Vandaag: Selling US Wars
Transnational Institute - 17.06.2007 07:58
The Iraq conflict, permanent occupation and the US agenda in the Middle East
3.30 pm 17 June, open at 3 pm, free entrance
Felix Meritis, Keizersgracht 324 Amsterdam
booklaunch/debate: Achin Vanaik, Tom Reiffer and Kamil Mahdi
Four years on from the invasion of Iraq, US troops and those of their allies still occupy the country. An estimated 655,000 Iraqis have died as a result of the invasion, according to The Lancet medical journal. The ‘divide-and-rule’ tactics of the occupying forces have fuelled sectarianism, with US forces now entrenching these divisions with a wall around a Sunni area of Baghdad. Meanwhile, the drive to control the country’s oil pricing and policies continues, with the occupying powers pressing a compliant Iraqi government to pass an oil law that allows Western oil companies to plunder the country’s oil wealth.
This roundtable discussion will address the US economic and strategic interests in the war on and continued occupation of Iraq, distinguishing these from the high-sounding slogans about "bringing democracy to the Middle East" and false claims about “weapons of mass destruction” that were used to justify it.
The event sees the launch of Selling US Wars, a collection of essays by renowned experts from around the world. It examines the excuses for war that were the basis for this period of the US empire drive—nuclear weapons, terrorism, "failed states," drugs, humanitarian intervention, and democracy—and analyses the pretexts asserted for the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as Washington's aggressive policies elsewhere. It gets behind the subterfuges to expose how Washington's spin-doctors worked to present its wars as humane, lawful, and necessary to keep Americans safe—and why the campaigns sometimes succeeded.
For more details, see
Transnational Institute,  http://www.tni.org
Universitaire Activisten, http://www.universitaireactivisten.nl
or contact  andrea@tni.org
 E-Mail: andrea@tni.org  Website: http://www.tni.org
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