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8:00-8:01 Billboard:
Iraq regime disintegrates as fighting and looting continues
in Baghdad: May Ying Welsh reports live from the Iraqi capital
Spanish journalists protest death of colleague who was killed
by U.S. forces
Kaveh Golestan 1950-2003: A look at the life of the Pulitzer
Prize winning Iranian photojournalist who was one of 10 international
journalists killed in Iraq
8:10-8:11 Headlines
8:11-8:12 One Minute Music Break
8:15-8:30 IRAQ REGIME DISINTEGRATES AS FIGHTING AND LOOTING
CONTINUES IN BAGHDAD: MAY YING WELSH REPORTS LIVE FROM THE
IRAQI CAPITAL
Looting is surging and buildings have been set on fire in
Baghdad today as fighting continues in some parts of the city.
US troops have come under fire throughout the day. Fighters
attacked a convoy of US marines and special forces at dawn
on the banks of the Tigris River near a mosque. One US soldier
was killed and over a dozen wounded. The BBC is reporting
Saddam Hussein may have been hiding in the mosque. US troops
are now searching the mosque.
US warplanes bombed non-Iraqi Arab fighters on the west
bank of river. Reuters reports the fighters appear to be in
control of several districts in the West of the city. They
are controlling checkpoints and US troops were nowhere to
be seen.
British war correspondent Robert Fisk visited a group of
the fighters yesterday and reports they are from Algeria,
Morocco, Syria, Jordan, and Palestine. One of them told Fisk:
"We left our wives and children and came here to die
for these people and then they told us to go.”
Yesterday, top US officer Brigadier-General John Kelly told
the Sidney Morning Herald that hundreds of non-Iraqi Muslim
fighters are putting up a stronger fight for Baghdad than
Iraq's Republican Guard.
He said: “They run into our machine guns and we shoot
them down like the morons they are."
Meanwhile, the capital has plunged into lawlessless. Tens
of thousands of people are roaming the city looking for plunder.
Iraqis are targeting government buildings, embassies, and
banks. They are taking air conditioners, radios, furniture,
and money. US troops are making little or no effort to stop
them and in some cases are joining them. On Monday, troops
from the US Army's 3rd Infantry Division stormed one of Iraq's
presidential palaces. They took ashtrays, gold-painted glassware
and other souvenirs.
U.S. troops are occupying the Oil Ministry.
The Pentagon reports over 100 US soldiers have been killed
in the invasion and around 400 injured.
- May Ying Welsh, independent reporter in Baghdad
8:20-8:21 One Minute Music Break
8:30-8:40 SPANISH JOURNALISTS PROTEST DEATH OF COLLEAGUE
WHO WAS KILLED BY U.S. FORCES
Spanish Journalists protested the death of a Spanish TV
cameraman killed by a U.S. tank shell in Baghdad yesterday
by putting their cameras, microphones and notebooks on the
floor as Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar arrived at the Senate.
Aznar found the floor outside the chamber covered with equipment
and 30 to 40 journalists standing in stony silence.
In a further display of anger, about 20 Spanish journalists
walked out of a news conference with British Foreign Minister
Jack Straw and his Spanish counterpart, Ana Palacio, after
just one question.
- Maria Carrion, filmmaker and former Democracy Now! producer
8:40-8:41 One Minute Music Break
8:41-8:58 KAVEH GOLESTAN 1950-2003: A LOOK AT THE LIFE OF
THE PULITZER PRIZE WINNING IRANIAN PHOTOJOURNALIST WHO WAS
ONE OF 10 INTERNATIONAL JOURNALISTS KILLED IN IRAQ
The lives of Michael Kelly and David Bloom have become widely
known across the country over the past week. They are the
two U.S. journalists who died while covering the invasion
of Iraq. Kelly, an editor of Atlantic Monthly, was killed
on Friday and Bloom, an NBC TV host, died on Saturday.
But receiving less attention have been the many international
reporters who have died since the attack began. They include
Al Jazeera reporter Tariq Ayoub; Reuters TV cameraman Taras
Protsyuk; Jose Couso, a Spanish cameraman for Madrid-based
TeleCinco; reporter Julio Anguita Parrado of the Spanish daily
El Mundo; German reporter Christian Liebig of the weekly Focus
magazine; BBC translator Kamaran Abdurazaq Muhamed; ITV news
correspondent Terry Lloyd; Paul Moran, a free-lance cameraman
for Australia’s ABC News. And finally there was Pulitzer
Prize winning cameraman Kaveh Golestan who died after stepping
on a landmine. Yesterday we talked to Wall Street Journal
reporter Farnaz Fassihi, to talk about Golestan, an Iranian
cameraman. We talked to Fassihi shortly after the statue of
Saddam Hussein had fallen in Baghdad.
- Farnaz Fassihi, Middle East correspondent of the Wall
Street Journal
8:58-8:59 Outro and Credits
9:00-9:01 Billboard:
U.S. occupies an Arab capital for the first time in history
as Hussein’s regime falls: British reporter Andrew Buncombe
joins us from Baghdad
A discussion with an Iraqi American whose father was murdered
and mother was jailed by Saddam Hussein’s regime
Turkey sends military observers into Kirkuk while U.S. prepares
to install a new government: A look at what happens after
the invasion ends with writer Dilip Hero and Iraqi American
Salam Al-Rawi.
9:10-9:11 Headlines
9:11-9:12 One Minute Music Break
9:12-9:25 U.S. OCCUPIES AN ARAB CAPITAL FOR THE FIRST TIME
IN HISTORY AS HUSSEIN’S REGIME FALLS: BRITISH REPORTER
ANDREW BUNCOMBE JOINS US FROM BAGHDAD
US troops, tanks, and armored vehicles rolled in and occupied
the capitol with only scattered resistance. Thousands of residents
poured into the streets. They celebrated, greeted US troops
with cheers and even flowers, looted, and tore down symbols
of Saddam’s rule. It is the first time in history that
the United States has occupied an Arab capital.
In the most dramatic moment, a moment that was broadcast
around the world, a group of Iraqis gathered around the gigantic
statue of Saddam Hussein in Al-Fardus Square. They tried to
cut down the statue with a sledgehammer but had little luck.
Then US marines roped the statue to an armored personnel carrier.
One US marine climbed to the top and covered Hussein’s
head with an American flag. The American flag was quickly
removed and an old Iraqi flag hung around Saddam’s neck.
Then, the Marines toppled the statue.
One resident told journalist Robert Fisk: "You'll see
the celebrations and we will be happy Saddam has gone. But
we will then want to rid ourselves of the Americans and we
will want to keep our oil and there will be resistance and
then they will call us "terrorists."
- Andrew Buncombe, reporter with the Independent of London.
He is reporting now in Iraq.
9:20-9:21 One Minute Music Break
9:25-9:40 A DISCUSSION WITH AN IRAQI AMERICAN WHOSE FATHER
WAS MURDERED AND MOTHER WAS JAILED BY SADDAM HUSSEIN
As Saddam Hussein’s regime falls, Democracy Now! talks
to an Iraqi America man who opposed the war although his family
had been brutalized by Hussein. Salam Al-Rawi’s father
was tortured and murdered. His mother was jailed.
As for Iraqis around the world yesterday was a day of mixed
emotions for Al-Rawi. Regime change in Iraq had occurred but
questions about where Iraq heads next remain unanswered.
- Salam Al-Rawi, Iraqi American businessman who owns restaurants
in New York.
9:40-9:58 TURKEY SENDS MILITARY OBSERVERS INTO KIRKUK WHILE
U.S. PREPARES TO INSTALL A NEW GOVERNMENT: A LOOK AT WHAT
HAPPENS AFTER THE INVASION ENDS WITH WRITER DILIP HERO AND
IRAQI AMERICAN SALAM AL-RAWI.
Turkey is sending military observers to Kirkuk with U.S.
approval, according to the Associated Press. This follows
an Iraqi Kurdish move into the oil-rich city in northern Iraq.
Turkey has repeatedly said that it will not accept Iraqi Kurdish
control of Kirkuk.
Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul said he spoke with Secretary
of State Gen. Colin Powell today and that Powell offered to
let Turkey send the observers.
Earlier BBC reported US-backed Kurdish forces have moved
into the center of the oil-rich city of Kirkuk. Local people
are celebrating.
The AP reports oil facilities are completely intact around
town and are even continuing to pump oil.
Near Kalaka, thousands of Kurds swarmed and looted abandoned
Iraqi bunkers and barracks in a free-for-all that the Kurdish
militia made no attempt to halt.
Meanwhile the BBC reports the controversy over Iraq’s
future continued as the Bush administration yesterday gave
differing accounts of a key meeting of exiles within the country.
Early on Wednesday, Vice President Dick Cheney announced
the US will organize a conference of Iraqi exiles, and people
from inside Iraq, to discuss the formation of an Iraqi interim
authority which would gradually take over the running of the
country.
He said the meeting would take place on Saturday in Nasiriya
in southern Iraq.
But, within a few hours, others in the US government attempted
to downgrade the status of the Iraqi opposition meeting.
In an unusual move, White House press spokesman Ari Fleischer
issued a correction to Cheney's statement, saying the meeting
would take place sometime after Saturday.
And State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said that
the venue of the meeting had not yet been decided
Meanwhile, a group of former senior U.S. officials endorsed
a call yesterday for the Bush administration to share influence
over postwar Iraq with other countries and a broad spectrum
of Iraqis.
The officials include: former secretaries of state Lawrence
Eagleburger and Alexander Haig Jr., former defense secretary
William Perry, former CIA director James Woolsey former House
speaker Newt Gingrich, and former senators Bob Kerrey (a Nebraska
Democrat) and Fred Thompson (a Tennessee Republican.) The
statement said: "Only if the United States invests in
helping Iraqis build a new Iraq will it have the moral standing
and political authority to promote its other objectives in
the region."
- Salam Al-Rawi, Iraqi American businessman who owns restaurants
in New York.
- Dilip Hiro, journalist and author of 24 books including
“Iraq: In the Eye of the Storm”
9:40-9:41 One Minute Music Break
9:41-9:58
9:58-9:59 Outro and Credits
For a copy of today’s program, call 1 (800) 881 2359.
Our website is www.democracynow.org.
Our email address is mail@democracynow.org.
Democracy Now! is produced by Kris Abrams, Mike Burke, Angie
Karran, Ana Nogueira and Elizabeth Press with help Sharif
Kouddous and Noah Reibel. Mike Di Filippo is our music maestro
and engineer.
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