Iraq discussion hits campuses

Raw sewage spills into the streets, disease runs rampant, children die and a nation waits.

This is the reality of present-day Iraq.

United Nations-approved U.S. sanctions on Iraq produced these conditions, which have caused the deaths of more than 1 million Iraqi people - 567,000 of them children - said David Finkel, a member of the editorial board of the British quarterly journal Against the Current.

In response to reports of conditions in Iraq, 15 University organizations, as well as community members, have joined together to voice their concerns about the U.S. sanctions on Iraq. Students and community members are scheduled to rally at noon on Thursday on the Diag in protest of the sanctions.

Some have started to plan a candle-light vigil in the event that the U.S. bombs Iraq.

While University students are discussing the sanctions against Iraq, students at Ohio State University will get a to hear about the situation first-hand tomorrow when Secretary of State Madeline Albright and Defense Secretary William Cohen travel to OSU to explain U.S. policy regarding Iraq.

At a teach-in this past Thursday night at the Michigan League, students listened to Finkel lecture on Americans' responsibility to remain informed about U.S. policy on Iraq. He spoke of the U.S. sanctions as a "weapon of mass destruction."

In addressing the U.S. government's reasons for the sanctions and possible war on Iraq, Finkel said it is the government's intent to "inflict such an enormous defeat so humiliating that the entire Arab world will follow (U.S.) orders and do what (the United States) says because it is futile to resist."

History Prof. Juan Cole, who specializes in Mideastern studies, said the Iraqi government has not taken steps to mitigate the situation.

"The U.N. embargo has been implicated in deaths in Iraq beyond what would normally occur," Cole said. "However, the Baathist government could have taken up the U.N. on its offer to allow Iraqi petroleum to be sold in order to buy medical supplies and food."

LSA first-year student Asma Rafeeq said she is interested in learning about both sides of the conflict.

"The word Iraq conjures images of the enemy," Rafeeq said.

Despite her Arab heritage, Heidi Arraf, president of the University's American Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, said she believes this is not an issue of politics or heritage.

No matter what one's political viewpoint is, "it is a humanitarian issue. We can't keep turning our backs on it every day ... innocent people are suffering unnecessarily," said Arraf, an LSA senior.

"Nothing is worth the killing of even one human soul," Arraf said.

Randy Bond, a delegate from Voices in the Wilderness, an organization committed to humanitarian relief in Iraq, spoke about his personal experience in the country.

"I found it hard to look (the Iraqi people) in the face and know what my country has done to their children," Bond said. "Five thousand children die every month as a result of the sanctions ... If we starve them to death, if we kill them with disease, it doesn't seem to be a problem."

Inflation in Iraq's economy since the Persian Gulf War has risen at such high rates that government-run agencies are no longer able to provide adequate services to citizens, Bond said.

Bond said that even Iraqi hospitals are desolate.

"Cabinets are literally empty, with only 5-10 percent of necessary supplies," Bond said.

A documentary shown at the teach-in mirrored Bond's account. University students wept as disease-stricken children flashed across the screen.

"The film was such a graphic portrayal, I cried." said LSA senior Kathryn Sabbeth "It made me realize my ideas are grounded in something real."

02-17-98