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DERRY PROTEST AGAINST USE OF CHEMICAL WEAPON IN IRAQ

Saturday 26th November 2005 at 2.30 pm Guildhall Square, Derry

A vigil to mark the first anniversary of the US siege of Fallujah will be held in Derry next Saturday.

Organised by the Derry Anti War Coalition, the vigil will take place in Guildhall Square at 2.30 pm.

In a statement, DAWC spokesperson Roderick Cobley said: "In the course of the siege, code-named Operation Phantom Fury, shells containing white phosphorus were poured into Fallujah.

"White phosphorus is a chemical which burns the flesh off the bone. It's internationally banned in battle except as a means of illumination. For a year, the US denied that it had fired the weapon at Fallujah.

"Now, after Italian television broadcast 'Fallujah: The Hidden Massacre' on November 7th, the Pentagon has had to own up. The film interviews US soldiers. One, Jeff Englehart, described the siege as 'just a massive killing of Arabs. Every single person that was walking down the street or in a house was a target.'

"Says another: 'The bodies melted before our eyes.'

"Around 1,400 civilians were killed in a city about three times the size of Derry

"Terrible things are being done on all sides in Iraq. Blair and Bush told us that their invasion would bring peace and democracy. Instead, it's brought horror piled upon horror.

"The occupation is the cause of the suffering, not the cure. We hear few details of deaths inflicted by the occupying forces. The UN information agency IRIN reported a fortnight ago: 'Dozens of civilians were killed and injured when US-led forces launched an offensive on the western Iraqi town of Husaybah, according to local doctors. One doctor in al-Qaim said that the US military's regular use of anti-personnel cluster bombs had left at least 31 dead and 44 wounded, among them women and children.'

"This part of the regular reality of Iraq is rarely reported in the western media. The slaughter in Fallujah a year ago was a major atrocity among an endless succession of 'minor' atrocities which are still occurring virtually every day.

"We are asking all opponents in Derry of this cruel war to join us for an hour to express sympathy and solidarity with the victims of Fallujah and to call for the immediate withdrawal from Iraq of the occupying armies."





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