Iraq: Deny the U.S. any of our oil wealth

Jamal Muhammad Taqi
Al-Iraq

Iraq deserves reparations for the “genocide” the Americans perpetrated, said Jamal Muhammad Taqi. In the course of nearly 10 years of invasion and occupation, the U.S. spent more than $4 trillion laying waste to this country, killing and maiming half a million Iraqis, mostly civilians; it caused an order of magnitude more in damage to our infrastructure and economy. And the crime continues: The country is “no longer safe to live in because of high levels of radiation and chemical pollution” from the depleted uranium bullets and bombs the Americans used. Rates of cancer and gruesome birth defects are soaring. The occupiers also “booby-trapped the country” in a metaphorical way, by “engineering a fractured system” that pits ethnic and religious groups against one another and ensures conflict. We know we’ll never get an apology, much less the reparations we deserve. But the least we can do is deny the Americans any oil contracts so they won’t profit from their crime. Alas, the corrupt cabal running Iraq is made up of those who “collaborated from the beginning” and owe their power to the Americans. “How long will it take Iraq to recuperate and completely liberate itself from the claws of the occupation and its handpicked regime?”