Peaceniks fall out on human shield mission
Sunday Times | 11.02.2003 21:22
Peaceniks fall out on human shield mission
Sunday Times, 09/02/03
One of the group’s three double-deckers has been abandoned in Italy with engine trouble and plans to travel through the Balkans were aborted as “too dangerous”. The head of the delegation, a former American marine, has been deported from Turkey for trying to enter the country with a “world citizen” passport after renouncing his United States citizenship.
Peaceniks fall out on human shield mission
The Sunday Times | February 9, 2003 | Jane Mulkerrins
A PLAN by a group of peace campaigners to travel by bus to Baghdad to offer themselves to Saddam Hussein as human shields has been threatened with collapse by the personal clashes, logistical chaos and the loss of their leader.
One of the group’s three double-deckers has been abandoned in Italy with engine trouble and plans to travel through the Balkans were aborted as “too dangerous”. The head of the delegation, a former American marine, has been deported from Turkey for trying to enter the country with a “world citizen” passport after renouncing his United States citizenship.
The second of the two remaining red buses and an accompanying white taxi limped into Istanbul yesterday after being stranded in blizzards for two days. Several members of the peace convoy spent the day scrabbling around the Turkish city trying to hire four-wheel-drive vehicles or trying to book plane or train tickets to take them on to Baghdad. “There comes a time at which we have to leave the buses behind and move on without them,” said John Rose, an American who spent seven years with the Zapatista rebels in Mexico and has joined the trip in Turkey. “We just have to cut them loose now.”
Yesterday the dwindling group of 40 “peaceniks” was joined by 35 Turkish volunteers. There was also a shock. Organisers told the human shields they must each stump up $1,000 before they could enter Iraq. In addition, they would have to leave their mobile phones at the border, cutting off all communication with home, and be subjected to tests for HIV.
Helen Williams, 34, from Newport, south Wales, said funds were already running dangerously low. “Some people are getting down to their last few pounds,” she said. “The sooner we get to Baghdad where we can live more cheaply, the better.”
Rajia Dhanjani, a 22-year-old hairdresser from south London, said: “I thought it would be hard when we got to Baghdad, but I had no idea the trip would be this awful. I thought the journey would be one long party.”
Last night the group held a crisis meeting at a cafe in Istanbul. The Turks showed themselves determined to impose more efficient organisation on the ramshackle British expedition which arrived almost a week behind schedule.
After three hours of debate, the Turks won through. The convoy will now remain in Istanbul until tomorrow.
“We have to show we are together on this,” said Tolga Temuge, 36, a Turk who quit his job as campaigns director of Greenpeace in the Mediterranean to travel to Iraq.
The British contingent were keen to strike out today for Ankara before heading to Syria en route for Jordan and then Iraq. However, the Turks, shocked at the shambolic antics of the British, pushed for a delayed departure to allow time to regroup.
The two red London buses, the white taxi and two minibuses will now head for Ankara tomorrow. Volunteers are trying to switch their minds from the disarray of recent days to the situations they will face on arrival in Baghdad, assuming they get there.
One of the buses, however, may have to find a new driver soon. Its driver, who identifies himself only as Gary, said the Syrian authorities had told him he would not be permitted to drive his vehicle through their country because his mother works for the Ministry of Defence in Britain.
If Gary’s mother’s job has made his journey difficult, his place in the convoy has been of little help to his mother. “My mum has had a really hard time because of me,” he said. “She works in intelligence and she has been blackballed by the ministry ever since they found out I was on the trip.”
Many participants are concerned they will run short of money and are unhappy at the prospect of a compulsory HIV test on the Iraqi border, about which they were not warned until this weekend.
“We are buying our own hypodermic syringes”, said Williams. “They could just as easily give you HIV with the needles in Iraq.”
Joe Letts, 52, a father of four from Dorset who was a cameraman during the last Gulf war and owner of the two red buses, was relieved finally to arrive in Istanbul last night but is determined his buses will make it to Baghdad.
“It was pretty hairy getting here and there were times I thought we wouldn’t make it. But the buses are running well now and we are definitely taking them all the way,” he said.
The rows started almost as soon as the group left London a fortnight ago, with arguments over which routes to take. A black bus owned by Ken Nichols O’Keefe, 33, a tattooed former US marine and Gulf war veteran, and full of young firebrands, drove through Germany — with a sightseeing stop-off at Dachau concentration camp — to Italy even though the vehicle was too tall for the Alpine tunnels and scraped its roof.
Another bus, one of the lumbering Routemasters owned by Letts, drove through France and waited for Nichols O’Keefe in Milan.
The tension was compounded when a group of Italian peace campaigners in designer clothes joined the Britons, many of whom are elderly activists wearing hippie-style clothes and cooking lentils aboard the buses. Instead of heading towards their objective, the peaceniks took a detour to Rome last Sunday for sightseeing.
Most of them eventually caught a ferry to Greece, but Nichols O’Keefe and a handful of others stayed behind with a stricken bus before flying to join the others. He was promptly detained in Istanbul and deported back to Italy.
He has angered other peaceniks by planning to meet Saddam on his arrival in Baghdad. At least five have returned home rather than deal with him and a Welsh couple have set out to reach the Iraqi capital on their own.
“People have got so fed up with him that they have dropped out,” said Letts. Nichols O’Keefe was dubbed “the messiah” and “Gandhi” by his less-than-enthusiastic fellow travellers. He had warned them any breakdowns “would be the work of the CIA”.
He is being held this weekend in an Italian jail and is facing deportation to the United States. His mother, Pat, who is continuing on the journey to Baghdad, said: “That would be the very worst outcome. It would be a disaster for him.”
Temuge, who is emerging as one of the new leaders of the group, said he thought the deportation was a political action on the part of the Turkish government. But volunteers were yesterday becoming increasingly disillusioned about the trip, its organisers and their chances of ever reaching Iraq.
Grace Trevett, a mother of four from Stroud, Gloucestershire, said: “There has been no democracy at all. Ken just tells people they have to like it or they can f*** off. If they can’t respect us, how are they going to respect the Iraqi people?” A soothing role has been played by Godfrey Meynell, 68, an Old Etonian former high sheriff of Derbyshire and son of a Victoria Cross holder. His wise air is helped by the copy of Plato and His Dialogues by G Lowes Dickinson which he reads in the bus. He admitted, however: “There is a real difference in spirit between the groups.
“Of course we are aware we may get used as propaganda or worse by Saddam Hussein. That is why we are very clear about our mission now so that it can’t be misinterpreted.”
The group will hope their experience is more fortunate than Meynell’s previous experience of a similar peace convoy. In 1956, he drove a van packed with corned beef to aid Hungarians rising up against the Soviets. The vehicle was stopped at the border.
Sunday Times, 09/02/03
One of the group’s three double-deckers has been abandoned in Italy with engine trouble and plans to travel through the Balkans were aborted as “too dangerous”. The head of the delegation, a former American marine, has been deported from Turkey for trying to enter the country with a “world citizen” passport after renouncing his United States citizenship.
Peaceniks fall out on human shield mission
The Sunday Times | February 9, 2003 | Jane Mulkerrins
A PLAN by a group of peace campaigners to travel by bus to Baghdad to offer themselves to Saddam Hussein as human shields has been threatened with collapse by the personal clashes, logistical chaos and the loss of their leader.
One of the group’s three double-deckers has been abandoned in Italy with engine trouble and plans to travel through the Balkans were aborted as “too dangerous”. The head of the delegation, a former American marine, has been deported from Turkey for trying to enter the country with a “world citizen” passport after renouncing his United States citizenship.
The second of the two remaining red buses and an accompanying white taxi limped into Istanbul yesterday after being stranded in blizzards for two days. Several members of the peace convoy spent the day scrabbling around the Turkish city trying to hire four-wheel-drive vehicles or trying to book plane or train tickets to take them on to Baghdad. “There comes a time at which we have to leave the buses behind and move on without them,” said John Rose, an American who spent seven years with the Zapatista rebels in Mexico and has joined the trip in Turkey. “We just have to cut them loose now.”
Yesterday the dwindling group of 40 “peaceniks” was joined by 35 Turkish volunteers. There was also a shock. Organisers told the human shields they must each stump up $1,000 before they could enter Iraq. In addition, they would have to leave their mobile phones at the border, cutting off all communication with home, and be subjected to tests for HIV.
Helen Williams, 34, from Newport, south Wales, said funds were already running dangerously low. “Some people are getting down to their last few pounds,” she said. “The sooner we get to Baghdad where we can live more cheaply, the better.”
Rajia Dhanjani, a 22-year-old hairdresser from south London, said: “I thought it would be hard when we got to Baghdad, but I had no idea the trip would be this awful. I thought the journey would be one long party.”
Last night the group held a crisis meeting at a cafe in Istanbul. The Turks showed themselves determined to impose more efficient organisation on the ramshackle British expedition which arrived almost a week behind schedule.
After three hours of debate, the Turks won through. The convoy will now remain in Istanbul until tomorrow.
“We have to show we are together on this,” said Tolga Temuge, 36, a Turk who quit his job as campaigns director of Greenpeace in the Mediterranean to travel to Iraq.
The British contingent were keen to strike out today for Ankara before heading to Syria en route for Jordan and then Iraq. However, the Turks, shocked at the shambolic antics of the British, pushed for a delayed departure to allow time to regroup.
The two red London buses, the white taxi and two minibuses will now head for Ankara tomorrow. Volunteers are trying to switch their minds from the disarray of recent days to the situations they will face on arrival in Baghdad, assuming they get there.
One of the buses, however, may have to find a new driver soon. Its driver, who identifies himself only as Gary, said the Syrian authorities had told him he would not be permitted to drive his vehicle through their country because his mother works for the Ministry of Defence in Britain.
If Gary’s mother’s job has made his journey difficult, his place in the convoy has been of little help to his mother. “My mum has had a really hard time because of me,” he said. “She works in intelligence and she has been blackballed by the ministry ever since they found out I was on the trip.”
Many participants are concerned they will run short of money and are unhappy at the prospect of a compulsory HIV test on the Iraqi border, about which they were not warned until this weekend.
“We are buying our own hypodermic syringes”, said Williams. “They could just as easily give you HIV with the needles in Iraq.”
Joe Letts, 52, a father of four from Dorset who was a cameraman during the last Gulf war and owner of the two red buses, was relieved finally to arrive in Istanbul last night but is determined his buses will make it to Baghdad.
“It was pretty hairy getting here and there were times I thought we wouldn’t make it. But the buses are running well now and we are definitely taking them all the way,” he said.
The rows started almost as soon as the group left London a fortnight ago, with arguments over which routes to take. A black bus owned by Ken Nichols O’Keefe, 33, a tattooed former US marine and Gulf war veteran, and full of young firebrands, drove through Germany — with a sightseeing stop-off at Dachau concentration camp — to Italy even though the vehicle was too tall for the Alpine tunnels and scraped its roof.
Another bus, one of the lumbering Routemasters owned by Letts, drove through France and waited for Nichols O’Keefe in Milan.
The tension was compounded when a group of Italian peace campaigners in designer clothes joined the Britons, many of whom are elderly activists wearing hippie-style clothes and cooking lentils aboard the buses. Instead of heading towards their objective, the peaceniks took a detour to Rome last Sunday for sightseeing.
Most of them eventually caught a ferry to Greece, but Nichols O’Keefe and a handful of others stayed behind with a stricken bus before flying to join the others. He was promptly detained in Istanbul and deported back to Italy.
He has angered other peaceniks by planning to meet Saddam on his arrival in Baghdad. At least five have returned home rather than deal with him and a Welsh couple have set out to reach the Iraqi capital on their own.
“People have got so fed up with him that they have dropped out,” said Letts. Nichols O’Keefe was dubbed “the messiah” and “Gandhi” by his less-than-enthusiastic fellow travellers. He had warned them any breakdowns “would be the work of the CIA”.
He is being held this weekend in an Italian jail and is facing deportation to the United States. His mother, Pat, who is continuing on the journey to Baghdad, said: “That would be the very worst outcome. It would be a disaster for him.”
Temuge, who is emerging as one of the new leaders of the group, said he thought the deportation was a political action on the part of the Turkish government. But volunteers were yesterday becoming increasingly disillusioned about the trip, its organisers and their chances of ever reaching Iraq.
Grace Trevett, a mother of four from Stroud, Gloucestershire, said: “There has been no democracy at all. Ken just tells people they have to like it or they can f*** off. If they can’t respect us, how are they going to respect the Iraqi people?” A soothing role has been played by Godfrey Meynell, 68, an Old Etonian former high sheriff of Derbyshire and son of a Victoria Cross holder. His wise air is helped by the copy of Plato and His Dialogues by G Lowes Dickinson which he reads in the bus. He admitted, however: “There is a real difference in spirit between the groups.
“Of course we are aware we may get used as propaganda or worse by Saddam Hussein. That is why we are very clear about our mission now so that it can’t be misinterpreted.”
The group will hope their experience is more fortunate than Meynell’s previous experience of a similar peace convoy. In 1956, he drove a van packed with corned beef to aid Hungarians rising up against the Soviets. The vehicle was stopped at the border.
Sunday Times
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