http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast...ings/index.html

The man, blindfolded and handcuffed, crouches in the corner of the detention center while an Iraqi soldier grills him about rampant crimes being carried out by gangs in the southern city of Basra.


Iraqi authorities say this man has confessed to killing 15 girls, including a 9 year old.

1 of 3 "How many girls did you kill and rape?" the soldier asks.

"I raped one, sir," the man responds.

"What was her name?"

"Ahlam," he says.

Ahlam was a university student in the predominantly Shiite city of Basra. The detainee said the gang he was in kidnapped her as she was leaving the university, heading home.

"They forced me, and I killed her with a machine gun, sir," he says.

The suspect, who is unshaven and appears to be in his 20s or 30s, was arrested by Iraq security forces after they retook most of Basra in April.

CNN was shown what authorities say was his first confession. On it are the names of 15 girls whom he admitted kidnapping, raping and killing. The youngest girl on the list was just 9 years old.

Basra turned into a battleground between warring Shiite factions vying for control of the country's oil-rich south after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Basra's streets teemed with Shiite militias armed with weapons, mostly from Iran, according to the Iraqi forces and the U.S. military. Watch a mom describe her three sons killed »

For four years after the invasion, Basra was under the control of British forces, but they were unable to contain the violence and withdrew in September last year.

Women bore the brunt of the militias' extremist ideologies. The militants spray-painted threats on walls across Basra, warning women to wear headscarves and not to wear make-up. Women were sometimes executed for the vague charge of doing something "un-Islamic."

In the wasteland on the outskirts of Basra, dotted with rundown homes, the stench of death mixes with the sewage. Local residents told the Iraqi Army that executions often take place in the area, particularly for women, sometimes killed for something as seemingly inocuous as wearing jeans.

Militias implemented their own laws with abandon, threatening stores for displaying mannequins with bare shoulders or for selling Western music. Many store owners are still too frightened to speak publicly.

But the horrors of militia rule are now surfacing as some residents begin to feel more comfortable speaking out.

Inside her rundown home, Sabriya's watery eyes peer out from under her robe. She points to the first photo of one of her sons on the wall.

"This one was killed because he was drinking," she says.

She draws her finger across her neck and gestures at the next photo.

"This one was slaughtered for his car."

"This one the same," she adds, looking at the third.

Her three sons, her daughter and her sister were all killed by the hard-line militia. Her sister was slaughtered because she was a single woman living alone, Sabriya says.

"They came in at night and put a pillow on her face and shot her in the head," she says.

Sabriya lives on what was once dubbed "murder street" for the daily killings that happened there last year.

On the day CNN visited, dozens of young men sat where there used to be piles of bodies. Sheik Maktouf al-Maraiyani shudders at the memory.

"Every day, we would find 10 or 15 of our men killed," he says, adding sorrowfully "one of them was my son." His son was 25 years old.

Now, "murder street" is part of a citywide effort to get Basra back on its feet. In a project funded by U.S. forces, Sheikh Maktouf and others are being paid $20 a day and upwards to clean up trash. Watch the transformation of 'murder street' »

Basra may be part of the country's oil rich south, but it wallows in its own sewage and trash. The stench of filth is impossible to escape. The effort also helps with the massive unemployment plaguing the city.

British forces officially handed over responsibility of Basra to Iraqi forces in December.

"The situation was so bad because the security forces were controlled by the militias," says Brig. Gen. Aziz al-Swady, who commands the 14th Iraq Army Divison.

To help curb the violence, British troops have returned to the city, adopting the U.S. approach of embedding with Iraqi units as advisers. The Iraqi prime minister also has flooded the city with additional troops, bringing in soldiers from western Iraq along with their American advisers.

"Now the citizens have started to trust the Iraqi security forces," said al-Swady.

The biggest difference is that residents are starting to leave their homes -- something unthinkable just a few months ago. At one of the parks in the city this past weekend, a father named Al'aa was out with his three young children and his wife.

"It's the first time that we have dared to come here in two years," he said.

The park was once often used for executions.


Everyone, residents and soldiers alike, knows the battle for Basra is not over. Militias still lurk in the shadows, and the security gains may not last without economic gains.

"The most important thing, our government must focus on finding jobs, different jobs for these people," says Maj. Gen. Tariq al-Azawi.

The British withdrew because the local government wanted it.... to the airport.

And that's coming from people I've talked to who were and are based there.

But yeah there were a lot of casualties. So now they are sending in the jocks again.

___________________
If you can read this, I'm seriously fucking bored.

quote:

Originally posted by CHRles http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast...ings/index.html

Not to justify [Iran's probable covert operations/alleged direct weapons supply] within Iraq, but here is a list of CIA activities in Iran...

quote:

Iran 1952 Britain, resentful of the nationalization of Iran’s oil industry, came up with the idea for the coup in 1952 and pressed the U.S. to mount a joint operation to remove the democratically elected government of Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh[1] and install the Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi to rule Iran autocratically. Partially due to fear of a Communist overthrow due to increasing influence of the Communist Tudeh party, and partly to gain control of a larger share of Iranian oil supplies, the US agreed. Brigadier General Norman Schwarzkopf, Sr. and CIA guru Kermit Roosevelt, Jr. were ordered to begin a covert operation to overthrow Mossadegh. A complex plot, codenamed Operation Ajax, was conceived and executed from the US Embassy in Tehran. Full details of the operation were released fifty years later, in 2003. Britain, who previously had controlled all of the Iranian oil industry, lost its monopoly and allowed U.S. oil companies to compete in Iran. Iran 1953 The United States and the West backed the Shah's regime. Although it did much to develop the country economically, the Shah's government also repressed political dissent. Iran 1957 CIA and MOSSAD help form and train SAVAK, the internal security apparatus of the Shah. CIA provides SAVAK with lists of Communists who the Savak would either imprison or execute. [2][3] Iran 1975 The CIA worked with the Mossad and SAVAK to covertly support uprisings of Iraqi Kurds in 1975 to destabilize Pre-Saddam Iraq.[3][4] Iran 1978 From August 1978 through beginning of 1979, CIA had no HUMINT on Iran.[5] Iran 1979 The Shah of Iran Mohammad Reza Pahlavi flees Iran for the U.S. on 16 January 1979. The CIA is caught unaware.[5] Because the Shah had neutralized or assassinated all of his moderate political opposition, when the Shah was finally overthrown in 1979, it was by extreme Islamic fundamentalists. Former CIA director Admiral Stansfield Turner had poor intelligence of the Islamist revolution of 1979 in Iran as, "It was a big gap in CIA coverage." Consequently the CIA engaged in numerous covert operations in an attempt to maintain control.[3][2] Iran 1980 Larry Everest, a correspondent for the Revolutionary Worker, writing in Z magazine reported that in June 1980, students in Iran revealed a 1980 memorandum from U.S. National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski to Secretary of State Cyrus Vance recommending the "destabilization" of the Iranian government by using Iran's neighbors.[6] Similar claims regarding the role of the CIA in destabilizing the Shah comes from the economist F. William Engdahl[7] and others, such as Robert Dreyfuss[3] suggest that the CIA wanted to use the Iranian Islamists to destroy the communist forces inside Iran, support the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan (which the Shah refused to do) and to spread Islamic fundamentalism inside the Soviet Union. This support of fundamentalists eventually led to the Chechen insurgency, according to a review of Engdahl's book in an Iranian journal.[8] Engdahl asserts in his book that Khomeini's coup was engineered * By Britain to get a better oil contract renewal and * By "the senior ranks of the U.S. liberal establishment" According to Engdahl, these two resourceful parties were able to direct the CIA in this task while keeping "President Carter largely ignorant of the policy and its ultimate objectives". The U.S. has denied that it gave Iraq a "green light" for its September 22, 1980 invasion of Iran. Five months before Iraq's invasion, on April 14, 1980, Zbigniew Brzezinski, signaled the U.S.'s willingness to work with Iraq: "We see no fundamental incompatibility of interests between the United States and Iraq... we do not feel that American-Iraqi relations need to be frozen in antagonisms." According to Iran's president at the time, Abolhassan Banisadr, Brzezinski met directly with Saddam Hussein in Jordan two months before the Iraqi assault. Bani-Sadr wrote, "Brzezinski had assured Saddam Hussein that the United States would not oppose the separation of Khuzestan [in southwest Iran] from Iran."[6] Author Kenneth R. Timmermann and former Iranian President Abolhassan Banisadr argue separately that Brzezinski met with Saddam Hussein in July 1980 in Amman, Jordan, to discuss joint efforts to oppose Iran. According to Hussein biographer Said Aburish however, at the Amman meeting Saddam Hussein met with three CIA agents, not Brzezinski personally[9]. Author George Crile claimed the CIA actively supported Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war in order to bleed both parties.[citation needed] Iran 1983 The Soviet KGB defector, Vasili Mitrokhin stated in his book, [10] that the CIA continued to provide lists of Iranian Communists that the Islamic revolutionary government utilized to arrest, torture and execute Iranian communists. Iran 1984 Beginning in August 1984, a small group within the US government, in the Iran-Contra affair, arranged for the indirect transfer of arms to Iran, as a means of circumventing the Boland Amendments that were intended, in part, to prevent the expenditure of US funds to support the Nicaraguan Contras. Since the arms-for-hostages deal struck by the Reagan Administration channeled money for to the Contras, the legal interpretation of the time was that the CIA, as an organization, could not participate in Iran-Contra. The relationships, first to avoid the Boland Amendment restriction, but also for operational security, did not directly give or sell U.S. weapons to Iran. Instead, the Reagan Administration authorized Israel to sell munitions to Iran, using contracted Iranian arms broker Manucher Ghorbanifar.[11] The proceeds from the sales, less the 41% markup charged by Ghorbanifar and originally at a price not acceptable to Iran, went directly to the Contras. Those proceeds were not interpreted as U.S. funds. The Administration resupplied Israel, which was not illegal, with munitions that replaced those transferred to Iran. While Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) William Casey was deeply involved in Iran-Contra, Casey, a World War II Office of Strategic Services (OSS) clandestine operations officer, ran the Iran operation with people outside the CIA, such as White House/National Security Council employees such as John Poindexter and Oliver North, as well as retired special operations personnel such as John K. Singlaub and Richard Secord

My point? It's useless for you to be mad at Iran for allegedly giving material support to Iraqi militias. The US/UK have been giving material support to coups, counter-insurgents, and tyrants for years. Tell me CHRles, who do you think holds the high moral ground here? My answer is nobody holds the high ground. Iran is playing the same game the US/UK have been playing for decades. Additionally we come back to the dilemma of George W Bush's strategic blunder of invading Iraq. This destroyed the only local enemy Iran really feared. Saddam Hussein. Now Iran has nothing to fear from its neighbors but an overstretched overburdened foreign military force. If the US didn't invade Iraq, we wouldn't be talking about Iranians weapons floating around in Iraq. Now Iran, with the experience gained from Mossad and CIA training of SAVAK in the 1970's fresh on its mind, you can be damned sure they are going to use their knowledge of asymmetrical warfare on their sworn enemies.

People who would say we need to punish Iran really are dumb. I liken it to a guy stepping a pit full of snakes, then getting mad at the snakes for biting his feet, and then using that as a justification to kill all the snakes. Learn from history. It ain't pretty no matter who your looking at.

___________________

More US funded insurgency activities...

quote:

General guerilla actions in Iran by ethnic minorities "America is secretly funding militant ethnic separatist groups in Iran in an attempt to pile pressure on the Islamic regime to give up its nuclear programme. In a move that reflects Washington's growing concern with the failure of diplomatic initiatives, CIA officials are understood to be helping opposition militias among the numerous ethnic minority groups clustered in Iran's border regions. "The operations are controversial because they involve dealing with movements that resort to terrorist methods in pursuit of their grievances against the Iranian regime. Such incidents have been carried out by the Kurds in the west, the Azeris in the north-west, the Ahwazi Arabs in the south-west, and the Baluchis in the south-east. Non-Persians make up nearly 40 per cent of Iran's 69 million population, with around 16 million Azeris, seven million Kurds, five million Ahwazis and one million Baluchis. Most Baluchis live over the border in Pakistan. "Teheran has long claimed to detect the hand of both America and Britain in attacks by guerrilla groups on its internal security forces. Last Monday, Iran publicly hanged a man, Nasrollah Shanbe Zehi, for his involvement in a bomb attack that killed 11 Revolutionary Guards in the city of Zahedan in Sistan-Baluchistan. [17] ...Iranian forces also claimed to have killed 17 rebels described as "mercenary elements" in clashes near the Turkish border, which is a stronghold of the Pejak, a Kurdish militant party linked to Turkey's outlawed PKK Kurdistan Workers' Party. "John Pike, the head of the Global Security think tank in Washington, said: "The activities of the ethnic groups have hotted up over the last two years and it would be a scandal if that was not at least in part the result of CIA activity." "Such a policy is fraught with risk, however. Many of the groups share little common cause with Washington other than their opposition to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose regime they accuse of stepping up repression of minority rights and culture. The Baluchistan-based Jundallah (Brigade of God)(TYYT group, which last year kidnapped and killed eight Iranian soldiers, is a volatile Sunni organisation that many fear could easily turn against Washington after taking its money. "A row has also broken out in Washington over whether to "unleash" the military wing of the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK), an Iraq-based Iranian opposition group with a long and bloody history of armed opposition to the Iranian regime. The group is currently listed by the US state department as a terrorist organization, but Mr Pike said: "A faction in the Defence Department wants to unleash them. They could never overthrow the current Iranian regime but they might cause a lot of damage."[17] An Asia Times report states the U.S. has military units operating inside Iran.[18] Baluchi guerillas in Iran According to ABC news, citing U.S. and Pakistani intelligence sources, U.S. officials have been encouraging and advising a Pakistani Balochi militant group named Jundullah that is responsible for a series of deadly guerrilla raids inside Iran, reported ABC News online. The Jundullah militants "stage attacks across the border into Iran on Iranian military officers, Iranian intelligence officers, kidnapping them, executing them on camera," This militant group is led by a leader, Abd el Malik Regi, sometimes known as "Regi." The U.S. provides no direct funding to the group, which would require an official presidential order or "presidential finding" as well as congressional oversight. A CIA spokesperson said "the account of alleged CIA action is false".[19] According to the Christian Science Monitor, Jundallah, or "God's Brigade," composed of predominantly Sunni Muslim Baluchis which inhabits Pakistan's gas-rich province of Baluchestan, as well as neighboring regions in Iran and Afghanistan.[20] Regi was also claimed by Iran to be associated with al Qaida which the group denies. Hossein Ali Shahriari, the representative from Zahedan in Parliament, said the attack had been carried out by “insurgents and smugglers who are led by the world imperialism,” a common reference to the United States and Britain.[21] MEK support The PBS documentary series "Frontline," reported, in October 2007, CIA supports Anti-Iranian organizations such as the People's Mujahedin of Iran (also known as the MEK or MKO) which has been involved in terrorist activities within Iran. Iran has demanded that the US stop supporting the MEK in exchange for stopping it's support of Shiite's in Iraq.[22] The show quoted Vali Nasr, author of The Shia Revival as saying the Iranians had hoped that the fall of Saddam would destroy the MEK, which is generally unpopular in Iraq...the MEK operated in Iraq as an arm of Iraqi intelligence against Iranian operatives in Iraq, against Shi'ites and against the Kurds. And, in fact, one of the major pressures on the United States to round up the MEK and put them in a camp did not come from Iran; it came from [Iraqi President] Jalal Talabani.... And I think at a third level the Iranians look at the MEK issue as a test of U.S. goodwill...." Richard Armitage disagreed that MEK was being supported. "Richard Armitage, U.S. deputy secretary of state, 2001-05, said... "I've heard through some interviews that in some of the discussions leading up to the invasion that Ryan Crocker had said to the Iranians that the MEK would be treated as part of Saddam's army, the implication being [it would be] on a target list, which wasn't exactly what happened after the war. "I don't know about that specifically, but we had discussed the MEK more pointedly after the invasion. And there were some in the administration who wanted to use the Mujahideen-e Khalq as a pressure point against Iran, and I can remember the national security adviser, Dr. [Condoleezza] Rice, being very specific about it, saying no, a terrorist group is a terrorist group. "That was exactly the point of view of the State Department as well. We wanted the U.S. military to disarm the MEK and contain them. ... And eventually we did disarm the major weapons [from] the MEK. Then we ... engaged in a broad effort to try to resettle these people, but we were very unsuccessful in getting them settled in foreign lands...."

___________________

quote:

Originally posted by Krypton My point? It's useless for you to be mad at Iran for [orange=orange]allegedly[/color] giving material support to Iraqi militias. The US/UK have been giving material support to coups, counter-insurgents, and tyrants for years. Tell me CHRles, who do you think holds the high moral ground here? My answer is nobody holds the high ground. Iran is playing the same game the US/UK have been playing for decades.

bad justification. iran isn't trying to undermine the US government, their assistance is harming the iraqi people much more than the US. If the Iranians are mad at the US for those actions giving support to Iraqi insurgents that kill civilians is a horrible way to retaliate.

We get your point Charles Iran= Evil

___________________
Mystic Mind - DJ Mixes
http://soundcloud.com/mystic-mind

Facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/DJMysticMind

quote:

Originally posted by jerZ07002 bad justification. iran isn't trying to undermine the US government, their assistance is harming the iraqi people much more than the US. If the Iranians are mad at the US for those actions giving support to Iraqi insurgents that kill civilians is a horrible way to retaliate.

I never said Iran cares about anybody. Neither side cares inherently about the Iraqi people. I think most of us can agree the US's fundamental belief in invading Iraq wasn't because they loved the Iraqi people so much. The US stays because if they don't, Iran will have a powerful influence on Iraq, and Iraq will probably turn into a Shiite Islamic government. This is the only reason the US stays. Iran is looking out for Iran, and it is to their interest to see to it Iraq never becomes a threat to them any longer. War hawks always try to denounce Iran for pursuing its interests through alternative means. As if the US/UK alliance isn't pursuing its own interest. Meanwhile, the Iraqi people themselves are caught in the middle of this ideological war. The Soviet boogey man died in 1991. The Islamic boogey man is having a field day!!

___________________

quote:

Originally posted by Krypton I never said Iran cares about anybody. Neither side cares inherently about the Iraqi people. I think most of us can agree the US's fundamental belief in invading Iraq wasn't because they loved the Iraqi people so much. The US stays because if they don't, Iran will have a powerful influence on Iraq, and Iraq will probably turn into a Shiite Islamic government. This is the only reason the US stays. Iran is looking out for Iran, and it is to their interest to see to it Iraq never becomes a threat to them any longer. War hawks always try to denounce Iran for pursuing its interests through alternative means. As if the US/UK alliance isn't pursuing its own interest. Meanwhile, the Iraqi people themselves are caught in the middle of this ideological war. The Soviet boogey man died in 1991. The Islamic boogey man is having a field day!!

don't you find it slightly hypocritical that you justify the reprehensible actions of another country because those actions are similar to those of the US, while at the same time condemning those actions when conducted by the US?

quote:

Originally posted by jerZ07002 don't you find it slightly hypocritical that you justify the reprehensible actions of another country because those actions are similar to those of the US, while at the same time condemning those actions when conducted by the US?

That's not what I'm doing. Both countries, as I said, are acting in their own selfish interest. Iran AND the US. No one holds the high moral ground, which CHRles loves to go down that road.

What are the interests? The US does not want Iraq to turn into a Shiite Islamic Republic like Iran. Iran does not want Iraq to be a springboard for an invasion or covert operations into Iran. Political Islam has replaced communism as the boogey man of the world.

___________________

Krypton is being a hypocrite. We all are in some way, but he's blind to his hypocrisy.

Furthermore, I completely back the CIA's operations in the 1950s. I love it when people look back on actions TODAY and don't look at what was happening back in the 50s.
The facts were that the US saw a growing problem with Communism, and if the US and UK didnt step in and kill that worthless spine some Iranians love so dearly (yet were born long after his death) then Iran could have fallen over to Soviet influence.
The real problem was in the 70s - Carter didn't do enough to help the Shah. Iran wasn't ready for a democracy - 1970s Iran can't be compared to the French or American revolution. A bunch of radical religious leaders gained office, not Iran's intellectual class.

quote:

Originally posted by Krypton Iran does not want Iraq to be a springboard for an invasion or covert operations into Iran. Political Islam has replaced communism as the boogey man of the world.

Iran has other things to worry about right now. You may have noticed Syria and Israel are holding peace negotiations. This move is largely backed by the Arab world in part out of selfishness. The Arab league knows that Israel would have an easier time destroying Iran's nuclear sites if it doesnt have to worry about Syria and Hezbollah getting in the way. Guess what - Saudi Arabia doesn't want to see a nuclear capable Iran just as much as Israel, and the US.
Basically, once Israel and Syria show their talks are serious, that will put more pressure on Iran to cooperate with the West.

Last edited by CHRles on May-22-2008 at 02:31

quote:

Originally posted by CHRles Krypton is being a hypocrite. We all are in some way, but he's blind to his hypocrisy.

Hypocrisy? Is that the only shit you can come up with?

quote:

Furthermore, I completely back the CIA's operations in the 1950s. I love it when people look back on actions TODAY and don't look at what was happening back in the 50s. The facts were that the US saw a growing problem with Communism, and if the US and UK didnt step in and kill that worthless spine some Iranians love so dearly (yet were born long after his death) then Iran could have fallen over to Soviet influence. The real problem was in the 70s - Carter didn't do enough to help the Shah. Iran wasn't ready for a democracy - 1970s Iran can't be compared to the French or American revolution. A bunch of radical religious leaders gained office, not Iran's intellectual class.

Ok, then expect more terrorism, more danger to Americans, more hate to proliferate throughout the world. Congrats...

quote:

Iran has other things to worry about right now. You may have noticed Syria and Israel are holding peace negotiations. This move is largely backed by the Arab world in part out of selfishness. The Arab league knows that Israel would have an easier time destroying Iran's nuclear sites if it doesnt have to worry about Syria and Hezbollah getting in the way. Guess what - Saudi Arabia doesn't want to see a nuclear capable Iran just as much as Israel, and the US. Basically, once Israel and Syria show their talks are serious, that will put more pressure on Iran to cooperate with the West.

Israel can strike targets in Iran irrespective of what Hezbollah or Syria does. Instead of looking at what Iran is doing, how about looking at the first country which acquired nukes in the Middle East. Really, who is the one who first proliferated nukes in the Middle East. It was Israel. Who are the ones threatening Iran? Israel and the US. Are both nuclear powers? Yes. So guess what? It is in Iran's best interest to somehow acquire nuclear weapons to fend off any perceived threats.

And to all those idiots who think Iran would be stupid enough to nuke Israel...Israel has hundreds of nuclear warheads. Whatever theoretical nuclear attack by Iran on Israel would result in Iran's own destruction many times over. IT'S CALL "MUTUALLY ASSURED DESTRUCTION"!!

___________________