Episcopal Press and News
Church Leaders Call for Relaxing Iraq Sanctions
Episcopal News Service. February 9, 1995 [95019]
(ENS) In an open letter to President Bill Clinton released January 26, Presiding Bishop Edmond L. Browning of the Episcopal Church and the Rev. Dr. Joan Brown Campbell, general secretary of the National Council of Churches (NCC), said economic sanctions against Iraq are causing "enormous suffering" for Iraqi civilians and should be relaxed.
Browning and Campbell said that "the severe economic sanctions imposed against Iraq have caused enormous suffering among the civilian population. Food is in short supply, or is unaffordable. Iraq's medical system, once one of the best in the Middle East, is unable to function because medications and medical equipment are unavailable."
Those most affected by the hardships, they said, are "the most vulnerable -- children, women, and the elderly." While the sanctions do not prohibit the importation of food or medicine, "it is clear that international charitable efforts cannot meet the great needs of Iraq's population," they said. "The time has come for Iraq to be permitted to sell oil in order to feed and care for its own people."
Four years ago, just before the Gulf War, Browning and Campbell joined other church leaders who traveled to Iraq to witness for a peaceful resolution of the Gulf crisis. The sanctions, imposed by the United Nations Security Council at the conclusion of the Gulf War, apparently have not significantly weakened the regime of President Saddam Hussein, they said. "The Iraqi Army remains intact, and the secret police continue to terrorize people into quiet submission," they said. They called on the United States to lead the Security Council to relax the sanctions.
Browning and Campbell acknowledged that Iraq has not complied fully with the conditions of the war's cease-fire agreement, and that the Iraqi government could misuse the resources sent after the lifting of sanctions. Still, the situation "must change," they said. "The sick and suffering people of Iraq have become victims of decisions made not only by their own government but by the United Nations as well."
Opening Iraq to the influences of the international community might accomplish more than sanctions, they added. "Exposing Iraq to new ideas and to the promising democratic trends now beginning to appear in the Middle East would surely pose a significant danger to the suffocating rule of Saddam Hussein," they said.