THE US, THE UN AND THE IRAQIS THEMSELVES, V. 7.0

Q Why has the Pentagon not yet submitted to Congress the ICRC inspection reports on Iraq that Secretary Rumsfeld promised? Why specifically have you not, and when do you plan to submit them?

MR. DIRITA: It's a question of -- when General Abizaid testified, whenever it was -- in mid-May -- he acknowledged what everybody knows, and that is our -- the process by which reports from the International Committee of the Red Cross are managed in this department is very uneven, and it's done primarily because everybody's trying to give deference to a process that the International Committee of the Red Cross feels must be managed a certain way.

And as I understand it, the ICRC is very anxious about ensuring that there not be any undue exposure to their findings and to their processes. And as a result, over a period of time, we've established a process and a relationship with the ICRC where reports very often come in at levels certainly well below the Pentagon, and very often at levels below the command level. And we did, in fact, see this in the case of the Iraq-related reports.

So there's been a clear intent and desire to provide the Congress such reports as we're able to pull together, collate and send over there. It's been a more challenging process than -- because of what I've just described -- than I think anybody had an appreciation for. We've been to the -- we've had lots of interaction with the committee staff and the committee leadership -- the Armed Services Committee -- in both houses, so that they understand our desire and our intent to do what the secretary said we would do. But as a practical matter, it's been difficult to sort of get in one place all of the reports that are available.

Last week we went up to both the House and the Senate in closed session, according to rules that we had agreed with the committee, to discuss the Guantanamo-related reports because we had a more complete understanding of those reports in terms of what was available.

So it's really more one of trying to make sure we know the extent to which these -- that we have these reports, that they are the reports. Certainly when we go up there thinking we have everything there is, there will be more. And we'll tell the committee that; that whatever it is we're providing them, we're almost certain to come up with more later. And so it's been a give and take. There's been no intent to do anything other than to comply with the secretary's intention, which is to provide the reports.

Q When do you expect to do this now? Even the first report, when will you make any of the reports available?

MR. DIRITA: Well, we've done that. We went up last week.

Q No, I'm sorry. But I don't think you've made any reports on Iraq available.

MR. DIRITA: Oh, I'm sorry, you said we'd made no reports. We did provide the Guantanamo report.

Q Right. When do you expect to make the first reports on Iraq --

MR. DIRITA: When they're ready. And it's been tough, but we're working through it with some dispatch. We've got the combatant commanders involved in it and ensuring that, you know, that they have an understanding of what reports may be available in their area of responsibility.

And I'd like to believe that at a responsible level on the committees, both the staff and the members understand that we're doing our best to comply with what is admittedly something that we're not well organized to do. And having said that, we're also attacking the process and trying to establish a process going forward that would be better managed -- I wouldn't say better managed, but more capable of managing this situation.

[..]

Q Larry?

MR. DIRITA: Yes.

Q Two questions. One, on the ICRC. Why don't you just go back and ask them for copies of the report? I'm sure they've got a big bulging file somewhere that they'd be happy to share.

MR. DIRITA: The ICRC?

Q Yeah. Presumably -- that would be --

MR. DIRITA: I'll mark that down. Thank you for the suggestion.

Q If I were doing that --

MR. DIRITA: If only I had thought of that.

Q That's why we have these briefings, Larry, to keep you up to speed.

I'd like to see somebody try to take the focus off of what Saddam did, and assign this to Bush.

And everybody; how about some recognition for my nimh-like research that exposed that bogus article above... heh?

<Hope that was good.>

McTag wrote:

We have free health care, too.

Be careful what you wish for . . . you might get it.

We are a truly sick bunch, and there's very nearly 300 million of us.

Turkish Peacekeepers Withdraw from North Iraq
Sun Jul 4, 2004

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkey is withdrawing its remaining peacekeepers from northern Iraq where they have been deployed since 1997 to prevent internecine fighting, a Turkish government official said on Sunday.
Iraqi Kurds have sought the withdrawal of the Turkish troops since the U.S.-led war to topple former president Saddam Hussein, saying the force could spark tension with Kurds.

Turkish peacekeepers entered the enclave under the supervision of Britain and the United States, which brokered a 1996 cease-fire between the rival Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).

The two factions, close allies of the United States, have run northern Iraq since the end of the 1991 Gulf War. Their relations have improved considerably since infighting plagued the region in the mid-1990s.

"The peacekeepers are leaving because their work there is done," the official told Reuters.

He said the force numbered 400 troops at most in the 1990s, but only around a dozen Turkish officers have been there in recent years.

Turkey still keeps a few thousand other troops in northern Iraq to pursue Kurdish guerrillas from Turkey who fought in the 1980s and 1990s for an ethnic homeland in southeastern Turkey.

"Those forces will stay in northern Iraq as long as the situation does not change," the official said.

Ankara considers northern Iraq part of its sphere of influence and fears Kurds there will seek independence in post-war Iraq and rekindle separatism among Turkey's own 12 million Kurds. Iraqi Kurds deny statehood is their aim.

Sharon: We have Good Relations With Kurds
Sunday, July 04 2004


Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon acknowledged that his country has good relations with the Iraqi Kurds.

An article in Haaretz newspaper reports that Sharon said Israel has been having meetings with Kurdish leaders Mesud Barzani and Celal Telebani for a while; however, Sharon denied claims that Israel was supporting the Kurds.

Sharon said that Israel knows supporting the Kurds would be a sensitive issue, especially in terms of relations with Turkey. Instead of supporting the Kurds, Sharon said that Israel maintains good relations with the Kurds.

Israel's reported activities in northern Iraq have caused some tension to develop between Turkey and Israel.

Seymour Hersh's article published by New Yorker magazine last month alleges that Israel has been training Kurdish soldiers in northern Iraq since last year. Israel's top commando unit, Mistaravim, is supposedly conducting the training of the northern Iraqi Kurds.

Sunday July 4

Spy chiefs face Iraq criticism
By Kate Kelland



Spy chiefs face Iraq criticism
By Kate Kelland


LONDON (Reuters) - An inquiry into intelligence cited by Prime Minister Tony Blair to justify war against Iraq will criticise some of Britain's top spymasters and senior government figures, media report.

The Sunday Times said a draft of the inquiry's report singles out the head of the Joint Intelligence Committee, John Scarlett, and the head of the Secret Intelligence Service MI6, Richard Dearlove, for allowing misleading intelligence, including the famous "dossier" Blair used to justify war.

"(The report's) conclusion will be that the intelligence was wrong and that the system for checking it didn't work," the newspaper quoted a political source as saying.

The report will also criticise the government's top lawyer, Lord Goldsmith, who advised Blair the war was legal, but who has since admitted in private conversations that he had doubts about his own advice, the Sunday Times said.

The Independent on Sunday added that Blair's Downing Street office would come under fire in the report by Lord Butler, which is due to be published on July 14.

It said Blair's powerful former communications chief Alastair Campbell would be censured for trying to influence Scarlett over what to include in the dossier.

Blair took Britain to war -- against the majority of public opinion -- on the basis of the dossier, which claimed that Iraq was stockpiling weapons mass destruction and that Saddam Hussein could have some weapons ready for use in 45 minutes.

No weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq and the 45-minute claim has been discredited.

The government's leader in parliament, Peter Hain, refused to comment on the media reports but warned against prompting a "witch hunt" for those thought to be responsible.

"Let's just wait for Lord Butler to report and then we will make a judgement," he told Good Morning Television. "There may be lessons to be learned...(but) this government will not be party to any kind of witch hunt against anybody."

Blair asked former civil servant Lord Butler to conduct a public inquiry into Iraq intelligence after an earlier probe by judge Lord Hutton gave the government such a clean bill of health that it was dismissed by many as a whitewash.

Blair is anxious to draw a line under the Iraq war, which has slashed his popularity ratings, but the inquiry could reignite the row over his role in the U.S.-led conflict.

Blair former special envoy to Iraq, Jeremy Greenstock, admitted on Sunday there were no weapons stockpiles in Iraq.

"There is no doubt that the stockpiles that we feared might be there are not there," he told BBC television. "We didn't know they were there, but we thought that there was a considerable danger. The intelligence...was quite compelling at the time."

"The decisions taken, from the intelligence at the time, were very understandable."

... The Iraq Questions, which began in the Autum of '02. ... is one of the longest continuous "Single Topic Discussions" on the Web, having literally scores of thousands of replies (many of which are original essays of major- magazine-article length and quality), and an aggregate pageview count well into the 7 figure range over its nearly 2 year history.