Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-03-16-Speech-4-214"
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"en.20000316.7.4-214"2
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"Mr President, the UN sanctions have become a weapon of mass destruction, claiming at least 200 children's lives every day. Dennis Halliday, who resigned from his position as director of the UN humanitarian mission in Iraq in protest at the sanctions, confirms the UNICEF statistics – five to six thousand children die every month as a direct result of the sanctions. Mary Robinson, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, has been speaking out against the sanctions imposed in violation of international law, which prohibits the starving of civilians as a method of warfare. She says: ‘How can you expect me to condemn human rights abuses in Algeria, China and elsewhere when the United Nations themselves are responsible for the situation in Iraq?’ The UN economic sanctions have denied Iraqis spare parts to restore infrastructure, making water and airborne infectious disease rampant. Furthermore, the shortage of medical and food aid has made deaths from these treatable diseases epidemic. The UN estimates that five to six thousand children die unnecessarily each month due to sanctions, even after the UN food for oil programme. The sanctions constitute relentless lethal force, and innocent Iraqi people caught between opposing forces are paying the price. It cannot continue.
John Pilger's documentary two weeks ago on British television showed quite clearly what the situation is, and nobody with an ounce of humanitarian concern in them can ignore this plight and can persecute the innocent people who have no say over Saddam Hussein. This is ridiculous: a war is being waged against voiceless children basically because the United States, and indeed the British, are supporting this kind of inhumanity to their fellow man."@en1
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