A 100-member Spanish delegation
of organizational and institutional representatives will travel
to Iraq in order to express their opposition to the sanctions
and the threat of a new military intervention against the country
CSCAweb / SCLSI, 2nd January, 2002
A 100-member Spanish delegation
of organizational and institutional representatives will travel
to Iraq in order to express their opposition to the sanctions
and the threat of a new military intervention against the country
A hundred members of Spanish organizations and institutional
representatives will depart from Madrid to Amman on Wednesday,
January 2nd, and then proceed to Baghdad. The delegation's trip
is part of a new initiative launched by the Spanish Campaign
for Lifting the Sanctions on Iraq (SCLSI), promoted by the
Arab Cause Solidarity Committee since 1991. The group will return
to Madrid on Saturday, January 12th. Several SCLSI delegations
had previously visited Iraq (in January 1999 and 2000, as well
as December 2000, in what was the first direct flight Madrid-Baghdad-Madrid
after the sanctions came into being).
The delegation will express its solidarity with the Iraqi
people and demand an end to the economic sanctions that were
put into effect on August, 1990 and have killed one and a half
million Iraqi citizens. At the same time, the delegation's aim
is to condemn the threats that point to a new US-sponsored military
intervention against Iraq. Besides condemning a decade of economic
sanctions and the recent threats calling for a new military intervention
against the country, members of the delegation will formally
hand over to Iraqi representatives all the educational materials
collected from May 2000 until April 2001 throughout Spain (during
the course of a State-wide campaign in which several tons of
education material, as well as 2 million pencils, were collected).
As it occurred in previous years, the program will include
meetings and visits organized by sectors in order for the members
of the delegation to get better acquainted with the humanitarian
situation in Iraq and the effects of the sanctions. The activities
will include a meeting with Tun Myat, UN Humanitarian Aid Coordinator
in Iraq. The delegation will also visit Basra, where it will
receive information about the effects of depleted uranium.
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