Site Search  

In January 1994 Galloway, his voice vibrating with deep feeling, his body language and manner strongly suggestive of awe and Respect, stood within smelling distance of Saddam Hussein, in a Baghdad palace and praised his courage, strength and indefatigability.

"Your Excellency, Mr President: I greet you, in the name of the many thousands of people in Britain who stood against the tide and opposed the war and aggression against Iraq and continue to oppose the war by economic means, which is aimed to strangle the life out of the great people of Iraq.

I greet you, too, in the name of the Palestinian people, amongst whom I've just spent two weeks in the occupied Palestinian territories. I can honestly tell you that there was not a single person to whom I told I was coming to Iraq and hoping to meet with yourself who did not wish me to convey their heartfelt, fraternal greetings and support. And this was true, especially at the base in the refugee camps of Jabaliyah and Beach Camp in Gaza, in the Balatah refugee camp in Nablus and on the streets of the towns and villages in the occupied lands.

I thought the president would appreciate knowing that even today, three years after the war, I still met families who were calling their newborn sons Saddam; and that two weeks ago, when I was trapped inside the Orient House, which is the Palestinian headquarters in Al-Quds, with 5,000 armed mustwatinin [settlers] outside demonstrating, pledging to tear down the Palestinian flag from the flagpole, the hundreds of shabab [youths] inside the compound were chanting that they wish to be with a DSh K [machine gun] in Baghdad to avenge the eyes of Abu Jihad [late Palestinian leader Khalil al-Wazir who was killed in Tunisia]. And the Youth Club in Silwan, which is the one of the most resistant of all the villages around Jerusalem, asked me to ask the president's permission if they could enrol him as an honorary member of their club and to present him with this flag from holy Jerusalem.

I wish to say, sir, that I believe that we are turning the tide in Europe, that the scale of the humanitarian disaster which has been imposed upon the Iraqi people is now becoming more and more widely known and accepted.

Fifty-five British members of parliament opposed the war, but 125 are demanding the lifting of the embargo. And this does not include the invisible section of the Conservative Party who must also be moving in that direction. And Sir Edward Heath is being a very persuasive advocate inside the Conservative Party.

It is my belief that we must convey the very clear picture that 1994 has to be the year of the ending of the embargo against Iraq. Otherwise, famine and all the awful consequences, including acts of despair by Iraqis, will be the result. And this is the message we must convey to civilized opinion in Europe.

Sir: I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability. And I want you to know that we are with you hatta al-nasr, hatta al-nasr, hatta al-Quds [preceding words in Arabic which mean until victory, until victory, until Jerusalem]."

This was not quite three years after Saddam Hussein had rocketed bombs on Israel during the Gulf War, and used poison gas against Iraq's Kurdish people.

Afterwards, Galloway tried to insist that his words were addressed not to the mass murderer in whose presence he stood, but as a salutation to the Iraqi people. Galloway then, under pressure, admitted that the words which began with "Sir", were addressed to the "indefatigable" and "strong" butcher.

On September 2, 1999 The BBC reported that "Maverick Labour MP George Galloway is to travel overland to Iraq on a double-decker bus. The 'Big Ben-to-Baghdad bus' - a converted London Routemaster - leaves London on Monday, visiting Glasgow and Birmingham before leaving Britain to travel through Europe and North Africa this autumn.

The convoy was sponsored by the Mariam Appeal , a charity named after four-year-old Iraqi girl Mariam Hamza, who was brought to Britain by Mr Galloway in 1998 for urgent medical treatment."

On his arrival Galloway told a rally attended by the Iraqi deputy prime minister, Tariq Aziz, he was ashamed of the role the British Government had played in sanctions.

Galloway has admitted being in Baghdad with Tariq Aziz, the Iraqi Foreign Minister, for Christmas later that year (1998), just over a week before the date of the confidential memo later discovered by the Telegraph was sent to Saddam. The memo, from the Iraqi head of intelligence showed Mr Galloway had asked a secret agent for a greater cut of Iraq's exports under the oil-for-food programme.

On 6 March, 2002 Ben Bradshaw wound up a commons debate on Iraq by telling Mr Galloway: "Some good points that you made on the Middle East peace process would I believe carry more credibility if you hadn't made a career of being not just an apologist but a mouthpiece to the Iraqi regime over many years."