Search for million missing Iraqis to take decades: Iraqi minister

[Barrett808]

SARAJEVO (AFP) - The search for more than a million Iraqis who went missing under the regime of Saddam Hussein may take more than 30 years due to the lack of local expertise and poor security, Iraqi Human Rights Minister Bakhtiar Amin said.

"It will take more than 30 years ... to find more than one million missing," Amin said Monday, adding that the main problem was the lack of experts and technical support to identify bodies.

"So far we have found 283 mass grave sites, and if the security situation allows we will find more of them," Amin said, adding that Iraq counts only 20 forensic pathologists.

Iraq also lacks storage facilities for human remains, with a current capacity of fewer than 80 bodies.

"Saddam turned Iraq into a museum of crimes, into a land of mass graves," the minister said, referring to the ousted dictator who is now on trial for crimes against humanity.

(more)

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/afp/20041122/wl_mideast_afp/bosnia_iraq_missing

[leftchick]

1. what about those mass graves in the Fallujah soccer field...

oops I'm sorry. Wrong dictator!

[54anickel]

10. Don't forget there were supposedly a few of those mass graves left

from Poppy's war too. I remember reading about those somewhere...

[Old and In the Way]

2. How do a million people get slaughtered and buried, but no one

knows where? Or are they throwng out a 30 year timeframe to find and process? Is this part of the Iran/Iraqi war graves of the 80's?

[The_Urge]

3. Nobody cares

It looks like this story is not what poeple want to talk about here.

[jayfish]

4. Not To Mention That Fact That It May Be A Lie.

They may have found 200+ mass grave sites, but Tony Blair himself has admitted that they have only found 4000+ bodies. Most from the Iran/Iraq war and Shia uprisings. Dontcha thinks it's strange that the UN was given a couple of months to find the WMD but we get decades to find bodies? The most advanced nation on the planet. Nice try though.

Jay

[The_Urge]

13. Nice try?

It could be a lie, it could be true as well. Why don't we talk about it and try to see what we can find out?

I read that while they have found what they believe to be 280 or so sites they have only exhumed 10-15. Since the vast majority have not been examined you can't presume why these people are in these graves.


As fas as the UN thing, I don't think that it is that strange and I'll tell you why. When there is a potential threat of WMD, you don't have ten years to figure out what is going on. On the other hand mass graves will stay right where they were left until you get to them. Dead people tend to stay where ya' leave 'em.

[jayfish]

18. Right After We Talk About How Many Iraqi's

we have killed and are killing now. How long will it take to find all of those bodies?

Jay

[LynnTheDem]

20. 55 "mass graves" have been exhumed

And all remains date from more than a decade ago. When Hussein was a "good ally" of the USA.

And guess who financed & trained OBL and the Taleban and who installed the Baath Party in Iraq and and and...

[The_Urge]

23. Yup

Although I wouldn't say that he was a good ally. And OBL and the Taliban were grievious errors. The Baath party was not installed by us, but these things are off topic. This thread is about the mass graves in Iraq. Do you have something to add about that?
I stand corrected abouthte # of graves that have been exhumed.

[makhno]

25. Baath was installed by the US

Another glorious American intervention in the name of preventing the red menace from spreading:

http://www.globalpolicy.org/security/issues/iraq/history/husseinindex.htm

[The_Urge]

28. Not quite

Giving the Baath party a list of communists and "installing" the Baath party are not the same. The Baath Party installed themselves. They were supported by the CIA because General Abdel Karim Qassim was a dictator who had siezed power and executed King Faisal II, and was going to take Kuwait back as Iraqi territory.
I don't agree with some of the things that our government has done over the years and I don't understand some of the things that we have done over the years, but I don't think that you can look at this stuff in a vacuum. Nor do I think that we can just install whom ever we want, we can only influence.

[makhno]

31. Well

They were supported by the CIA because General Abdel Karim Qassim was a dictator who had siezed power and executed King Faisal II, and was going to take Kuwait back as Iraqi territory.

The dictatorial nature of Qasim's regime or Kuwait had little to do with the CIA's actions. Rather it was Qasim's realignment of Iraqi foreign policy with Soviet interests in the Gulf that led the CIA to sponsor the botched Ba'ath coup of 1959 and then continue sponsoring Saddam's activities until the succesful overthrow of Qasim's regime in '63. If Qasim was a pro-US dictator in, say, Reza Shah's mould, you better believe me, he would've been left the hell alone, dictatorship, Kuwait, or rape rooms be damned.

[The_Urge]

34. I agree

We were not very fond of the idea of Russian control of the middle east.

[makhno]

37. Right

And so any argument of "democracy" vs. "dictatorship" or the supposedly progressive nature of our foreign policy is quite nonsensical indeed.

[LynnTheDem]

26. Yes actually, the Ba'ath Party WAS installed by the USA.

And yes, actually, Rumsfailed called Hussein "OUR GOOD ALLY". Cheney called Hussein "OUR GOOD ALLY". Apparently you've never read the National Security Archives on the subject?

And it isn't just OBL and Taleban that have been "grevious errors" by the USA.

And yes, dear, I do have things to add about mass graves and in fact have added things, and with your 26 posts I sure do appreciate your being the thread monitor.

[The_Urge]

29. Hon,

You are taking what I said out of context. I said that I didn't think that Iraq was a good ally. That was how I felt about it, not Cheney or Rumsfeld, me. I've ony read some of the National Security Archives, not all of them.
As fas as the Baath Party, the CIA doesn't have the power to "install" a new government. All they can do is help one along. The CIA did help them along, but we didn't put them there, they did that themselves. It could also be sadi that the Baath party was helped for a reason. General Abdel Karim Qassim was going to invade the newly formed country of Kuwait and reclaim it for Iraq.

I'm sorry,I didn't realize that there was a minimum number of posts before I could ask someone to stay on topic. At what number will I be allowed to speak my mind?

[LynnTheDem]

36. Dear.

Discussions, something you keep insisting you want, do tend to deviate to surrounding issues.

The CIA certainly does (and often has) installed regimes in other countries. In fact they make quite a habit of it.

Feel free to speak your mind...just as I did.

[The_Urge]

39. I will

I understand that discussions deviate, its all good. Dont give the CIA too much credit. Catch-ya later "hon" :toast:

[LynnTheDem]

40. Good stuff.

Sweetie. :toast:

[Name removed]

6. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[TahitiNut]

11. The "Class of September 10, 2004" (9/11 anniversary arrivals)

Here're just some of the members of that Class. Go ahead, click on the names ...

Username: jforb
Username: Monkey Lord
Username: offcamber
Username: Varmintpoontang
Username: Quercus
Username: YoungGun
Username: HoosierModerate
Username: ???_???? :eyes:
Username: BushSuxs
Username: Spiralman
Username: zanistan
Username: Gluttony
Username: Arty
Username: scaredamurikan
Username: 5card
Username: obamarocks
Username: Kerrymander
Username: Mousketeer

... and others. :eyes:

[The_Urge]

15. That would be too easy.

but am i right in my assertion? If I hadn't posted how many responses would do you think there would have been. How many would have put in their two cents about as many as one million (I think that number is to high) people murdered. The very thought of such a thing makes me shudder.

[LynnTheDem]

27. It's BULLSHIT, dear.

One million Iraqis murdered is RIGHTWINGNUT BULLSHIT.

There havern't been many posts because most of us on this board are NOT IGNORANT RIGHTWINGNUTS; we already KNOW it's BULLSHIT.

[The_Urge]

30. Maybe it is

I just think that it is as worthy of discussion. I mean we waste time taking about much more insignificant things. I don't believe the one million number but where there is smoke there is fire. I don't see this as a right or left wing issue. I sorry that you see it that way.

[LynnTheDem]

33. And "we" at DU have talked about it for 2 years

Old news, old lies.

[The_Urge]

38. So,

yeah, just more lies. Okay.

[newyawker99]

9. Hi The_Urge!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[The_Casual_Observer]

5. They would need a million years a least

The whole thing is a myth like WMD, made up by Iraqi exiles looking for a sympathetic ear in the US. What else would explain the fact that they can't find more that 4000? A million people would be hard to bury or hide unless they were cremated, funny that nobody who was involved has spoken up about where they put all the bodies.

[The_Urge]

21. Myth

Why is it that you think that this is not true. It has been well documented that Saddam made hundreds of thousands of shi'ias "dissappear". What did he do? Give them a ride to the boarder give them some travelers cheques and let them on their merry way.
People involved have spoken up, you dismissed that they were just looking for a sympathetic ear.
Maybe he did this;
http://massgraves.info/

[prayin4rain]

7. More than a million?

How very strange. This is the first I have heard of these kinds of numbers. Can't figure out what happened to over a million people. Huh?

[Yupster]

8. I remember the scenes right after Saddam's fall

where all those people were going through the prisons looking for hidden rooms or basements because they were sure their relatives were there somewhere. They didn't want to accept that they had been executed.

[kurtyboy]

12. Funny how Freeps will take it on faith that

A million Iraqis disappeared--"Heck it may take three decades-If we ever find out!"

But when solid evidence in the fossil record supporting evolution is offered--"That's not PROOF! It's still just a THEORY! You have to ALLOW ALTERNATIVE explanations!"

Just another in a long string of hypocritical behaviors by the right.

[LynnTheDem]

14. HRW, ICRC, AI and bush's site all mention

16,500 missing Iraqis over the past decade.

"No details were available about the fate of the approximately 16,500 people reported “disappeared” in the last ten years, mainly ethnic Kurds and Shi’as..."

http://www.hrw.org/worldreport99/mideast/iraq.html

http://www.state.gov/p/nea/rls/13456.htm

Even bush doesn't say "millions" or even "hundreds of thousands" anymore.

Somebody forgot to update the talking lies for Mr. Amin. Hopefully he won't mention that Purple Plastic People Shredder and REALLY make a total fool of himself.

[Minstrel Boy]

16. lol @ the "Purple Plastic People Shredder"

All that hysteria and not a shred of evidence for it.

[LynnTheDem]

22. That was Ahmed Chalabi's "curveball" pal who started that bullshite

The same asshole that went on & on about Iraq's wienie trucks. You remember them, the "winnebagos of death" that were in fact weather balloon trucks sold to Iraq...by the UK.

If people weren't dying and having their brains scrambled & their limbs blown off, you'd have to ROTFLMAO over this bullshit. If this crap were fiction, no one would publish it because it's too fucking stupid.

[MisterP]

35. I believe it was another amoral liar, this one passing himself off

as an Armenian Apostolic (Orthodox) or Assyrian priest. Several bishops wrote that, in effect, "I don't know this foo'!"

[Barrett808]

17. Juan Cole recently said that exhumations of mass graves show about 5,000

Iraqis mass-buried under Saddam:

The Lancet, a respected British medical journal, reports that the US and coalition forces (but mainly the US Air Force) has killed 100,000 Iraqi civilians since the fall of Saddam on April 9, 2003. Previous estimates for civilian deaths since the beginning of the war ranged up to 16,000, with the number of Iraqi troops killed during the war itself put at about 6,000.

The troubling thing about these results is that they suggest that the US may soon catch up with Saddam Hussein in the number of civilians killed. How many deaths to blame on Saddam is controverial. He did after all start both the Iran-Iraq War and the Gulf War. But he also started suing for peace in the Iran-Iraq war after only a couple of years, and it was Khomeini who dragged the war out until 1988. But if we exclude deaths of soldiers, it is often alleged that Saddam killed 300,000 civilians. This allegation seems increasingly suspect. So far only 5000 or so persons have been found in mass graves. But if Roberts and Burnham are right, the US has already killed a third as many Iraqi civilians in 18 months as Saddam killed in 24 years.

http://www.juancole.com/2004/10/us-has-killed-100000-in-iraq-lancet.html

[LynnTheDem]

19. Tony Blair admits only 5000 in Iraq "mass graves"

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/politics/story/0,6903,1263830,00.html

Of course, US State StenoMedia didn't bother mentioning this fact much.

[Minstrel Boy]

24. In less than a decade, more than a million Iraqis will be killed

by US arms.

Perhaps they will become the Allawi regime's "million missing Iraqis" from the Saddam era.

[daleo]

32. In other words, Saddam's crimes were vastly overblown

Nobody ever doubted that he was a ruthless dictator, but it now appears that he was a run of the mill ruthless dictator, who killed nowhere near the number of political opponents claimed by western propaganda. It now seems reasonable to conclude that the Bush family has been responsible for more Iraqi deaths than Hussein, both when he was their puppet and their enemy.

[Porcupine]

41. Pure fiction- Mass graves show up on satelite photos

which is how we found the ones in Bosnia and Kosovo to zap Milosivic. In one of the most strategic areas of the world we have been taking regular photo surveys since about 1950.

We can find 1000 year old camel trails in Saudi Arabia with satelite radar but we can't find the graves of a million people?

If there were mass graves the Pentagon would be able to find them easily. This is pure, unadulterated propoganda.