Powell Seeking Broader International Effort in Iraq

 

Updated
By K.L. Vantran, AFPS

US Secretary of State Colin Powell, left, looks on as L. Paul Bremer, the U.S. civilian administrator for Iraq, greets with a kiss Saeed Hussein Al-Sadr, a senior Iraqi Shiite cleric before private talks in Baghdad Sunday Sept. 14, 2003. Karel Prinsloo / AP Photo

Halabja, Iraq -- Powell visited a mass grave in Halabja Monday, a city where Saddam Hussein used chemical weapons to murder thousands on March 16, 1988. The secretary arrived from Baghdad to participate in the dedication of a museum and memorial to remember those murdered in the city. Iraqi Kurds called the attack "Bloody Friday." At least 5,000 Iraqi Kurds died from a lethal mixture of mustard gas and the nerve agents Sarin, Tabun and VX. Another 10,000 were reported injured. Saddam's cousin Ali Hassan al-Majid, known as "Chemical Ali", ordered the gas attack against the Kurds. Ali was captured in August by coalition troops and Iraqi Kurds had stressed he should go on trial in Halabja and pay for his crimes against the innocent civilians attacked in an anti-Kurd campaign during the Iran-Iraq war.

"In the streets and alleys of Halabja, corpses piled up over one another," according to information on the Kurdistan Democratic Party–Iraq Web page: "Tens of children, while playing in front of the their houses in the morning, were martyred instantly….

US Secretary of State Colin Powell (L) meets with a member of the Iraqi Governing Council Adnan Pachachi in Geneva. Mehdi Fedouach / AFP

The innocent children did not even have time to run back home. Some children fell down at the threshold of the door of their houses and never rose again."

It has been reported that many of those attending Monday's ceremony lost seven to ten family members in the genocidal attack.

Before helping to rebuild hearts in Halabja, on Sunday in Baghdad, Powell spent 12 hours in talks on rebuilding Iraq's overall structure with the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council and American officials advising Iraq.

The rebuilding of Iraq should be an international effort, Secretary of State Colin Powell said in an interview from Baghdad Sunday. "We're looking for a UN resolution that would give a broader political mandate to the international effort to help the Iraqi people, and, through that broader political mandate, perhaps encourage other companies to -- other countries to contribute troops to the 30 countries have troops here now, and might encourage people to be forthcoming at the donors conference for Iraq that will be held in Madrid next month, and to show a sign of encouragement to the Iraqi people that the international community is going to do everything it can to help the Iraqi people build a better country," reiterated Powell, during an interview with journalist Tony Snow.

Rebuilding a country after 30 years of dictatorship requires many resources, Powell told CNN's "Late Edition With Wolf Blitzer." The United Nations has a number of agencies that can help the people of Iraq with humanitarian needs, he added.

Though some 30 nations already are lending assistance in Iraq, the secretary said he believes other countries might find it easier to participate either with military or reconstruction activity if there were a broader U.N. mandate.

Powell said such a mandate also would be "a vote of confidence for what the Iraqi people are doing. They're hard at work, it's very, very impressive, and I'm very encouraged by what I've seen."

US Secretary of State Colin Powell, center, greets US soldiers during his arrival at a US air base in Baghdad, Iraq in this image from television Sunday Sept. 14, 2003. L. Paul Bremer, the U.S. civilian administrator for Iraq looks on in the rear at right. AP Photo / POOL

Disagreement between the United States and France over returning full authority and sovereignty to the Iraqi people has to do with timing, said Powell. France has suggested a quick turnover -- perhaps as soon as a month, he added. But Powell said the Iraqi Governing Council isn't yet ready.

The last thing the United States wants to do is "set the Iraqis up to fail," the secretary said. He noted the council needs time to bring ministries up to speed, to man them, to write and ratify a constitution, and to hold elections.

The United States wants to turn the government over to the Iraqi people with an Iraqi leadership that has been elected by the people, said Powell. U.S. and coalition partners want authority to go to the Iraqi people as soon as possible, and "don't want to stay one day longer."

Powell spoke of U.S. and coalition successes. "Saddam Hussein is gone," he said. "That awful regime is gone, that threat to the region is gone. A new democratic Iraq will arise. It will take a lot of work, a lot of money and a lot of good will, but it will happen."

The secretary said he was pleased to help the Iraqi people put together a government they can be proud of -- "a government that can never again be called a dictatorship, but rather a government that can be a model for this region and the world."