'Experienced Iraqis not wanted' (Amer Al Saadi still in solitary)

[Barrett808]

'Experienced Iraqis not wanted'
Michael Jansen
Thursday, August 5, 2004

Fighting for a second term in office, George W. Bush is beset with the accusation that he waged war on Iraq, toppled its government and occupied the country without a legitimate casus belli. Ahead of the war, Bush and his acolyte, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, argued that Iraq posed an imminent threat to the West because President Saddam Hussein had a hidden arsenal of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.

Ahead of the war, the president's adviser on weaponry, Lt. General Amer Al Saadi, flatly denied the accusation. The chief of the UN inspection team seeking to prove or disprove the allegation, Hans Blix, said that Iraq may not have the weapons Bush and Blair still claim it possessed. A former UN inspector, Scott Ritter, said that 95 per cent of Iraq's banned weapons had been destroyed by the mid-1990s. Nevertheless, Bush and Blair persisted with this charge. But no banned weapons have been found, although US teams of experts have been combing the country in a desperate search for these non-existent weapons.

Meanwhile, Saadi, the man who told the truth (unlike Bush and Blair) resides in solitary confinement in a small cell at Camp Cropper, the US prison for “high value” detainees at Baghdad International Airport. Saadi, number 55 on the US list of most wanted Iraqis, surrendered to the US military on April 11, 2003, believing he would be interrogated and set free.

His interrogators, from the US Central Intelligence Agency and the department of defence, say that they have finished the debriefing and his release has been promised. But Saadi remains, day after day, in his small cell going about his daily routine. An active man who was always well dressed and enjoyed good food and drink, he now wears a yellow jumpsuit and dines off military rations. He is allowed out of his cell for one hour for exercise in a yard, but spends the rest of the time locked up with a cot, mattress and plastic chair. He has a Koran and one recreational book at a time, but no pen, paper, radio or television. He plays solitaire on a battery-powered toy whenever he is allowed batteries. He also composes and solves crossword puzzles in his head. Recently, he began doing the same with poetry. Once a week he is permitted to write a single page letter to his German wife, Helma, who waits impatiently for him to come home to their elegant home in Baghdad. She has seen him only three times since his detention and spoken to him several times on the phone. But visits and telephone calls are now banned.

(more)

http://www.jordantimes.com/thu/opinion/opinion2.htm

[gulfcoastliberal]

1. I heard his story on NPRs Morning Edition a week or so ago...

Very very sad. His wife, who had been living in exile for years in Germany, is now without her husband again. She had come back to Baghdad after the war. Al Saadi pretty much had no choice but to continue his job with the Saddam regime. Very very sad. Release him!

[burrowowl]

2. I was wondering what

happened to him.
Bu$h Fascist Non-Compassionate Fucktard!