|
Austria's Haider Calls For Lifting Of U.N. Embargo On Iraq
 |
|
Hussein (R)
receives Austria's Freedom Party leader Joerg Haider in Baghdad, Feb. 12.
|
BAGHDAD, Feb. 13 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Far-right Austrian politician Joerg Haider called on the United Nations Wednesday to lift the crippling sanctions it imposed on Iraq in 1990, Ath-Thawra newspaper reported.
"The embargo must be lifted to end the suffering of children and old people in Iraq," the governor of the southern Carinthia province and former leader of Austria's Freedom Party said at the end of a three-day visit to Baghdad.
"The coming days will see a considerable boost in relations between Iraq and Austria on the road to the lifting of the unjust embargo," Haider told Ath-Thawra, mouthpiece of the ruling Baath party in Baghdad.
Sanctions were imposed on Iraq for invading Kuwait in August 1990.
A U.N. supervised oil-for-food program allows Iraq to export crude to buy essential goods, but Baghdad complains the program does not meet the needs of its 22 million people and is demanding a total lifting of the embargo.
Haider, invited to Iraq by a local non-governmental organization called the Organization for Friendship and Peace, held talks Tuesday, February 12, with President Saddam Hussein.
The state-run INA news agency said Saddam suggested they "develop relations" between his ruling Baath party and Austria's Freedom Party, which was formerly led by Haider and which governs in a controversial
coalition with the conservative People's Party.
"We are willing to develop our relations with Austria and to cooperate with this country as much as is possible," Saddam was quoted as saying.
The Iraqi leader said the cooperation should be aimed at "the establishment of Arab-European and Muslim-Christian dialogues to enlarge cooperation ... to create a world without persecution, without aggression and without hegemony."
Baghdad “hopes that Americans could benefit from Europe's thoughts on the importance of identity and the national character, its rights and the rights of others,” Saddam Hussein told Haider. “But it seems that when U.S. officials ascend power they are inflicted with power dazing. Instead of ruling with wisdom, they use power as a baton against peoples."
 |
|
Haider
demanded that U.N. sanctions against Iraq be lifted and rejected any
"external threats against Iraq.'' |
"Americans are insulting Iraqi people when they insult their leadership,” Saddam added. “This American stance is not confined to Iraqi people, but it seems that it is a U.S. policy which the U.S. administrations used to apply against the peoples of the world in general but in different periods and different degrees."
"The base of U.S. problem with the world and with itself is its involvement with Zionism which engaged America in series of problems which will not end unless this coalition, America and the Zionist entity on the Arab lands, be ended and dissolved," Saddam said.
"America does not realize that power is worthless without wisdom. Wisdom can turn other factors into power. The main power is that of Almighty God and God is the strongest.
“America says the Islamic world is against it, why? Are the people in America more Christian than the people, for example, in France, Britain and Austria? If it is a struggle of religions, is America more religious than Germany, Italy and Belgium? We all know that all these states are more religious in Christianity than those who talk about struggle of religions in America.
"So Europe should carry out double responsibility, first to avert itself from the flames of U.S. aggressive policy which try to hint that the conflict is between the West and Islam. The second is to convince the U.S. and guide it to wisdom. However, the U.S. is incapable of accepting advice and wisdom."
"Why did [the September 11 attacks] happen in the United States, and not in France or in Austria?" Saddam rhetorically asked Haidar.
"The American leaders have not even asked themselves this question up until now ... but it is clear that the positions of Europe are much different from those adopted by the United States," he said.
Although it was unclear whether Haider was making an official visit as governor of the southern Austrian province of Carinthia, it is sure to embarrass Austria, especially since it comes on the eve of a visit by the country's far-right vice-chancellor to the United States, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
Haider also earlier met with Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tareq Aziz for talks focused on the "current international situation and the U.S.-Zionist plot against Iraq, calling on Europe to oppose it," Iraqi newspapers reported.
The U.S. embassy in Vienna, meanwhile, declined comment on Haider's trip, saying he was "regional politician" and not in national government.
Austrian Vice-Chancellor Susanne Riess-Passer, who succeeded Haider as head of the Freedom Party two years ago, may face questions about Haider's trip to Baghdad, when she travels to Washington Wednesday.
In his State of the Union address January 29, U.S. President George W. Bush accused Iraq, Iran and North Korea of being an "axis of evil" seeking to acquire weapons of mass destruction and supporting international terrorism.
"We don't know in which capacity Haider is in Baghdad," Austrian foreign ministry spokesman Harald Guenther said earlier. "He has not told us if he went there as governor of Carinthia, or if he is on a private trip."
"We weren't informed about this trip," said a spokesman for President Thomas Klestil, declining all other comment.
Haider, former leader of the Freedom Party, which governs in a controversial coalition with the conservative People's Party, arrived Monday.
His political allies said he was undertaking "mediation in favor of Israel" with the Iraqi leadership, but Israeli diplomats were perplexed at the claim.
"We are not aware of any goodwill mission by Haider to Iraq," said a spokesman for the Israeli embassy in Vienna, Ilan Ben-Dov, recalling that Israel withdrew its ambassador to Austria after the far right took office in 2000, and has "for years" had no links with the Freedom Party.
Last October, conservative Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel was received in the White House by Bush, in a further sign of Austria's normalization since Haider joined him in forming a coalition government in February 2002.
Schuessel at that time -- a month after the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington -- highlighted Vienna's solidarity with Washington in the fight against so-called terrorism.
The latest trip by Haider comes after the far-right strongman traveled to Iran and Syria in Novemeber 2001. He was also recently seen in Vienna with the son of Libyan leader Moamar Kadhafi, who he has in the past visited in Tripoli.
Such trips could "call everything into question again" for the Austrian government, said the conservative Austrian daily Die Presse.
|
