December 14, 2004, As Mesopotamia Melts... the Show (Trials) Must Go On
Amidst reports of successive attacks on gates leading to the protected American suburb in the center of Baghdad affectionately (and, interestingly, accurately so) called "the Green Zone", interim premier (and, I suppose, the front runner in next month's show elections in Iraq) Iyad Allawi has announced that starting next week, proceedings will commence vis a vis trials of former members of the Saddam Hussein Tikriti regime.
Now, those irritating defendants and their irritating attorneys are kvetching about things like not being able to have counsel present during interrogations and proceedings, or having, you know, formal charges and shit for like, a year or more. But, you know what guys: compared to the poor shlubs at Gitmo, or Abu Ghraib, or in our ghost prisons, Bagram Airbase or other gulags, you just have no idea how good you have it.
I guess the Allawi team needs... something... going into the elections; I hear the SCIRI (Iranian-oriented theocratic) parties are kind of, you know, well-positioned, so Allawi may need some decent bread and circuses of his own.
Well, what these puppets and quislings who are managing the occupation for us (albeit no longer in name, though in fact) need most is legitimacy among Iraqis, even as neither they nor their American protectors seem capable of protecting much of anything (including, evidently, even the Holy Green Zone.)
So... when all else fails... show trials!
Stay tuned...
Comments
From what Riverbend is saying, legitimacy is about as likely as being welcomed with flowers. From what she outlined it looks like US backed thieves on one side and Iranian backed theocrats on the other for the coming election. If I were Iraqi I would be scared shitless.
Posted by irisclara at December 15, 2004 6:10 AM