The victims are the children, of course.
In 1999 UNICEF (The United Nations Children's Fund) conducted a survey in Iraq to determine the effect of sanctions on Iraq, imposed by the United Nations.
What had sanctions done?
The surveys reveal that in the south and center of Iraq -- home to 85 per cent of the country's population -- under-5 mortality more than doubled from 56 deaths per 1000 live births (1984-1989) to 131 deaths per 1000 live births (1994-1999). Likewise infant mortality -- defined as the death of children in their first year -- increased from 47 per 1000 live births to 108 per 1000 live births within the same time frame. The surveys indicate a maternal mortality ratio in the south and center of 294 deaths per 100,000 live births over the ten-year period 1989 to 1999.
And in practical terms, what does this mean?
Ms. Bellamy noted that if the substantial reduction in child mortality throughout Iraq during the 1980s had continued through the 1990s, there would have been half a million fewer deaths of children under-five in the country as a whole during the eight year period 1991 to 1998. As a partial explanation, she pointed to a March statement of the Security Council Panel on Humanitarian Issues which states: "Even if not all suffering in Iraq can be imputed to external factors, especially sanctions, the Iraqi people would not be undergoing such deprivations in the absence of the prolonged measures imposed by the Security Council and the effects of war."
So, we have an eight year period, and 500,000 premature deaths of children under 5.
500,000 / 8 years = 62,500 per year = 1,202 per week = an average of 171 children per day under 5 dead.
It's worth emphasising that this is just under fives. Obviously including up to age ten, for instance, would lead to higher figures. And since the survey, another four years of sanctions have been inflicted.
This is the result of diplomacy. Twelve years of dying kids. It is the one reason, more than any other, why I support a war to remove Saddam Hussein's regime, a regime which brought these sanctions upon the people of Iraq. Remove the regime, and you remove any rationale for continued sanctions. I don't care if Hussein has no weapons of mass destruction nastier than a toothpick. The UN sanctions are weapons of mass destruction, and they've hit civilians and their children for 12 years. If the regime stays, the sanctions will stay.
When Mr. Chirac and the anti-war lobby argues for continuing diplomacy, more time for inspections, they also argue for more time for sanctions (I thought about calling this thread "Chirac - accessory to child murder."). Every day of delay is another day the regime continues in existence, and aid is denied the Iraqi people. Another day of starvation and disease for those children.
So when you light your candles and march for peace and protest that "war is always the worst option", remember the children who are dying for your "morality." May they weigh heavily upon your consciences.
Expatbrit
