In her speech to the UN, US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright accused those who oppose the deadly
embargo on Iraq of engaging in "Alice in Wonderland" fantasies. Albright also claimed that Iraqi children now
have a higher caloric intake then before the United States did Iraq the great favour of destroying it during the
Gulf War.

A report just released by the Rome based UN agency, the Food and Agriculture Organization, shows that it is
Albright who is engaging in fantasies and is still trying to deceive the public about the nature of the embargo.
According to the report, child malnutrition in Iraq is a widespread and serious problem.

Albright also attacked Iraq for refusing to allow yet another UN team to come and assess the impact of the
sanctions. Iraq is right to reject such a mission: the effects of the sanctions are well known, and have been
more than adequately exposed by such senior UN officials as Denis Halliday and Hans von Sponeck. Another
assessment mission is just a delaying tactic to buy another six months for the deadlocked diplomats to do
nothing. While they "assess" the situation, another twenty or thirty thousans Iraqis may die. They cannot wait for
any more UN studies.

And if it is true, as Mrs. Albright claims, that Iraqi children are doing better than ever before, one must ask her
what the sanctions are for? They are obviously not bringing Saddam Hussein to his knees, and, we hear from
the US, that Iraq is thriving. So what then are they for?

Albright's bilious speech had the tone of a bitter, defeated and vindictive woman who knows that she is on her
way into history's dustbin. But her "legacy" of mass killing in Iraq threatens to live on after her, which is why the
renewed propaganda efforts to obscure the effects of the sanctions must no be allowed to succeed.

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AP Online

September 14, 2000; Thursday 1:59 AM, Eastern Time

HEADLINE: Child Malnutrition Plagues Iraq

Rome-AP-A U.N. report says child malnutrition remains a serious problem in much of Iraq despite increases
in food rations in the country, which has been under U.N. sanctions for a decade.