Allegations Against Iraqi PM

[Jessica Blue]

Could be trouble brewing...

There will be if these allegations are true. Paul Mcgeogh is a highly respected journalist here, not given to flights of fancy, so the story is being taken seriously by the Australian media.


Iraqi PM shot inmates, says witnesses

There are allegations that the Iraqi Interim Prime Minister shot seven and killed six Iraqi insurgents in the week leading up to the handover of sovereignty last month.

Two unnamed people, who are alleged to have witnessed the shootings, told Australian journalist Paul McGeough that Iyad Allawi allegedly shot the insurgents in a courtyard adjacent to a maximum security cell in Baghdad.

Dr Allawi's office has denied the claims.


http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200407/s1156008.htm

 

[aerocontrols]

Could be trouble brewing...

There will be if these allegations are true. Paul Mcgeogh is a highly respected journalist here, not given to flights of fancy, so the story is being taken seriously by the Australian media.

Iraqi PM shot inmates, says witnesses

Are these the same witnesses who described Saddam Hussein to him?

 

[Jessica Blue]

Hmmm...they got that wrong didn't they?

It may well be completely untrue. I'm just noting the allegations.

 

[Checkmite]

There will be if these allegations are true. Paul Mcgeogh is a highly respected journalist here, not given to flights of fancy, so the story is being taken seriously by the Australian media.

He may be legitimate - that's fine. The problem however is right here:

Two unnamed people, who are alleged to have witnessed the shootings, told Australian journalist Paul McGeough that Iyad Allawi allegedly shot the insurgents in a courtyard adjacent to a maximum security cell in Baghdad.

As respected as Mcgeogh is, it is still not responsible journalism when you spread such potentially devastating rumors without any possible way of corroborating them.

 

[Jessica Blue]

I do agree with you Joshua, which is what makes me thinks there's perhaps more to come out. It seems strange that Mcgeogh would launch this story on the flimsy evidence suggested in that article.

On a television report it was mentioned there were also five Americans present a the time of the shooting. The full story may not be out yet.

 

[Mr Manifesto]

Re: Re: Allegations Against Iraqi PM

As respected as Mcgeogh is, it is still not responsible journalism when you spread such potentially devastating rumors without any possible way of corroborating them.

Unless, of course, you want to protect your sources. From being arrested for speaking out, for example, or perhaps killed. THINK MAN! Haven't you seen one of those movies where the cops put pressure on the journo to tell them where (s)he got their information from, and they won't give because of journalistic integrity?

 

[Grammatron]

How does that saying go…extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence?

 

[Cleon]

How does that saying go…extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence?

Mind if I ask why you think the claim is "extraordinary?"

 

[Grammatron]

Mind if I ask why you think the claim is "extraordinary?"

I guess it's completely ordinary for a Prime Minister to pull out a gun and shoot 7 people, with so many witnesses right as the power was about to be handed to him.

 

[Mr Manifesto]

How does that saying go…extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence?

I'm sure that if McGeogh's sources aren't any good, he's going to be eating an awful lot of crap very soon. Especially considering that the SMH is going through a journo-cull at the moment. They would jump on any excuse to get rid of an overpaid, incompetant journalist.

 

[Cleon]

I guess it's completely ordinary for a Prime Minister to pull out a gun and shoot 7 people, with so many witnesses right as the power was about to be handed to him.

Completely ordinary, no, but not completely bizarre, either. We're not talking space-aliens-kidnapped-Bigfoot extraordinary, here.

Here you have a situation where a new leader is going to be installed, come hell or high water. This new leader knows that installation is going to happen no matter what, and the power installing him doesn't seem to care overmuch what happens to prisoners in his care (see Abu Ghraib etc). Further, his political experience is one of extreme corruption (the Iraqi National Congress), and the country in question is one where such acts of spontaneous violence by its leaders are not particularly unusual.

Much stranger things have happened.

 

[Tmy]

We could punish him. But isnt being PM of Iraq enough of a death sentence???

 

[American]

Those poor poor insurgents. So sorry to see your friends die that way.


au revoir les perdants!!!

 

[Tmy]

Those poor poor insurgents. So sorry to see your friends die that way.


au revoir les perdants!!!

Its the new Iraq! Long gone are the days were unelected leaders murder those who would dare opposed them....... eerrrrrr ummmmm nevermind.

 

[demon]

Maybe the story will out, one way or the other but it`s hardly an "extraordinary claim" considering his dubious past.

I guess there's some bad blood flowing through Allawi's veins, what with him being a relative of Ahmad Chalabi and all and there are plenty of earlier, serious allegations that Allawi was a "terrorist" along with his Iraqi National Accord...setting off car bombs in Baghdad in the 90's.

From an earlier post:
Having searched BBC Online for "Allawi", and reading all the results, I find there is no reference to the fact that Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi stands accused of terrorism. The New York Times' Joel Brinkley (9th June, 2004) notes evidence that Mr Allawi -

"... ran an exile organization intent on deposing Saddam Hussein that sent agents into Baghdad in the early 1990's to plant bombs and sabotage government facilities under the direction of the C.I.A., several former intelligence officials say."

.......

"Dr. Allawi's group, the Iraqi National Accord, used car bombs and other explosive devices smuggled into Baghdad from northern Iraq, the officials said."

.......

"One former Central Intelligence Agency officer who was based in the region, Robert Baer, recalled that a bombing during that period "blew up a school bus; schoolchildren were killed" ".

"Ex-C.I.A. Aides Say Iraq Leader Helped Agency in 90's Attacks"
By JOEL BRINKLEY
June 9, 2004

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/09/p...404c51b395&ei=5070&pagewanted=print&position=
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


So, Mr Allawi is accused of heading an organisation that used car bombs to terrorise and kill Iraqi people. Don`t people agree that the appointment of an alleged terrorist as Prime Minister is newsworthy, particularly as Allawi's appointment was characterised by BBC as being part of the "war on terror"?

Of course, this has been largely ignored in favour of the tosh taked about him and sovereignty since the Good Fairy Paul Bremer handed him the keys to the city and flew off into the sunset.

 

[Grammatron]

Mr Allawi is accused of heading an organisation that used car bombs to terrorise and kill Iraqi people. Don`t people agree that the appointment of an alleged terrorist as Prime Minister is newsworthy, particularly as Allawi's appointment was characterised by BBC as being part of the "war on terror"?

Of course, this has been largely ignored in favour of the tosh taked about him and sovereignty since the Good Fairy Paul Bremer handed him the keys to the city and flew off into the sunset.

I thought you called those people freedom fighters?

 

[demon]

Hardly matters what I call them, what matters is the double standards of the imperial coalition.
Terrorist one minute, newly installed PM the next. Great basis for winning hearts and minds don`t you think?
Consistency has no place in foreign policy, we might know that, but it`s objectionable to see the media and our discredited leaders pretending that it exists and it`s depressing to see millions of people still lapping up the fiction...although that`s changing.

 

[Grammatron]

Hardly matters what I call them, what matters is the double standards of the imperial coalition.
Terrorist one minute, newly installed PM the next. Great basis for winning hearts and minds don`t you think?
Consistency has no place in foreign policy, we might know that, but it`s objectionable to see the media and our discredited leaders pretending that it exists and it`s depressing to see millions of people still lapping up the fiction...although that`s changing.

What about the double standard of communist demon?

Aren't labels fun?

 

[demon]

Double standards?
Have you anything to say about former CIA operative Allawi running Iraq for the US or not, apart from saying that accusations about him doing naughty things are "extraordinary"?
Are those accusations, now that you have been filled in about some of his past, still "extraordinary"?
You make a point of being "Mr no agenda"...seems you have one afterall.

From another report:
"The witnesses did not perceive themselves as whistle-blowers. In interviews with The Age they enthusiastically supported Dr Allawi for the killings. One justified the alleged killings and said: "These criminals were terrorists. They are the ones who plant the bombs. Allawi said they deserved worse than death; that they didn't need to be sent to court."
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/07/16/1089694560142.html?from=top5&oneclick=true#

Not even hostile witnesses...still "extraordinary"?

 

[Grammatron]

Double standards?
Have you anything to say about former CIA operative Allawi running Iraq for the US or not, apart from saying that accusations about him doing naughty things are "extraordinary"?

Not much, don't know the man. Seems like you won't be ok with anyone US puts up there temporarily, so why even bother arguing?

Are those accusations, now that you have been filled in about some of his past, still "extraordinary"?
You make a point of being "Mr no agenda"...seems you have one afterall.

Yes, yes they are.

From another report:
"The witnesses did not perceive themselves as whistle-blowers. In interviews with The Age they enthusiastically supported Dr Allawi for the killings. One justified the alleged killings and said: "These criminals were terrorists. They are the ones who plant the bombs. Allawi said they deserved worse than death; that they didn't need to be sent to court."
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/07/16/1089694560142.html?from=top5&oneclick=true#

Not even hostile witnesses...still "extraordinary"?

Yes, yes it is.

If they agree with him so much why anonymously tell it to some journalist? Why not praise him on TV with CNN, BBC, Al-Jazera, etc.?