Rally in Adelaide joins calls for Iraqi sovereignty

Bob Briton

On the eve of the handover of extremely restricted powers to the 
interim government in Iraq, around 400 people from a wide range 
of opinion gathered in Adelaide to protest the loss of 
sovereignty and suffering that the ongoing occupation 
represents.

Rally MC Anne McMenamin pointed out that opposition to the 
occupation of Iraq was not restricted to the political left. She 
first called on former national president of the Liberal Party 
John Valder to address the crowd. He said that his comments were 
not being made on the spur of the moment — that his concerns 
about the Howard Government's "grovelling at Bush's feet" had 
been building for some time.

Mr Valder recommended that people show no mercy to Howard at the 
forthcoming elections, given that the PM has shown no compassion 
for the refugees languishing in detention, for the war dead in 
Iraq or for the situation of Australia's service men and women. 
He expressed his wish that one day Bush, Blair and Howard would 
face a suitable international tribunal for orchestrating what he 
pointed out was the invasion of Iraq.

Bill Hartley — former AMWU Media and Publicity Officer, 
Victorian ALP State Secretary and ALP National Executive member -
- traced the history of imposed political systems in the Middle 
East. He pointed out that nobody in the region is looking to the 
Iraqi "model" as inspiration for establishing new democratic 
structures in their countries. He, too, called on the voters of 
Australia to throw the Howard Government out for its role in the 
Iraqi tragedy.

Ruth Russell — the Adelaide activist that went to Baghdad as a 
human shield — spelled out the realities of the new Iraqi 
government. She said it could not make laws without reference to 
the occupying powers, it could not revoke laws made by those 
powers and it could not do anything about the 14 permanent US 
military bases being constructed on Iraqi territory.

Human Rights lawyer Michael Hourigan spoke of his experiences in 
Baghdad where 70 per cent unemployment, polluted water, destroyed 
services, uncontrolled crime and the humiliations of occupation 
are pushing people to desperate acts of resistance. He noted that 
the revelations about the Abu Ghraib prison proved to be the 
final straw for many Iraqis.

Stehen Darley of the NOWAR coalition gave a detailed report about 
the priviledged position of corporations with White House 
connections in the conspicuously profitable work of 
reconstructing Iraq. He startled many of the people attending the 
rally when he pointed out that one of the favoured contractors, 
Kellogg, Brown and Root Pty Ltd, now has its headquarters in 
Adelaide at 186 Greenhill Rd. KBR is a subsidiary of Halliburton, 
the corporation linked to plutocratic US Vice President Dick 
Cheney and is behind a number of big Australian infrastructure 
jobs like the Alice Springs to Darwin railway.

Kaurna elder John Smith conveyed the sympathy of the Indigenous 
people for the trials of the Iraqi people.

During the demonstration a young Iraqi boy stood before the crowd 
with wires attached to his outstretched arms in a chilling 
reference to the notorious events at Abu Ghraib.

Rock band Inferno added their guitar driven rock message to the 
event.