Opponents of the war in Iraq on Thursday held an unofficial hearing on Capitol Hill to draw attention to a leaked British government document that they say proves their case that US President George W. Bush misled the public about his war plans in 2002 and distorted intelligence to support his policy.
In a jammed room in the basement of the Capitol, Representative John Conyers Jr., the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, presided as witnesses asserted that the "Downing Street memo" -- minutes of a July 23, 2002, meeting of Prime Minister Tony Blair and his top British security officials -- vindicated their view that Bush made the decision to topple former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein long before he has admitted.
"Thanks to the Downing Street minutes, we now know the truth," said Ray McGovern, a CIA analyst for 27 years who helped organize a group of other retired intelligence officers to oppose the war.
The memo said that Sir Richard Dearlove, the head of British intelligence, had said in the meeting that Bush had already decided on war, "but the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."
Cindy Sheehan, mother of a 24-year-old soldier killed in Iraq last year, said the Downing Street memo "confirms what I already suspected: the leadership of this country rushed us into an illegal invasion of another sovereign country on prefabricated and cherry-picked intelligence."
The White House maintains that Bush decided to invade Iraq only after Secretary of State Colin Powell made the administration's case in a lengthy presentation to the UN Security Council on Feb. 5, 2003. His argument focused on intelligence demonstrating that Iraq had illicit weapons. No weapons, however, have been found.
Asked about the memo last week, Bush said, "Nobody wants to commit military into combat. It's the last option."
He added, "We worked hard to see if we could figure out how to do this peacefully."
After the hearing, Conyers and a dozen congressional colleagues delivered to the White House bundles they said contained the names of more than 560,000 Americans gathered on the Internet who had endorsed his letter to Bush demanding answers to questions raised by the British memo. Some 122 members of Congress also signed the letter.
Asked about Conyers' letter and the British memo, Scott McClellan, the president's chief spokesman, described the congressman as "an individual who had voted against the war in the first place and is simply trying to rehash old debates that have already been addressed."
"And our focus is not on the past," McClellan said. "It's on the future and working to make sure we succeed in Iraq."
A bipartisan group of House members introduced a resolution calling on the administration to announce by the end of the year a plan for the withdrawal of US forces, and more than 40 legislators announced the formation of an "Out of Iraq" Congressional caucus led by Representative Maxine Waters, a Democrat.
Also, a New York Times/CBS News poll published yesterday showed that 37 percent of Americans questioned approve of how Bush is dealing with Iraq, down from 45 percent in February.
At a rally across from the White House, speakers roused a crowd of several hundred people with calls to recall the troops and to impeach Bush. The protesters, organized by the group AfterDowningStreet.org, said the memo was a "smoking gun" that proving their case against the administration.
PRECARIOUS RELATIONS: Commentators in Saudi Arabia accuse the UAE of growing too bold, backing forces at odds with Saudi interests in various conflicts A Saudi Arabian media campaign targeting the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has deepened the Gulf’s worst row in years, stoking fears of a damaging fall-out in the financial heart of the Middle East. Fiery accusations of rights abuses and betrayal have circulated for weeks in state-run and social media after a brief conflict in Yemen, where Saudi airstrikes quelled an offensive by UAE-backed separatists. The United Arab Emirates is “investing in chaos and supporting secessionists” from Libya to Yemen and the Horn of Africa, Saudi Arabia’s al-Ekhbariya TV charged in a report this week. Such invective has been unheard of
‘TERRORIST ATTACK’: The convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri resulted in the ‘martyrdom of five of our armed forces,’ the Presidential Leadership Council said A blast targeting the convoy of a Saudi Arabian-backed armed group killed five in Yemen’s southern city of Aden and injured the commander of the government-allied unit, officials said on Wednesday. “The treacherous terrorist attack targeting the convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri, commander of the Second Giants Brigade, resulted in the martyrdom of five of our armed forces heroes and the injury of three others,” Yemen’s Saudi Arabia-backed Presidential Leadership Council said in a statement published by Yemeni news agency Saba. A security source told reporters that a car bomb on the side of the road in the Ja’awla area in
US President Donald Trump on Saturday warned Canada that if it concludes a trade deal with China, he would impose a 100 percent tariff on all goods coming over the border. Relations between the US and its northern neighbor have been rocky since Trump returned to the White House a year ago, with spats over trade and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney decrying a “rupture” in the US-led global order. During a visit to Beijing earlier this month, Carney hailed a “new strategic partnership” with China that resulted in a “preliminary, but landmark trade agreement” to reduce tariffs — but
SCAM CLAMPDOWN: About 130 South Korean scam suspects have been sent home since October last year, and 60 more are still waiting for repatriation Dozens of South Koreans allegedly involved in online scams in Cambodia were yesterday returned to South Korea to face investigations in what was the largest group repatriation of Korean criminal suspects from abroad. The 73 South Korean suspects allegedly scammed fellow Koreans out of 48.6 billion won (US$33 million), South Korea said. Upon arrival in South Korea’s Incheon International Airport aboard a chartered plane, the suspects — 65 men and eight women — were sent to police stations. Local TV footage showed the suspects, in handcuffs and wearing masks, being escorted by police officers and boarding buses. They were among about 260 South
RSS