This fucking hostage thing

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3611397.stm

This is the top story on BBC News ATM. I'm not seeing it ANYWHERE else.

There's this thread aswell
What would Koizumi Do?

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/04/09/1081326910430.html

Now some of these 'monitors' (they do all seem to be peaceniks, from the BBC's description of them; they're helping street kids and taking photos and measuring radioactivity levels) have been captured. The demand is that the Japanese government withdraw its troops from Iraq by lunchtime Sunday or these hostages will be 'eaten'.

Now, this may or may not be a 'charade'. It probably isn't. These three people are as good as dead already. But the demand is a charade. The real desire of the Iraqi resistors is to get a compelling story on networks around the world, to issue a graphic warning to all those who collaborate with Bush. Pour encourager les autres.

The terrorists know their immediate demands won't be met. The Japanese government would lose credibility if it backed down, and the terrorists would lose credibility if they backed down. (Credibility is unfortunately equated on both sides with the firm intention to take life rather than to let live.) Imagine a scenario in which the Japanese government pretended to be withdrawing from Iraq, got its three monitors back, then said 'Ha ha, fooled you!' and sent everybody back in. It's not going to happen, is it? Because this stand-off is all about image. It's not about saving lives. It's about sending a clear, strong message. 'Back off.' That message will be heard as a result of this.

Street opinion in Japan is of course horrified, but at the same time stoical. Nobody wanted to send Japanese to Iraq, but now they are there, nobody wants or expects the government to back down. Or rather, the government will be expected to back down (or face down) in a quieter way in future cases where they're being strong-armed and jack-booted into doing things their own people don't want. This will happen in parliaments all over the world, not just in Japan. And in this regard, the terrorists have 'won'.

I gather many of them are threatening to resign from the US lackey council if the marines don't stop smashing up Faluja. Given that the USA is going to be scarpering from Iraq with its tail between its legs in the next year or so I'd say they are taking steps to prevent themselves being strung up from lamp-posts.

Not that it makes much difference but that's not Chalabi's quote. I don't mind Iraqi politicians objecting to U.S. policies. It seems a smart way to maintain some credibility with the populace. I just wish they'd learn to speak out of both sides of their mouths like American politicians. They need to be more vocal and visual in upholding the law. Like why don't I hear this type of outrage when Iraqi police stations are attacked?

And with all these recent developments I wouldnt be surprised if it turns into something like Guantanamo.

Ghazi Ajil al-Yawer, a Sunni Muslim member of the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC), said he was ready to resign if the US did not seek a peaceful solution to the crisis in Falluja.

"How can a superpower like the US put itself in a state of war with a small city like Falluja? This is genocide," he told AFP news agency on Friday, the first anniversary of the fall of Saddam Hussein.

Fellow IGC member Adnan Pachachi said the Falluja offensive was "illegal and totally unacceptable" whilst Kurdish IGC member Mahmoud Uthman described US policy as counter-productive.

The Iraqi interim Human Rights Minister, Abdel Basit Turki, and a member of the Iraqi Governing Council's rotating presidency, Iyad Allawi, both resigned on Friday without giving a reason for their decision.

Anyway thanks Momus for your kind words .. oh, about a year ago today. You posted some comforting thoughts on the eve of the Iraq war when I was in the throws of depression. I appreciated it.

— It will free the Japanese hostages in 24 hours in response to a call from the Islamic Clerics Committee for an immediate release.

— It has confirmed through its own sources that the three have not been cooperating with the occupation forces and were helping Iraqi citizens.

— It made the decision also out of consideration for the pain of the hostages' families and in respect of the Japanese public's stance toward the issue.

— It wants the Japanese public to pressure the Japanese government to withdraw its troops from Iraq because the dispatch is illegal.

— Japanese politicians do not represent the Japanese public but instead are agents for the criminals U.S. President George W Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

— The U.S. injured Japanese people by dropping nuclear bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The same thing is happening in Fallujah.

— It is not considering targeting foreign citizens.

— The holy war will continue until victory.

Fucking horrifying.

It should go without saying that what I love about this war is that every single thing can be explained to suit five different political ends. It's like "Choose Your Own Ideological Spin on a Horrid Situation #45: You Are A Hostage!!"

It is not clear what the seven Chinese men detained late on Sunday were doing in Iraq. Chinese sources say they did not work for the government. Chinese media report that the 10 Chinese companies doing business in Iraq have about 40 employees there.

But the BBC's Rupert Wingfield-Hayes says that, until now, China appeared to be the country least likely to have citizens kidnapped in Iraq. Beijing opposed the war and has no troops in the country.

Japan, on the other hand, has 550 troops in Iraq, carrying out humanitarian work, and the kidnappers have demanded that the soldiers be withdrawn.

OTHER FOREIGN HOSTAGES
Nabil George Razuq, 30, Palestinian aid worker
Fadi Ihsan Fadel, 33, Canadian aid worker
Thomas Hamill, 43, US civilian worker

(I wonder who shot the Iranian diplomat and if they knew who he was.)

i'm starting to see this conflict from the POV of the iraqis fighting, in various ways, against the occupation, i must admit

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/23/international/asia/23JAPA.html

Freed From Captivity in Iraq, Japanese Return to More Pain
By NORIMITSU ONISHI

TOKYO, April 22 — The young Japanese civilians taken hostage in Iraq returned home this week, not to the warmth of a yellow-ribbon embrace but to a disapproving nation's cold stare.

Three of them, including a woman who helped street children on the streets of Baghdad, appeared on television two weeks ago as their knife-brandishing kidnappers threatened to slit their throats. A few days after their release, they landed here on Sunday, in the eye of a peculiarly Japanese storm.

"You got what you deserve!" read one hand-written sign at the airport where they landed. "You are Japan's shame," another wrote on the Web site of one of the former hostages. They had "caused trouble" for everybody. The government, not to be outdone, announced it would bill the former hostages $6,000 for air fare.

...

Grasping Japan's attitude toward them, the hostages found themselves under crushing pressure, Dr. Saito said.

According to him, Mr. Imai, the 18-year-old former hostage, registered a high blood pressure reading. Ms. Takato, who had a pulse rate of over 120 beats per minute, kept bursting into tears. When the doctor told her she had done good work in Iraq, she cried convulsively and said, "But I've done wrong, haven't I?"

On Tuesday, Ms. Takato used the tranquilizers Dr. Saito gave her and finally left Tokyo for her hometown in Hokkaido. Ms. Takato, the news media reported, expressed fear about returning to her family home, but she may as well have been talking about returning to Japan. "I feel like going back home quickly, but I'm also afraid of going home."

ned otm

Oh, you know, Japan has to perserve its specialness at all costs, needs of the many over those of the few, can't make an omelette without breaking some eggs, what's a few brutalized human beings amongst friends, etc.

Worst Banner Ad of the Day.

so apparently one of the 7 people killed in the manila hostage incident worked at my university. jeez.

https://twitter.com/#!/hullstephen

happening now.

being followed here
london

happy 40th!

https://i.imgur.com/FEBgcpg.jpg