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During my 1997 travels in Iraq, I witnessed the cruel irony of sanctions in the life of Zaynub, a little girl suffering from Kwashiorkor’s disease at Basra’s Pediatric Hospital. Zaynub had the distended stomach of famine, and yet, she lay above one of the wealthiest oil reserves in the world.

None of what I saw had to happen.

Without America’s brutal insistence on maintaining a blockade that impacts the health of an entire nation, Zaynub would have been a healthy girl, enjoying a childhood of adventure along the streets and canals of Basra.
Under sanctions, she is now dead.

The Oil-for-Food Program

Months earlier, in late 1996, the United Nations established the “oil for food” program. Ever since then, the program has fallen short in addressing the humanitarian needs of Iraq’s 22 million people. As recently as April 1998, UNICEF reported: “The Oil-for-Food plan has not yet resulted in adequate protection of Iraq’s children from malnutrition and disease.”

Later that same year, Denis Halliday, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq, resigned his post in protest of the sanctions. He declared that the Oil-for-Food program was woefully inadequate, doing little to end the humanitarian crisis.
Within the United Nations, there is a mounting backlash against the U.S. air strikes and misguided sanctions policy. Led by France and Russia on the United Nations Security Council, there is an effort to end the economic sanctions against the people of Iraq. The Clinton administration has reacted to this effort by trying to head France and Russia off at the pass with its own proposal that would allow Iraq to sell more oil under the United Nations Oil-for-Food program, yet keep economic sanctions tightly in place.

Congress Attacks Oil-for-Food

For all the wrong reasons, the administration’s proposal is coming under fire in both houses of Congress. As this goes to print, Rep. Joe Barton’s Energy and Power Subcommittee has scheduled hearings to not only discuss the new proposal, but to also discuss doing away with the Oil-for-Food program altogether. The cruelty I witnessed under sanctions seems to have no bounds in Congress.

A week before, similar hearings took place in the Senate. During a joint hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations and Energy Committees, Senators Jesse Helms (R-NC) and Frank Murkowski’s (R-AK) attacked the United Nation’s Oil-for-Food program. Other Republicans, particularly Senators Brownback, Hagel and Nickles, joined the attack. They denounced what they consider a contradiction in U.S. policy: punishing air strikes against Saddam Hussein for “non-compliance” on the one hand, and, raising the amounts of oil Iraq can export to reward him on the other hand. Their spin doctors have clearly been working overtime.

“The so-called ‘oil-for-food’ program may have worthy humanitarian goals, but Saddam is using the increased oil capacity to smuggle oil products for hard cash,’’ said Sen. Frank Murkowski, a Republican from Alaska. “We are rewarding [Saddam] by a de facto lifting of sanctions.”

The joint hearing came in response to recent calls by George Yates, chairman of the Independent Petroleum Association of America, and other oil industry insiders to keep Iraqi oil off the market. Referring to George Yates’ February 9th opinion piece in the the New York Times and meetings he and other Congressmen had with George Yates, Senator Nickles, an Oklahoma Republican, said Iraq has re-emerged, under the U.N. program, as a major player in oil markets. He blamed America’s favorite demon, Saddam, for an oil glut that has “put 40,000 to 50,000 people out of work’’ across United States.

Although the Oil-for-Food Program is inadequate due to the disrepair of Iraq’s oil infrastructure, doing away with the program without lifting economic sanctions would be disastrous. According to the most conservative estimates, the economic sanctions imposed on Iraq have already cost the lives of over 500,000 innocent civilians.

Movement in Congress to Lift the Sanctions

As a result of tremendous grassroots pressure, there has been some movement in Congress to respond to the plight of the Iraqi people under sanctions and the inadequacy of UN humanitarian efforts. Last year, Representatives John Conyers (D-MI) and Tom Campbell (R-CA) circulated a letter for congressional signatures calling on President Clinton to rethink the sanctions policy and “de-link” economic sanctions against civilians from military sanctions against the Iraqi government. Forty-one Representatives signed onto the letter. Senators Abraham (R-MI) and Wellstone (D-MN) have been leaders in the Senate in calling on President Clinton to work to improve the Oil-for-Food program.

At the hearing, Senator Wellstone stated: “I have seen the reports on the number of innocents who have died in Iraq. I have met with reputable doctors who have traveled there. The sanctions have been devastating. I don’t doubt that Saddam doesn’t care a wit about his people, but that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t care.”

Energy Secretary and former US ambassador to the United Nations, Bill Richardson, responded that the best solution to Iraq’s humanitarian crisis was his administration’s proposal to lift the current ceiling of $5.2 billion-worth of oil that Iraq can produce every six months under the Oil-for-Food program. But according to a February 6th article in the Economist: “with Iraq’s dilapidated wells able to pump only $3.1 billion in the most recent 6 month period, and their capacity declining 6% a year, the gesture is meaningless.”

It is the Iraqi people who are suffering not Saddam Hussein. If the U.S. administration and some members of Congress insist on punishing Saddam Hussein, then sanctions should target him, not the people of Iraq. Unfortunately, Saddam Hussein is simply their cover. Keeping Iraqi oil off the market and gaining political capitol for being “tough on Saddam” and “supporting the troops” seems to be the driving force behind America’s Iraq policy. Forgotten are the people who are paying the price with their lives.

Take Action Now!

For those outside of D.C., please call your member(s) of Congress at (202) 224-3121 and urge them to end the war on the people of Iraq! Tell them that the oil industry’s efforts to do away with the Oil-for-Food Program is nothing short of a death sentence for many more children in IRAQ! End the economic sanctions and the air strikes against the people of Iraq.

Erik Gustafson is executive director of the Education for Peace in Iraq Center (EPIC). For more information on how you can help, call EPIC at (202) 543-6176.

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