INTERNATIONAL PROGRESS ORGANIZATION -- INFORMATION SERVICE

Committee to Save the Children in Iraq -- Special Hearing at United Nations Office in Geneva

Geneva, 26 August 1991

At a special hearing held on 26 August 1991 at the United Nations Office at Geneva, a delegation of the Committee to Save the Children in Iraq presented eyewitness testimony to the United Nations Special Rapporteur for Human Rights Violations in Iraq, Mr. Max van der Stoel. The testimony was given following the presentation of a statement by Mr. Warren Hamerman, delegate of the International Progress Organization to Commission on Human Rights, Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, at its forty-third session on 13 August 1991 in Geneva. Mr. Hamerman had argued that the embargo policy of the Security Council led to gross violations of human rights in Iraq, above all of the right to life.

Ms. Muriel Mirak-Weissbach, coordinator of the Committee to Save the Children in Iraq, reported onn the findings of her fact-finding visit to Iraq between July 7-30, 1991. Citing discussions with Chaldaean Church representatives, doctors, and scores of ordinary citizens, she illustrated how the "forced autarkic context" created try the embargo had brought bout a situation in which attempts by government, social and international relief groups to alleviate the suffering of the civilian population were doomed to fail. With food stocks nearing depletion, economic activity having come to a halt, and an unemployment rate of 70-80 %, the Iraqi people have no means to generate income or produce goods required for survival. The effects of total economic degradation on the family, she said, were such as to undermine guarantees of protection and assistance solemnly guaranteed in international human rights covenants.  Referring to the fact that the embargo is threatening the lives of all Iraqis indiscriminately, she cited Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani's recent statement: "Tell everybody in Europe that they should put an end to the sanctions! The Kurds are exposed to inhuman suffering under the sanctions. Please give us a chance for survival!"

The pediatrician Dr. Margit Fakhoury presented chilling pictures of the plight of Iraq's most vulnerable citizens, its children. As member of the delegation of the Committee to Save the Children in Iraq, Dr. Fakhoury had examined children suffering from the effects of the war and embargo and had arranged for the treatment of 22 Iraqi children in Germany. Giving case studies of each child, she showed how the embargo has been directly responsible for inadequate treatment and often death. Malnourished babies, she explained to the UN Special Rapporteur on Iraq, are defenseless against common flues or diarrhea, and die. Newborn babies with meningitis, who receive massive antibiotic treatment in Europe, cannot receive this treatment in embargoed Iraq; they either die or are physically and/or mentally handicapped for the rest of their life. Describing the danger of epidemics in Iraq, Dr. Fakhoury stressed that, due to contaminated drinking water, crowded living quarters, and decreased resistance caused by malnourishment, the spread of tuberculosis, cholera, etc. will increase rapidly. Furthermore, if no diagnostic skin tests are available, no x-rays are functioning, doctors cannot identify carriers, she explained. "And if they could identify them, they cannot treat them because of the lack of antibiotics. Even for anemia, nothing can be done; to give the right kind of blood transfusion, you need serological test sera, a good working laboratory, slides, tubes, microscope, electricity." Due to the embargo, none of this is available in Iraq, .

Following the presentation of the eyewitness reports, the Special Rapporteur, Mr. Max van der Stoel, and his assistant, Mr. John Packer, followed up with detailed questions on the social and economic situation in Iraq. Mr. Kamal Fakhoury, also a member of the Committee delegation, provided important insights into the collapse of the infrastructure caused by the embargo.