Iraqi Human Rights Minister Resigns

[Barrett808]

Iraqi Human Rights Minister Resigns
By LEE KEATH, Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq (news - web sites)'s U.S.-appointed human rights minister said Tuesday he had resigned to protest abuses of Iraqi detainees by American guards, and the interior minister demanded that Iraqi officials be allowed to participate in the running of prisons.

Abdul-Basat al-Turki said he resigned "not only because I believe that the use of violence is a violation of human rights but also because these methods in the prisons means that the violations are a common act."

He did not say what day he submitted his resignation, but Iraqi news media said it was Sunday.

Al-Turki told the Arab television station Al-Jazeera that he had complained in December about human rights violations by Americans to the top U.S. administrator in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer. He did not say if there were any results from the complaints.

(more)

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040504/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_prisoner_abuse_minister&cid=540&ncid=1480

[orthogonal]

1. A lesson for us

If only politicians in this country still believed "the buck stops here" and resigned over their failures.

[daleo]

2. After this, no sane Iraqi would remain with the coalition

Any Iraqi who cooperates (willingly) with the U.S. administration will be branded the worst kind of collaborator. The torture photos took away the last shred of justification for cooperation. The jig is up for the occupation.

[damnraddem]

3. So this is Dubya's plan to hand over power by June 20:

first Fallujah, now the prisons -- he'll give Iraq back to Iraqis piecemeal, as they become increasingly outraged at how we are running things.

Too bad he doesn't have the documents from Iraq's National Library to hand over -- but they were all destroyed in the looting and fire that the U.S. criminally failed to prevent.

[Mattforclark]

4. That one was coming

I wonder which high-profile resignation we'll see next?

[gratuitous]

5. Now there's a shocker

He's not leaving to "spend more time with his family."