true. but i wonder how these documents were found, now, in one of the ministry buildings blitzed 2 weeks ago. not to mention the fact that the ministries were emptied and cleaned out months ago. it has 'half-arsed MI6 job' written all over it.
It's ugly either way. Galloway has already admitted writing the memo - which to me looked like the most fake of them all - that Fawaz Zureikat was his representative in Baghdad.
Mr Zureikat, however, shares a telephone number in Jordan with a company that is a major dealer in Iraqi oil — Middle East Advanced Semiconductor — whose directors include a Ziad Abdullah K Zureikat. Diplomats said that this company has lifted 8.8 million barrels of Iraqi oil since registering with the United Nations Oil-for-Food programme in August 2000.
The circumstances surrounding this unfortunate incident remind me of a writer named William T. Vollman, writing about the occupation of Leningrad and the fighting between the Russians and Germans.
At the end of one of his stories in Grand Street Issue #71 he writes of the Soviet General who fled into the arms of the Germans:
"And so once again the bolt clicked shut, and Vlasov found himself back inside his sweltering conceptual prison, the notion that logic, limitation, and realism informed the doings of rational men."
It's been a problem that many writers have tried to think about and solve, whether or not there are other forces other than reason which humankind must fight in making decisions for the good. Now, I won't say here whether I believe in God, or Fate, or Luck, or even Evil, because what I think is not important, but the question burns in my mind all the time when I see viewpoints from the Left and the Right,
"Why are we doing whatever it is we are doing, whenever we do it?"
And the answers I come up with scare me, because it seems to me we know nothing real, believe in nothing substantially true, and act according to myths we did not create.
Comments
If it's true, then he's a gigantic asshole and worse, a big setback to the peace movement everywhere.
Posted by: lia | April 22, 2003 1:23 PM
true. but i wonder how these documents were found, now, in one of the ministry buildings blitzed 2 weeks ago. not to mention the fact that the ministries were emptied and cleaned out months ago. it has 'half-arsed MI6 job' written all over it.
Posted by: gwen | April 23, 2003 3:34 AM
and it continues today: today's Torygraph headline: 'Memo from Saddam: we can't afford to pay Galloway more, BBC coverage, and Guardian article on Galloway's plans to sue.
Posted by: gwen | April 23, 2003 3:52 AM
It's ugly either way. Galloway has already admitted writing the memo - which to me looked like the most fake of them all - that Fawaz Zureikat was his representative in Baghdad.
On the other hand Lord Goldsmith, the same guy who ruled the war was legal, now just happens to be investigating unrelated allegations against Galloway for abuse of donations.Posted by: xowie | April 23, 2003 4:44 AM
The whole thing smacks of a headline from the Sun from about 20 years ago: "Gaddafi: How I Handed Over the Libyan Cash to Arthur Scargill", later found in court to be entirely untrue. I want a job at MI5. It must be a real doss.
Posted by: gwen | April 23, 2003 4:53 PM
The circumstances surrounding this unfortunate incident remind me of a writer named William T. Vollman, writing about the occupation of Leningrad and the fighting between the Russians and Germans.
At the end of one of his stories in Grand Street Issue #71 he writes of the Soviet General who fled into the arms of the Germans:
"And so once again the bolt clicked shut, and Vlasov found himself back inside his sweltering conceptual prison, the notion that logic, limitation, and realism informed the doings of rational men."
It's been a problem that many writers have tried to think about and solve, whether or not there are other forces other than reason which humankind must fight in making decisions for the good. Now, I won't say here whether I believe in God, or Fate, or Luck, or even Evil, because what I think is not important, but the question burns in my mind all the time when I see viewpoints from the Left and the Right,
"Why are we doing whatever it is we are doing, whenever we do it?"
And the answers I come up with scare me, because it seems to me we know nothing real, believe in nothing substantially true, and act according to myths we did not create.
Posted by: Grekon Farsi | April 23, 2003 10:02 PM