Knit A Saddam Doll

Those of you with a penchant for knitting may, or probably may not, be interested to know that there is a knitting pattern available for a Saddam doll.

Rachael Matthews has written a book which contains designs for a number of dictators, including; Saddam Hussein, Pol Pot, Hitler and Idi Amin.

Why would anyone want to knit a dictator?

Banquo's Ghost

Izzat al Douri, a key former member of Saddam's regime who is still on the run, has allegedly released an audio message telling President Bush that this would be a "decisive year" and vowing to continue fighting American forces.

This message, if genuine, is regarded more as an election tactic (an election date has yet to be set in Iraq, but is likely to be called) rather than a direct threat to President Bush.

The Watchlist

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has stated that the US has produced a watch list of suspected and known terrorists, containing the names of more than one million people. According to the ACLU the list is growing by an average of over 20,000 records per month.

Among those on the watchlist are rather bizarrely Saddam Hussein who was actually hanged in 2005, decorated war veterans, and US senator Ted Kennedy.

The Transportation Security Administration has flatly denied the one million names figure; they say it contains a "mere" 450,000 people.

So that's alright then!

Saddam's Son's Cars Found

Police in Iraq have discovered five cars that were once owned by Odai, one of the sons of Saddam Hussein.

The cars, two Rolls Royces and several vintage classics, were stolen from Odai Hussein's palace after the US invasion in 2003. They were then buried in an orchard in Baghdad's Dora neighborhood.

The thieves planned to smuggle the cars out of the country, and sell them. However, police learned of the plan and arrested three people.

$10BN Lawsuit

The Iraqi government has served a number of foreign companies with a $10BN civil lawsuit. The companies, including Daimler, Siemens and B. Braun are accused of colluding with Saddam Hussein.

The lawsuit describes the kick backs etc involved in the United Nation's food-for-oil program in Iraq as "the largest financial fraud in human history."

The lawsuit has been filed in the US federal court in New York, and alleges that 2,200 companies from 66 countries paid a total of $1.8BN in kickbacks to Saddam Hussein's regime in exchange for supply deals.

Quote:

"Its impact on the people of Iraq when far beyond financial loss.

The corruption of the OFFP (oil-for-food program) affected the very lives and health of the Iraqi people."

Daimler allegedly sold Mercedes trucks and spare parts to the Iraqi government. The A UN-sponsored report by Paul Volcker claims that an area manager at Daimler agreed in 2001 to pay a 10% kickback on a deal to sell an armoured van to Iraq, at an inflated price.

Daimler maintained at the time that it did not knowingly pay kickbacks.

Siemens has been accused of paying a six-figure sum as a bribe to the regime, to secure energy and medical-equipment contracts.

Chickens are coming home to roost!

Yellowcake Goes To Canada

550 metric tonnes of yellowcake (concentrated natural uranium), the last vestige of Saddam Hussein's nuclear program, arrived in Canada on Saturday.

The shipment removed the risk of it being used by insurgents and smugglers crossing to Iran.

Yellowcake can be enriched for use in reactors and, at higher levels, nuclear weapons using sophisticated equipment.

Police Seize Boris's Cigar case

The British police have confirmed that they are examining an Iraqi cigar case belonging to London mayor Boris Johnson, in order to determine whether it is a looted Iraqi artifact. Johnson handed over the case on Monday.

Johnson took the case in 2003 from the bombed-out home of former Iraqi deputy prime minister Tariq Aziz.

Johnson was then working as a journalist, and had been taken to Aziz's ransacked villa. He is quoted in The Daily Telegraph:

"And there, just by my toe, protruding from beneath a piece of dusty plywood, was the cigar case.....the circumstances in which I came by this object were so morally ambiguous that I cannot quite think of it as theft."

He added, rather ruefully:

"Well, I suppose we should be grateful for one thing, it seems that a Western politician is finally going to pay the price for his involvement in the Iraq war."

Much a do about nothing!

Lara Logan Slams Iraq Coverage

Lara Logan of CBS puts the boot into the lamentable US media coverage of the Iraq occupation.

Bush Regrets Rhetoric, Not The War

As per the Chicago Tribune

Reporter: "Do you actually just regret your war rhetoric, or do you regret having gone to war with Iraq?"

"I don't regret it at all," Bush replied. "Removing Saddam Hussein made the world a safer place."

"The guy said, 'Now what could you do over?' " Bush said of the Times interviewer. "First of all, you don't get to do things over in my line of work. But I could have used better rhetoric to indicate that, one, we tried to exhaust the diplomacy in Iraq; two, that I don't like war."

The president told French television in an interview taped before his arrival in Paris last week: "Sometimes my rhetoric was a little—was misunderstood. I mean, I can remember saying, you know, 'dead or alive,' which sent ... signals that could be easily misinterpreted."

All very well, but in this world it's actions not words that count.

Fifth Trial

The fifth trial by the Iraqi High Tribunal begins July 21, this trial will cover the 1999 assassination of Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr.

Among the defendants are former Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz and Ali Hassan al-Majid, aka "Chemical Ali."

Aziz, Majid and six other co-defendants currently face charges in the Iraqi High Tribunal on war crimes for the execution of 42 businessmen in 1992.