The Downing Street "Memo" is a document containing meeting minutes transcribed during the British Prime Minister's meeting on July 23, 2002 - eight months PRIOR to the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.

The Times of London printed the text of this document on Sunday, May 1, 2005. Since then, several other leaked UK government documents have come to light. Together they present a disturbing picture of a President obsessed with invasion, and a loyal ally troubled both by how it could be justified and by what it would bring.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/2829717.stm

In an open letter to 10 Downing Street, published in the Guardian newspaper, a group of 16 academic lawyers have argued that taking action without a new, clear United Nations mandate "will seriously undermine the international rule of law".

This is the full text.

By JOHN PILGER

ON November 7, the day before the United Nations Security Council voted on a resolution that made an American and British attack on Iraq more than likely, Downing Street began issuing warnings of imminent terrorist threats against the United Kingdom.

Cross-Channel ferries, the London Underground and major public events were all said to be "targeted".

Will Americans Fall For the Same Lies Again?

http://www.uexpress.com/tedrall/site/viewru.htm

"The Defense Department claims:

12 nations with nuclear weapons programs,

13 with biological weapons,

16 with chemical weapons, and

28 with ballistic missiles as existing and emerging threats to the United States. But only one of those countries sits atop the second largest oil reserves in the world."

Charles Peña, Senior Defense Policy Fellow of the Cato Institute, for The Chicago Tribune

By Paul Reynolds

Two years after the fall of Baghdad, it is an open question as to whether an endgame to the insurgency is under way or whether Iraq faces a war that will drag on for years.

The optimists hope that a combination of the elections in January and the growth of indigenous security forces will eventually prevail over a rebellion which lacks fundamental popular support.

This view was summed up by US President George W Bush with the words: ''The Iraqi people are taking charge of their own destiny."

Pessimists on the other hand argue the insurgents can still mount major attacks and that the political institutions are still far too weak to provide effective leadership.

Last year it was Afghanistan, this year it is Iraq, and Allah and Bush et al. only know who is next in there serial genocide of Muslim nations.

Had the rulers not been fooled into establishing Gulf Cooperative Council after 1991 Gulf War, Muslims wouldn't be seeing this day, when the enemies of Islam will kill another thousands of Muslims and deestry the resources of Muslims to keep us backward and dominated pretending to be the protectors and friends of Muslims, while the reality is that a few hundred Muslims are being tortured and incacerated against the International Law in Guntanamo Bay, Cuba, and Bagram Air Base in Kabul.

Paul Routledge

NOTHING more clearly illustrates the cruel hypocrisy of America's war against Iraq than Washington's reaction to the news that GIs have been captured.

Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld screamed "Geneva Convention! Geneva Convention!" at the Iraqis for showing footage of US soldiers taken on the battlefield.

He thundered that the film was "video propaganda" which violated their rights as prisoners of war under international law.

How two-faced can you get?

Rumsfeld is the warmonger who ignored international legalities when the UN refused to back the invasion of Iraq.

CAIRO, April 12 (IslamOnline.net) – Most of the Iraqis killed in the week-long U.S. occupation offensive into the restive town of Fallujah, west of Baghdad, are children and women, an Iraqi dentist in the besieged town revealed Monday, April 12.

Osama Saleh Al-Tikrit belied U.S. claims that 95 percent of the victims were resistance fighters, saying the entire world “has got used to the American lies”.

“I was in Fallujah before Sunday ceasefire and I saw with my own eyes many civilians and ordinary people lying dead on the streets,” Tikriti, a dentist at Baghdad hospital, told IslamOnline.net over the phone.

Friday, 28 March

2100: The Syrian Government dismisses allegations by US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that it is supplying military equipment to Iraq and accuses the US of trying to distract attention from civilian casualties.

2045: Coalition warplanes attack Baghdad, according to news agency reports.

1845: Two Iraqi 'sleeper cells' planning attacks on American interests abroad have been captured and their plans foiled, US State Department officials say.

1830: US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld says Syria is supplying military equipment - including night-vision goggles - to Iraq in what he terms a "hostile act".

Thursday, 27 March

2020: More large explosions in Baghdad and anti-aircraft fire heard.

1915: The Iraqi defence minister said troops were prepared to defend the capital as he acknowledges that coalition forces are closing in on Baghdad and will surround the city.

1907: US ambassador walks out of UN debate after Iraqi ambassador accuses US of trying to exterminate Iraqi people.

1718: Arab news channel al-Jazeera shows pictures of a US Army Apache attack helicopter which it said had been shot down over Iraq.

1648: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein vows to "inflict maximum material and human damage among enemy ranks" at a meeting with Baath Party senior members.