A statement issued by organizers says in part, “On Tuesday, President Bush took to the airwaves to try and win support for the war in Iraq. All Bush could do in his speech is repeat the disproved claims that ‘there is a link between the events of September 11, 2001 and Iraq.’ We know there was no link and that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. The Bush justification for the war in Iraq continues to be lies and inventions.”

This week will mark the one-year anniversary of the so-called ‘hand-off of sovereignty’ to Iraq. Yet U.S. troops continue their occupation, the war casualties continue to grow, and the Bush administration can offer no end to the violence. “The majority of Americans want the war to end and the troops to be withdrawn. The majority of Iraqis want the foreign troops out of their country,” the statement continues.

Speakers at the rally included Sami Rasouli, an Iraqi-American who lived in the Twin Cities for many years before returning to Iraq in the fall of 2004. He has returned to the Twin Cities for a visit and to report on conditions in Iraq today.

Also at the protest, plans were announced for a large delegation to go from Minnesota to attend a national anti-war march set for Washington D.C. on Saturday, Sept. 24.

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“The war on Iraq has been raging for nearly three years, and there is no end in sight. Looking at the long battle ahead, the anti-war movement needs a deeper understanding of how events are unfolding in Iraq and what we can expect in the coming months and years,” says Jessica Sundin a conference speaker and member of the Anti-War Committee who traveled to Iraq in 1998.

Throughout the day, speakers emphasized the importance of supporting Iraqi sovereignty and self-determination. Lively discussions focused on how to build the anti-war movement, especially on high school and college campuses. Workshop sessions included: Sovereignty, Oil and War: U.S. Empire versus Iraqi Independence; Resistance Movements in Iraq; ‘Democracy’ Under Occupation and The Faces and Frontiers of Activism – Youth and Student Organizing Against the War.

Erika Zurawski, a conference organizer with the University of Minnesota Anti-War Organizing League (AWOL) commented, “The public opinion against this war is increasing every day. As we’re seeing more poor people, and especially people of color recruited into this war for profit while college is more and more a distant possibility. We must continue to speak out and organize against this war.”

The Anti-War Committee and AWOL are working with other local peace groups to organize a major anti-war demonstration on Saturday, March 18, when protests will take place across the world to mark the third anniversary of the war on Iraq and demand an end to the occupation.

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Chicago, IL – Sami Rasouli is an Iraqi American. “When the U.S. invaded, I felt like I was attacking myself. I was the oppressed and the oppressor.” Rasouli emigrated from Iraq to the U.S. in 1976 and became a U.S. citizen in 2001. He moved back to his home in Najaf, Iraq in 2004 to help counter the U.S. occupation. Since then he has returned the U.S. each year to speak, explaining the disastrous impact of the occupation on the Iraqi people and to seek support for his efforts. Rasouli is in the U.S. now; he travels back to Iraq in July, but will be back in Saint Paul, Minnesota by Sept. 1 to join the protests at the Republican National Convention.

On June 11, Rasouli traveled here, sponsored by Chicago-based organizers of the Coalition to March on the RNC and Stop the War. In addition to speaking to a packed room of anti-war activists at the Eighth Day Center for Justice, he gave numerous interviews, including to the Cliff Kelley Show. Kelley hosts the most popular Black radio call-in show in Chicago on WVON.

Rasaouli condemned the newest development from the Bush administration: imposing 58 permanent U.S. military bases on the regime in Baghdad. Rasouli explained that even President Malaki can’t accept this. The puppet government in Iraq has so little support among the people of Iraq that it is housed in the Green Zone, protected by U.S. occupation forces.

When Rasouli was asked about the U.S. elections and how they will impact the war, he declared, “If we have a responsible president, he must admit the U.S. occupation has failed; agree to withdraw, leaving no military force behind, including equipment; and sit down with the national resistance forces of Iraq.”

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