January 05, 2005

Monbiot on War and Poverty

The victims of the tsunami pay the price of war on Iraq:
"Why must the relief of suffering, in this unprecedentedly prosperous world, rely on the whims of citizens and the appeals of pop stars and comedians? Why, when extreme poverty could be made history with a minor redeployment of public finances, must the poor world still wait for homeless people in the rich world to empty their pockets?

The obvious answer is that governments have other priorities. And the one that leaps to mind is war. If the money they have promised to the victims of the tsunami still falls far short of the amounts required, it is partly because the contingency fund upon which they draw in times of crisis has been spent on blowing people to bits in Iraq.

The US government has so far pledged $350m to the victims of the tsunami, and the UK government 50m pounds ($96m). The US has spent $148 billion on the Iraq war and the UK 6bn pounds ($11.5bn). The war has been running for 656 days. This means that the money pledged for the tsunami disaster by the United States is the equivalent of one and a half day's spending in Iraq. The money the UK has given equates to five and a half days of our involvement in the war...

If our leaders were as generous in helping people as they are in killing them, no one would ever go hungry. "
You can join the campaign against global poverty at: www.makepovertyhistory.org

2 comments:

Harrywr2 said...

Please refrain from referring to leaders of a nation that you are not a citizen of as "our Leaders". How the AMERICAN people chose to spend there money is of no concern to you.

Also, what is it that you don't understand about a "Free Iraqi" having no obligation, as a free human being to respond to your ridulous rants

#1 Cell phone provider in Iraq, NOKIA(Finnish Company), so your cell phone conspiracy doesn't work either.

Jaraparilla said...

Nokia, supply the HANDSETS. Qualcomm supply the network (and resell parts to other companies).

And as a member of a Western country that participated in this illegal invasion, I can can rightly use the term "our leaders" however I want.

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