Iraq:
Hero's welcome for Big Ben to Baghdad bus!

George Galloway, the campaigning Glasgow Labour MP, received a hero's 
welcome in Baghdad as he arrived in the now famous big red double-decker 
London bus at the end of an epic two-month journey which began in London 
last September.

The bus, carrying medical aid to blockaded Iraq, travelled through France 
and Spain, then through Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt and Jordan 
to reach its goal, Baghdad.

All along the journey the bus stopped for rallies to mobilise public 
opinion against the brutal blockade which has led to the death of over a 
million Iraqis since 1990.

Thousands of Iraqis packed the Great Conference Hall in Baghdad to welcome 
Galloway and the volunteers who came with him. Deputy Premier Tariq Aziz 
called him "a true friend of the Iraqi people" in his welcome.

The Iraqi Minister stressed that his country would not accept any UN 
resolution that fell short of the total lifting of sanctions nor would it 
accept the Anglo-Dutch proposal currently tabled at the UN Security 
Council.

This proposal calls for a conditional suspension of sanctions if Iraq 
allows the return of weapons inspectors and puts its oil revenues under UN 
control.

In an address to the Iraqi parliament, Galloway slammed the sanctions 
regime.

"You know better than me the gravity of this great crime, one of the great 
crimes of the 20th century that has been committed against Iraq", he 
declared, apologising for Britain's shameful role in maintaining the deadly 
blockade which has brought famine and disease to millions, a crime he 
compared to Pol Pot's genocide in Cambodia.

The "Big Ben to Baghdad" bus is the focus of the Mariam Appeal, the 
international charity named after Mariam Hamza who was rushed to Scotland 
for emergency leukemia treatment in May 1998.

On his second day in Iraq George went to the children's hospital in Baghdad 
and visited the leukaemia ward. Mariam Hamza was the first child he 
visited.

She initially responded well to treatment and entered a period of 
remission. Now her condition has worsened. The five-year-old girl is now 
suffering from neurological disorders such as blindness, seizure and 
weakness.

Back at Galloway's hotel Iraqi parents and their children queued to ask him 
to help them get treatment which Iraq cannot provide because the sanctions 
regime bars the import of vital medicines and medical equipment.

Over the past two months George and the Mariam Appeal volunteers have 
worked to raise the question of the suffering of the Iraqi people 
everywhere they went.

In Jordan, Galloway said, "World countries must work to lift the unjust 
embargo on Iraq which leads to the death of more than 84,000 Iraqi children 
per year at a rate of one child every six minutes."

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New Worker