IRAQ: Bush, Blair, Howard and the Downing Street memo

From the Green Left Weekly:


Rohan Pearce

US troops shot Farqad Mohammed Khinaisar at 8am on May 29. She was 15 minutes away from the Baghdad high school she taught at when a convoy of soldiers from the 3rd Infantry Division opened fire on her car. Her death was the end result of a decision by the US, British and Australian governments to pursue their imperial interests, at the expense perhaps more than 100,000 Iraqi lives.

With the publication of the “Downing Street memo” in Britain's Sunday Times on May 1, the motives behind the Iraq invasion are once more under scrutiny. The top-secret document records the minutes of a July 2002 meeting between British Prime Minister Tony Blair, some of Blair's closest advisors, top cabinet members and senior members of Britain's intelligence community, including Richard Dearlove, head of the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6).

While the US media did not extensively cover the issue at first, 88 members of Congress signed a letter sent to US President George Bush on May 5 by Democrat Congress member John Conyers that calls for the White House to respond to the issues raised by the memo. A petition in support of Conyers' letter has garnered more than 500,000 signatures. More here>>>