COMMENT

Uprising In Iraq

THE resistance to the US occupiers in Iraq has increased dramatically. Everyday there are around 60 attacks on the US troops and their allies. The attacks on those who are collaborating with the Occupation regime are also intensifying. Last week saw the events which highlight the depth of the anger and hatred against the Americans.

In Fallujah which has been in the forefront of the resistance, four American private security guards travelling in a car were attacked and done to death. People on the streets joined the attackers in dragging the corpses down the streets and dismembering them. The brutality of the act has shocked the Americans. The four killed were employed by an American security firm Blackwater. Their men with armed forces background are also guarding the American governor Paul Bremer in Iraq. The attack was not therefore on civilians but on mercenaries hired by the Americans to do their dirty job for them. In retaliation, the American troops have encircled Fallujah and fierce fighting is going on at the time of writing this. The Americans are bombing houses and killing innocent civilians.

More significantly, the fighting has now spread with the crackdown on the followers of the Shia cleric Moktada al-Sadr who has been calling for a war on the American occupiers. The closing down of  a newspaper belonging to this group and the arrest of a key aide of the cleric has sparked off a virtual uprising. The militia loyal to al-Sadr has taken on the American, the Spanish, Italian and British troops in Najaf, Nassariya, Basra and the Sadr city suburb of Baghdad. In Najaf alone 19 Iraqis were shot dead by Spanish troops and the puppet Iraqi force. In the fighting four soldiers of El Salvador serving under the Spanish were killed. Nine American soldiers were killed in these clashes mainly in the Baghdad suburb. Twelve American marines were killed in Ramadi. Since April 3 in a space of four days, 30 US soldiers and 130 Iraqis have died in the fighting.

The US had planned to hand over power to a pliant regime on June 30 and for this purpose the governing council has prepared an interim constitution. This itself was done in haste as the Americans realised that it would be difficult to keep up the direct military occupation. But now the situation has rapidly deteriorated. Bush will have to answer to the American people how he proposes to get out of this mess. Indications are the Americans will send in more troops. What the Americans are facing is a quagmire which is sucking them into a Vietnam type situation.

This is the time to step up the demand that the Americans withdraw from Iraq immediately. Let the UN set up an interim administration in preparation for handing over power and sovereignty to the Iraqi people.