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Thousands Rally in Washington to Protest Iraq Sanctions
About 3,000 people braved heavy rains to rally in front of the White House on Sunday to protest against prolonged sanctions Iraq.
"Stop the sanctions now!" the crow in Lafayette Square chanted.
"What is the purpose of this policy?" asked Green Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader."Is it to demonstrate that the United States of America is the most powerful country in the world? I don't think that needs to be demonstrated on the graves of one million innocent Iraqi civilians."
Nader, one of about a dozen speakers at the rally, said that 5,000 Iraqi children were dying each month from diseases and malnutrition resulting from the sanctions.
Democratic Congressman Dennis Kucinich of Ohio said that the sanctions were wrong and did nothing but continued to "weaken and kill innocent children."
The U.N. Security Council imposed sweeping sanctions against Iraq this Sunday 10 years ago following its invasion of Kuwait.
Despite increasing international efforts to lift the crippling embargo, some western countries, especially the United States and Britain, insist that the sanctions must remain in place until Iraq has proven to U.N. inspectors it has given up programs to develop weapons of mass destruction.
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