As reported by the UK Guardian newspaper (1 December, 2007: http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,,2220119,00.html ), even before he was sworn in as PM, Australia’s new leader Kevin Rudd had stated “"The combat force in Iraq we would have home by around about the middle of next year". However that means committing Australian forces to over 6 months more in Occupied Iraq and will leave hundreds of Australian defence personnel indefinitely in Occupied Iraq and the Gulf.
As a responsible scientist and citizen, on Day #2 of the newly-elected Rudd Government I published a detailed and documented “Rudd Australia Report Card #1. Continued Australian and US Coalition war crimes in Occupied Iraq” (see: http://open.newmatilda.com/crosswire/?p=142 ). The main features of this damning Report about Rudd Australia and Occupied Iraq are listed succinctly below:
1. the Coalition invasion and occupation of Iraq was illegal, was based on false evidence and has led to what some outstanding US, UK and Australian writers call an “Iraqi Holocaust” and “Iraqi Genocide” (genocide as defined by Article 2 of the UN Genocide Convention: http://www.edwebproject.org/sideshow/genocide/convention.html );
2. there have been 0.8-1.2 million post-invasion excess violent deaths (UK ORB: http://www.opinion.co.uk/Newsroom_details.aspx?NewsId=78 and http://www.countercurrents.org/polya190907.htm ) and US Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health:
http://www.countercurrents.org/burnham230907.htm );
3.there have been 0.7-0.8 million post-invasion non-violent excess deaths (UNICEF: http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/index.html and UN Population Division: http://esa.un.org/unpp/ );
4. there have been 1.5-2.0 million post-invasion excess deaths (summation of the foregoing data);
5. there have been 0.6 million post-invasion under-5 infant deaths (UNICEF: http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/index.html and UN Population Division: http://esa.un.org/unpp/ );
6. there have been over 1.1 million US-caused Iraqi deaths according to the prestigious Just Foreign Policy organization: http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq/iraqdeaths.html );
7. there are currently 4.5 million refugees (UNHCR: http://www.refugeesinternational.org/content/article/detail/10294 and the BRussells Tribunal: http://www.brusselstribunal.org/ );
8. eminent scholars and writers who decry “Iraqi Holocaust” and/or an “Iraqi Genocide” include Dr Mark Weisbrot (President of Just Foreign policy: http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/68568/ ), Dr Paul Craig Roberts (eminent US writer, academic, editor and Father of Reaganomics: http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts10162007.html ) and John Pilger (outstanding, award-winning Australian-UK writer and journalist: http://www.newstatesman.com/200711150033 ); indeed what is clearly an Iraqi Holocaust also constitutes an Iraqi Genocide as defined by Article 2 of the UN Genocide Convention (see: http://www.edwebproject.org/sideshow/genocide/convention.html );
9. a major cause of the 0.7-0.8 million non-violent post-invasion excess deaths in Occupied Iraq is the war criminal Occupier non-provision of life-sustaining food and medical requisites in gross violation of Articles 55 and 56 of the Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War: http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/92.htm ; the “total annual per capita medical expenditure” permitted in Occupied Iraq by Occupier Australia and the US Coalition is $135 (2004) as compared to $2,560 (UK), $3,123 (Australia) and $6,096(the US) (see WHO: http://www.who.int/en/ and http://mwcnews.net/content/view/17066/42/ );
10. a previous government Minister and now Leader of the Opposition has admitted that oil was a major factor in the government’s decision to keep troops in Iraq (see: http://news.independent.co.uk/world/australasia/article2739741.ece );
11. according to a 2007 survey by the US Studies Centre, University of Sydney, 67% of Australians polled opposed Australia’s presence in Iraq (see:
http://sydney.edu.au/us-studies/docs/Survey_Murray_OpEd.pdf ) i.e. Australians are overwhelmingly opposed to continued Australian participation in the Iraq War; and
12. in various polls conducted in recent years about 70-90% of Iraqis want the foreign Occupiers to leave (see: http://www.greenleft.org.au/2006/686/35610 ; http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=18574 ).
Yet much of what is outlined above is IGNORED by Murdoch-dominated Australian Mainstream media and politicians in a process of sustained, racist holocaust ignoring and holocaust denial. Indeed there is an urgent need for all Australians to be made aware of their complicity in the 25 million excess deaths in the post-1950 US Asian Wars (see “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950”, G.M. Polya, Melbourne, 2007: http://mwcnews.net/content/view/1375/247/ and http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/ ).
Australia is indeed the Land of Lies and Flies and must be described as an egregiously dishonest, politically correct racist (PC racist) Murdochracy.
Many Australians pragmatically accepted that in order to win the recent election Labor leader Kevin Rudd had to accommodate to the Murdoch-dominated Mainstream media and to a selfish, mercenary and ignorant Murdoch media-brainwashed electorate. However Rudd Labor - even before it was sworn into office - effectively renewed Australian complicity in the continuing Iraqi Genocide against the overwhelming wishes of the Australian and Iraqi people.
Similarly, Australians are overwhelmingly concerned about climate change but the Rudd Labor Government is committed to a grossly deficient greenhouse gas reduction target of “60% reduction by 2050” but with no reduction of fossil fuel exports (Australia is the world’s #1 coal exporter and a major natural gas exporter) – this will in reality mean an 80% INCREASE in CO2 emissions by 2050 as compared to the 80% REDUCTION demanded by an overwhelming international scientific consensus (see: “Australia Labor victorious – but not green enough”: http://green-blog.org/2007/11/28/australian-labor-victorious-but-not-green-enough/ ).
What can decent people around the world do about this Murdochratic travesty? Decent people can only (a) inform everyone they can in relation to genocide and akin atrocities and (b) act ethically in all their dealings with those complicit in such outrages against humanity e.g. by international Sanctions and Boycotts against climate criminal, climate genocidal, war criminal and Iraqi Genocide-complicit Australia.
Dr Gideon Polya published some 130 works in a 4 decade scientific career, most recently a huge pharmacological reference text "Biochemical Targets of Plant Bioactive Compounds" (CRC Press/Taylor & Francis, New York & London, 2003). He has just published “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950” (G.M. Polya, Melbourne, 2007: http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/ and
http://mwcnews.net/content/view/1375/247/ ).