Anan: Iraq situation "worse that civil war"

Che Guava

Che Guava

The Juicy Revolutionary
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Kofi Anan and Bush finally agree on Iraq: it's not a civil war....

UN chief tells of Iraq war sorrow

The situation in Iraq has become "much worse" than a civil war, the outgoing United Nations Secretary General, Kofi Annan, has told the BBC.

Mr Annan, who leaves office after 10 years on 31 December, said life for the average Iraqi was now worse than under the regime of Saddam Hussein.

Expressing his sadness for being unable to prevent the war, he urged regional and international powers to help Iraq.

But Mr Annan urged his successor, South Korean Ban Ki-moon, to "do it his way".

Asked by the BBC's Lyse Doucet whether the situation in Iraq could now be classified as a civil war, Mr Annan pointed to the level of "killing and bitterness" and the way forces in Iraq are now ranged against each other.

"A few years ago, when we had the strife in Lebanon and other places, we called that a civil war. This is much worse.

"We have a very worrisome situation in the broader Middle East," Mr Annan said, linking the ongoing conflicts in Iraq and Lebanon with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and tensions over Iran.

Tough situation

He admitted that the failure to prevent the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 was a major blow to the UN, one from which the organisation is only beginning to recover.

Mr Annan described the current situation in Iraq as "extremely dangerous" and empathised with the plight of ordinary Iraqis.

"If I were an average Iraqi obviously I would make the same comparison, that they had a dictator who was brutal but they had their streets, they could go out, their kids could go to school and come back home without a mother or father worrying, 'Am I going to see my child again?'

"The society needs security and a secure environment for it to get on - without security not much can be done - not recovery or reconstruction."

'No will'

Mr Annan, a Ghanaian who joined the UN in 1962, became the first sub-Sahara African secretary-general at the start of 1997.

The years before his appointment were marred by the genocide in Rwanda and ethnic cleansing during the wars in the former Yugoslavia.

Although the UN vowed "never again" in the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide and killings at Srebrenica, the organisation has been unable to end a three-year crisis in Sudan's Darfur region, where more than 200,000 people are thought to have died.

"It is deeply, deeply disappointing and it's tragic," said Mr Annan. "But we do not have the resources or the will to confront the situation."

He pledged to work towards a solution in Darfur, which Sudan's government has refused to allow UN peacekeepers to enter, until his very last moment in office.

And he was clear in his advice to Mr Ban, the South Korean diplomat who will pick up the reins at the UN's New York headquarters on 1 January.

"He should do it his way. I did it my way, my predecessors did it their way and he should do it his way."
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link

Hmmmm...any nominations for what we could call the situation then...?
 
;)

True, I've heard those insurgeants can be quite rude...
 
Hmmmm...any nominations for what we could call the situation then...?
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Politically poisoned.

I've heard all the claims about how bad it (allegedly) is over there, yet when I run all the available sets of numbers (many provided by ANTI-war activists, and therefore probably biased in favor of the conclusion that something's wrong) I can't find any evidence that anything is actually wrong.

Yeah, people are getting killed, but I can't find any numbers suggesting the death rate over there is any worse than in the United States.

It's like that gremlin in your fridge who runs and hides whenever you open the door. He's definitely there--says your six-year-old son--yet, curiously, only your six-year-old son can see the little bastard.


It's got me thinking that everybody's trying to spin Iraq for their own political purposes.
 
BasketCase said:
Politically poisoned.

I've heard all the claims about how bad it (allegedly) is over there, yet when I run all the available sets of numbers (many provided by ANTI-war activists, and therefore probably biased in favor of the conclusion that something's wrong) I can't find any evidence that anything is actually wrong.

Yeah, people are getting killed, but I can't find any numbers suggesting the death rate over there is any worse than in the United States.

It's like that gremlin in your fridge who runs and hides whenever you open the door. He's definitely there--says your six-year-old son--yet, curiously, only your six-year-old son can see the little bastard.


It's got me thinking that everybody's trying to spin Iraq for their own political purposes.
Click to expand...

You can't say that. How dare not bow to the "fact" that Iraq is so bad. There are houndreds of thousands of people dug up from the mass graves. They all are not sunni. There isn't that much more killing then before. Its just with a free press allowed to report on the killing that isn't done by Sadams death squads but by shia death squads you hear about the killings now. Annan should shut up and do something about Sudan. Or prosacute the child rapists and embezalors and other UN employies like his son that were breaking the rules and taking bribes that were done under his lead.
 
BasketCase said:
I've heard all the claims about how bad it (allegedly) is over there, yet when I run all the available sets of numbers (many provided by ANTI-war activists, and therefore probably biased in favor of the conclusion that something's wrong) I can't find any evidence that anything is actually wrong.

Yeah, people are getting killed, but I can't find any numbers suggesting the death rate over there is any worse than in the United States.
Click to expand...


Maybe we outta take a look at your numbers again, since I haven't seen anything so far to convince me that there isn't near anarchy in Iraq.

I mean, is there anyone in the Iraqi government, in the whitehouse, at the UN or on the streets of bahgdad that is still saying that there's nothing really wrong with the situation there?
 
BasketCase said:
Politically poisoned.

I've heard all the claims about how bad it (allegedly) is over there, yet when I run all the available sets of numbers (many provided by ANTI-war activists, and therefore probably biased in favor of the conclusion that something's wrong) I can't find any evidence that anything is actually wrong.

Yeah, people are getting killed, but I can't find any numbers suggesting the death rate over there is any worse than in the United States.

It's like that gremlin in your fridge who runs and hides whenever you open the door. He's definitely there--says your six-year-old son--yet, curiously, only your six-year-old son can see the little bastard.


It's got me thinking that everybody's trying to spin Iraq for their own political purposes.
Click to expand...

IBC has Iraqi deaths at about 50,000. It's been three and a half years (ish). I'll round to four. So each year, 12,500 people are dying (this is not true, the numbers were high during invasion and this year is higher than 2005... but whatever!)

12,500 / year where as the US had under a bit 17,000 murders in 2005. You're right, not as many people are dying in Iraq.

But percapita... if only Iraq had a population ten times bigger. If only!
 
BasketCase said:
Yeah, people are getting killed, but I can't find any numbers suggesting the death rate over there is any worse than in the United States.
Click to expand...

US has more people, way more. This comparisn has no context.

Next time 3 car bombs go off in New York City killing 50+ people, tell me what news station is covering a murder case instead.

And more people have been killed in Iraq.
 
augurey said:
IBC has Iraqi deaths at about 50,000. It's been three and a half years (ish). I'll round to four. So each year, 12,500 people are dying (this is not true, the numbers were high during invasion and this year is higher than 2005... but whatever!)

12,500 / year where as the US had under a bit 17,000 murders in 2005. You're right, not as many people are dying in Iraq.

But percapita... if only Iraq had a population ten times bigger. If only!
Click to expand...

Forgive me, but you're making a number of mistakes.

firstly, the IBC figure is undoubtedly a fair bit lower than the actual figure, seeing as they only count deaths from hostile actions, that have been reported (IIRC) three times by reputable ndependent media.
The true body count is likely to be higher, maybe even up to the 650,000 mark reported by the Lancet, which was compiled through death certificates and such, and also incorporates deaths due to the war, that were not through hostile action.

Also, bear in mind that your calculations are 12,500 a year are kiklled through bombs and shootouts-the IBC does not take into account petty murder.
 
BasketCase said:
I've heard all the claims about how bad it (allegedly) is over there, yet when I run all the available sets of numbers (many provided by ANTI-war activists, and therefore probably biased in favor of the conclusion that something's wrong) I can't find any evidence that anything is actually wrong.
Click to expand...
Oh, yeah.

Little bit like with the PRO-war activits like yourself that say everything is fine and dandy there?

The evidence is right before you're freaking eyes. It's nothing but total denial if you don't admit such fact. I know this fall to deaf ears...

Whether it's better or worse than during Saddam's regime is of course another issue.

According to you, you probably could travel to Iraq as pleasantly as you would to United States. Since "same amount" of people is killed in US as in Iraq. I don't highly recommend it though. You could get first hand experience and evidence why the situation really is BAD.
 
What's so funny about the democrats mid term elections win is that, in two years the republicans will say : "Irak is in civil war because of the democrat congress". And they might even make a large amount of people forget that they instigated this mess all by themselves back in 2003. :)
 
Apparently Comrade Earmuffs is still upset about his oil-for-Kofi scandal falling through.
 
C~G said:
According to you, you probably could travel to Iraq as pleasantly as you would to United States. Since "same amount" of people is killed in US as in Iraq. I don't highly recommend it though. You could get first hand experience and evidence why the situation really is BAD.
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Reading this comment somehow inspires me to think that United States are inherently violent in nature and somehow infected the Iraqis as analogous to a virus.:lol:

Of course that is quite silly since it is not even close enough to be true that we have the "same amount" of people being killed in our own soil as in Iraq.:rolleyes:
 
More evidence that we have to stay. We can't let this get any worse.
 
I hate to be the one to use the words, but "worse than civil war" is just shouting liberal media bias.
 
puglover said:
More evidence that we have to stay. We can't let this get any worse.
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What if we cant stop it from getting worse? What then?

MobBoss said:
Its "civil unrest". Think crips vs bloods but on a vastly larger scale.
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Right. We all know that the only way a conflict can be a Civil War is if its sepia tinted, theres banjo plucking in the background and narration from out of work actors.
 
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