Guantanamo Bay detention centre at which torture is practised.

It also urged them to demand the truth about the use of Shannon airport for "extraordinary rendition" flights, involving the illegal transport of detainees to countries where they can be tortured

with impunity.

At the weekend, Amnesty also published a report that challenges all of those who have gathered to treat Bush as an honoured guest at Stormont. Rhetoric and Reality – the Iraqi Refugee Crisis reveals that almost five million Iraqis have had to flee their homes since the US invasion in 2003 and the subsequent internal armed conflict. Just over half are internally displaced, while the rest have sought asylum in other countries – mainly those bordering Iraq but including EU countries.

Predictably, Palestinians are among those who have suffered most. Already refugees within Iraq, many of them are now living in appalling conditions in makeshift camps in a no-man’s-land between Iraq and Syria. There are snakes, scorpions, extreme temperatures and hardly any food, water or medical supplies. One aid worker described life in these camps simply as "hell".

A Palestinian living there told Amnesty that many people are in a state of such despair that they want to die.

Iraqis who have fled to Syria, Lebanon, Jordan and Egypt are subject to severe restrictions including the inability to get work, education or access to medical facilities.

Many have been forced into abject poverty, with small children having to work, young girls being forced into prostitution and women facing an increased level of domestic violence.

International assistance for the host countries has been ‘pitiful’ and UN agencies are running out of the funds they need to provide the most basic amenities.

Last month, the Iraqi prime minister addressed EU heads of state in Brussels, using the occasion to urge Iraqis to return home. Amnesty points out that international media coverage has tended to focus on this ‘good news’ story of people coming home, with its implication that the worst is over for Iraq.

The reality is that Iraq remains one of the most dangerous and inhospitable countries in the world. Around 1,000 Iraqis are killed every month and almost half of the population has no access to safe drinking water. Many of those returning are doing so because they have no choice. They are destitute or they have been refused asylum elsewhere. Most Iraqi asylum seekers attempt to enter Europe through Greece – it turns away 98 per cent of them.

Many returnees remain internally displaced.

The UK’s record is particularly shameful – it refuses even to take in Iraqis who put their lives at risk by working for British forces. They are required to have good English and to have worked for British forces for at least 12 months. Most had little English and had contracts for six months.

"Apathy and rhetoric have been the overwhelming response to one of the worst refugee crises in the world," Amnesty concludes.

This is Bush’s farewell visit. That is the only good thing that can be said about it.

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