In 1999, the population of Iraq was estimated at approximately 22 million people. The economy of the country is based largely on its oil reserves, agriculture and industry. Its main industries are textiles, construction, food processing and chemicals. Iraq has a long history of strong foreign relations with other countries in the Middle East and beyond. In terms of politics, Iraq has had a republic system with Saddam Hussein as President since 1979. His Ba’ath Party continued to hold a majority in Parliament after their victory in the 1999 elections. See ethnicityology for Iraq in the year of 2018.
Yearbook 1999
Iraq. The year was marked by US and UK intensive bombing of the so-called flight ban zones in North and South Iraq. The attacks were directed not only to US or British aircraft but also to other air defense facilities, liaison centers and oil pipeline control stations. In September, according to Iraq 187 civilians had been killed in this year’s attacks. The United States accused Iraq of deliberately placing air defense and radar systems in residential areas.
In March, Iraq succeeded in getting the Arab League (Arab League) out with a communique calling for a halt to all attacks against Iraq who did not have the support of the UN Security Council. In other respects, Iraq did not bring home any major sympathy from the outside world, but neither did the US receive the same support as before from the countries around the Persian Gulf.
Visit Countryaah official website to get information about the capital city of Iraq. Several proposals on how Iraq’s cooperation with the UN could be resumed were presented during the year. by France, the UK and the Netherlands, and by a UN committee. However, none of the proposals were accepted by the Security Council. Iraq also opposed all the proposals which did not impose unconditional and complete lifting of the sanctions.
- Also see Abbreviationfinder.org to see the acronym of IRQ which stands for Iraq and other definitions of this 3-letter abbreviation.
In October, the United States announced that it would begin providing military training to Iraqi opposition leaders. At the same time, fax machines, computers and other office equipment worth $ 2 million would be delivered to the opposition. The groups that can benefit from US support are the umbrella organization INC (Iraqi National Congress), Iran-based SCIRI (Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq), the two competing Kurdish groups KDP (Kurdish Democratic Party, Kurdistan Democratic Party) and PUK (Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, Kurdistan Patriotic Union) and three other groups.
The Iranian opposition group Mujaheddin-e-Khalq (People’s Mujaheddin) and its bases in Iraq suffered several attacks during the year. Iran denied all interference.
The attacks against Shi’ite Muslim leaders in Iraq continued. Storayatollah Muhammad Sadiq as-Sadr was murdered along with two of his sons in southern Iraq in February, triggering violent protests among the country’s Shia Muslims. According to the opposition, several hundred protesters were killed, but that information was denied by the regime. In April, it was announced that four people had been arrested and executed for the murder. In March, the regime had announced that eight men had been executed for the murders of two other Shi’ite imams in southern Iraq 1998. However, the opposition claimed that they executed were not guilty but that the regime was behind the murder.
UN Children’s Fund UNICEF reported in August that child mortality in the government-controlled part of Iraq had doubled in the nine years that the country had been subject to financial sanctions. In 1984-89, 56 of 1,000 children died before the age of five; in 1994-99, the corresponding figure was 131., 88% of all goods reached the population.
In June, the Revolutionary Command Council decided to make it legal to own and trade in foreign currency. The measure was an attempt to stop the fall of the Iraqi currency. The Iraqi civilian population was severely affected during the year by the worst drought of the century.
1 year of occupation
One year after the start of the US invasion and the occupation of Iraq, North American soldiers continue to be killed daily, and the military admits that it is not Al Qaeda that is behind it, but Iraqi resistance groups that, despite the capture of Saddam Hussein, continue their actions.
Torture, political and military crisis for the United States
In April, a car with 4 North Americans was stopped in Fallujah, the car caught fire, the 4 killed, subsequently dragged through the streets of Fallujah and hung up in a bridge. The action triggered a violent retaliatory action by the occupying forces, which cost nearly 1,000 civilians Iraqi lives. On the other hand, the United States completely lost control of the city, and it was only when an Iraqi force with former Iraqi officers and soldiers was sent in late April that the situation stabilized and the tens of thousands who had fled the occupation force’s offensive could return.
Another front was also opened in April when Imam Moghthar al Sadr declared war on the occupying power. The reason was that the occupying power had shut down the radical Shiite imam’s newspaper in Baghdad. Al Sadr’s supporters around Iraq set up armed militias that quickly gained control of several major cities – including Najaf – and in many places police went to the militia or fled the police stations without a fight. Although the Shiites chiefly criticized al Sadr and called for calm, the rebellion was met with sympathy in the Shi’ite population, and also received sympathy from the Sunni people. By the end of April, the United States had lost political and military ground and lost control of several major cities. The situation prompted Spain to advance its decision to withdraw its soldiers and was followed by several Latin American countries.
In May, it was revealed that the United States was torturing Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad. The prison was a torture center under Saddam Hussein and the US continued this practice. The images of the torture went around the world, forcing both President Bush and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeldt to distance themselves from the torture. The participating North American soldiers were brought to trial and sentenced, and the occupying power sought to create an image of the individuals who had gone too far. However, that is not the case. The United States operated for nearly 100 years the School of the Americas in Panama, where Latin American officers were trained in US “interrogation methods” – torture. Following the democratization process in Latin America in the 1980s, the United States in the 1990s chose to move its torture school to Georgia. (See SOAW and USARSA). During May, it was revealed that the torture had been intensified especially following the terrorist attack on the UN headquarters in Baghdad in August 2003. the top military commander in the country, General Ricardo Sanchez had attended the torture in Abu Ghraib. That forced Bush in late May to declare Sanchez would be replaced. But the images and documentation of torture destroyed the last remnant of America’s moral reputation in the Arab world, and questioned in principle what kind of “democracy” the United States wanted to introduce into the Arab world.
The United States suffered another political setback in mid-May when the Department of Defense abandoned its defense of Ahmed Chalabi. Until then, Rumsfeld had been the protege of Chalabi, who for a period was thought to be Iraq’s new leader. But in mid-May, his home in Baghdad was searched and the United States made allegations against him for spying on Iran. At the same time, he was made solely responsible for delivering all the allegations of weapons of mass destruction that formed the basis of the US invasion of the country. The Pentagon produced a story in which Iran should have been interested in avenging itself on Saddam Hussein, and therefore through Chalabi had provided the United States with false intelligence to provoke a North American invasion. But the history of the Pentagon does not shine, why Iran should be interested in getting North American troops along its eastern border when Iran itself is on the US list of rogue states. Nor does the history of the Pentagon illustrate why the US intelligence system should have relied solely on intelligence from a single corrupt politician.
