袁中平死了:Iraq, Libya : History does not repeat itself

来源：百度文库 编辑：九乡新闻网 时间：2024/05/05 23:06:14

Iraq, Libya : History does not repeat itself






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History does not repeat itself, but it does rhyme.

More than 100 anti-war protesters, including the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers, were arrested outside the White House in demonstrations marking the eighth anniversary of the U.S.-led war in Iraq.


The protesters, some shouting anti-war slogans and singing "We Shall Not Be Moved," were arrested Saturday after ignoring orders to move away from the gates of the White House. The demonstrators cheered loudly as Daniel Ellsberg, the former military analyst who in 1971 leaked the Pentagon's secret history of the Vietnam War that was later published in major newspapers, was arrested and led away by police.


In New York City, about 80 protesters gathered near the U.S. military recruiting center in Times Square, chanting "No to war" and carrying banners that read, "I am not paying for war" and "Butter not guns."


Similar protests marking the start of the Iraq war also were organized Saturday in San Francisco, Chicago and other cities.


Authorities said 113 protesters were arrested, processed and given violation notices for disobeying an official order. They could pay a small fine and be released, or be freed with a future court date.


"The majority were cooperative," said U.S. Park Police spokesman David Schlosser.


One military veteran who showed up for the rally was Paul Markin, a 64-year-old retired U.S. Army colonel from Lynn, Mass., who said he's frustrated by what he sees as the U.S. government's escalation of the wars. He said he's been against wars since coming home from Vietnam.


"Ever since that time, I've gone to the other side. Instead of a warrior, an anti-warrior," Markin said.

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Eight year passed and now, how are Iraq people? Do they find their democracy as they once expect? Seems not. Despite the US pumping billions of dollars into regenerating Iraq, thousands of Iraqis are still living below the poverty line and are skeptical about prospects for improvement.


At 7am every day, Fatma crouches outside her house and along with her sister and cousins and begins to sort through garbage.


Displaced from southern Iraq, Fatma’s family is too poor to send her to school and so she works eight hours a day sorting through Baghdad’s landfill, collecting plastic and metal that will be shipped abroad for recycling.  Her reward for carting forty pounds of trash around is two dollars and fifty cents.


For many, the acres of Baghdad’s trash is just waste, but for local families, this is not only their livelihood, but also their home.


Over 2,000 people live on Baghdad’s landfill, Al-Tajiat, making their homes out of the garbage that the rest of the city throws away.  There is no running water or electricity and no access to medical treatment.  If someone becomes sick they have to be taken to hospital by donkey cart.


The US is spending $53 billion on the reconstruction effort in Iraq, but the residents of Al-Tajiat have not seen a dime of it. What they have seen, though, is the sectarian violence that drove them from their homes five years ago.

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In 2005, Naima’s family moved to the landfill and have been living there ever since, too afraid and too poor to return home. Naima is still unemployed.


Experts worry about the children who grow up too poor to go to school. Without an education, they are easily preyed on by criminal gangs and terrorist organizations that lure them with money and promises of a brighter future.

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Iraq remains a very dangerous place where kidnappings and murders are part of daily life.  For the Shia families, living on a trash heap is still better than living with Sunni neighbors back home.


But, until that is possible and until American reconstruction dollars reach the quarter of Iraq’s population that live in poverty, children like Fatma will continue to collect trash in order to survive


Authorities estimated several thousand protesters turned out in Baghdad, Basra, Ramadi, Mosul and a small town in Iraq's eastern Diyala province. They were galvanizing on popular uprisings across the Mideast to repeat long-standing complaints about Iraq's limited electricity, shoddy water and sewage services, and potential layoffs in government jobs.


"Our children have many diseases because of sewage problems and accumulated trash in the area," said Ali Hassan, a resident of Boub al-Sham, where more than 1,000 protesters gathered amid stagnant pools of water and a stench of waste in the air. The Diyala town is located about 15 miles (25 kilometers) northeast of Baghdad.


In the southern port city of Basra, around 1,500 demonstrators got into a shoving match with riot police who lined up to protect the provincial government headquarters.


A small delegation of the protesters met with Basra provincial officials to present a list of demands, including better electricity, more jobs and a crackdown on crime and corruption in Iraq's second-largest city.


In a press conference Sunday, al-Maliki said he would increase monthly food rations for all Iraqis by about 15,000 Iraqi dinars, or about $12. He also rejected the use of violence against demonstrators, noting that "we have to look at the protests in a civilized way and we should deal properly with the demands."


Baghdad political analyst Hadi Jalo said it's unlikely that Iraq's protests will compare with others in the Middle East because the government has enough money to ease complaints in limited ways, like paving roads or installing power generators in some neighborhoods.

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Today, eight years after the breakout of Iraq War, US and its allies start another war to Libya. People are always vulnerable to suffer more than you can expect. Poor children are forced to say goodbye to their sweet childhood; parents cannot protect their beloved ones; families have to depart as homes are destroyed......did the West ever think about this ? What is the next after this air strike? no answer. Democracy and peace shall not realize with the sacrifice of people's happiness. The tragedy in Iraq has not been forgotten (and even continues everyday), and history should not repeat itself.  
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