On December 16, the missiles fired from US warships in the Persian Gulf landed not just on Baghdad but also on Basra and southern Iraq.
Once again, the people of the southern half of the country find themselves in the firing line. In Basra, which has been off-limits since the end of the Gulf War, Fao, which witnessed the bulk of the fighting in the Iran-Iraq war, and Urum Kass’r, the port which welcomes the few boats allowed in under the UN’s oil for food resolution, the scenes are the same. Devastation, people hunting for food and muttering their discontent after eight years’ embargo. And those same slogans are hammered out by the state’s propaganda machine, which portrays Saddam Hussein as the last bastion of Iraqi resistance and pride. AVAILABLE FOR VIEWING: French version only.