NationStates Jolt Archive

Athletes from Iraq have been banned from taking part at this summer's Beijing Games, the International Olympic Committee has announced.

The team was already the subject of an interim ban after the Iraqi government replaced the country's Olympic committee with its own appointees.

Under the IOC charter, all committees must be free of political influence.

Iraq had been planning to send a team of at least seven athletes to the Olympics which start on 8 August.

Two rowers, a weightlifter, a sprinter, a discus thrower, a judoka and an archer were in the frame for the trip to Beijing.

"The deadline for taking up places for Beijing for all sports except athletics has now passed," said IOC spokeswoman Giselle Davies.

"The IOC very sadly has now to acknowledge that it is likely there will be no Iraqi presence at the Beijing Olympic Games, despite our best efforts."

She added: "Clearly, we'd very much like to have seen Iraq's athletes in Beijing.

"We are very disappointed that the athletes have been so ill-served by their own government's actions."

Hussein al-Amidi, the general secretary of the Iraqi Olympic Committee, said: "This morning we were informed of the final decision of the International Olympic Committee to suspend the membership of the Iraqi Olympic Committee.

"It's a final decision, there is no way to appeal. This means that Iraq will not take part in the coming Olympic games.

"It is a blow to Iraq and its international reputation, its athletes and its youth.

"I swear those athletes who have been training - they phoned me today and they were crying and were very upset."

The Iraq government dissolved the National Olympic Committee in May and the interim IOC ban was put in place on 4 June.

Davies added that the Iraqi government had been asked to travel to Switzerland to meet the IOC to discuss possible remedies but failed to do so.

The committee which the government dismissed was elected in 2004, in line with the Olympic movement's regulations.

The Iraqi government said it took the decision to appoint a new committee because the previous one was corrupt and had not been functioning properly.

Ahmad al-Samarra'i, chairman of the committee dismissed by the government, and several other members had previously been abducted by gunmen while attending a meeting in central Baghdad in July 2006.

They have not been seen since.


(link (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/olympics/7523708.stm))

The article doesn't say whether this also affects Iraq's Paralympic team (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_at_the_2008_Summer_Paralympics).

Didn't the entire Olympic committee get taken hostage and shot a year or so back in Iraq?

Which would kind of explain having to appoint one, no?

Didn't the entire Olympic committee get taken hostage and shot a year or so back in Iraq?

Which would kind of explain having to appoint one, no?

According to the article, some were kidnapped by gunmen (their fate remaining unknown), while the others were dismissed by the government, being accused of corruption. This dismissal led to a temporary ban from the IOC, which was never resolved.

Politics and bureaucracy have led to the athletes being banned from the Games for reasons beyond their control.

Indeed. C'est triste, etc.

Didn't the entire Olympic committee get taken hostage and shot a year or so back in Iraq?

Which would kind of explain having to appoint one, no?
That is what the article somewhat stated Yoo

Screw the IOC!

I don't know, when a duly elected body of the larger event you want to participate in is kidnapped in part, and the rest fired, and you refuse to obey the rules of the parent organization in, I don't know, working out how to elect a new group... what do you expect?

It sucks horribly for the athletes, but if the IOC caved on this, it would say that force and intimidation are fine when you don't like the rules of the game, and that you don't have to answer to the IOC if you want to be in the Olympics.

Had they but gone to work it out with the IOC, as indicated, they would have been in the games. Since Iraq decided they could do as they liked, the IOC did as THEY had the authority to do and disinvited them.

surely Iraqi athletes would compete on the US team :confused: (: P)

anyway yes the IOC is a corrupt bag of doo-doo and yes I don't beleive a word of what it says on this but you would think the IOC would bend over backwards to help the more disadvantaged nations athletes

surely Iraqi athletes would compete on the US team :confused: (: P)

Eh? They're Iraqis, not Americans.


anyway yes the IOC is a corrupt bag of doo-doo and yes I don't beleive a word of what it says on this but you would think the IOC would bend over backwards to help the more disadvantaged nations athletes

I'm with Katganistan on this. I blame the Iraqi government, not the IOC. The IOC has rules, and has to apply them; presumably the Iraqi authorities knew the consequences of what they were doing. Having said that, I hope the IOC does everything it can to enable the Iraqi athletes to compete as independents, under the Olympic flag. (There are precedents.)

surely Iraqi athletes would compete on the US team :confused: (: P)
Why?

anyway yes the IOC is a corrupt bag of doo-doo and yes I don't beleive a word of what it says on this but you would think the IOC would bend over backwards to help the more disadvantaged nations athletes

You don't believe some of the Iraqi IOC committee was kidnapped and the rest fired?

Listen, if the IOC could support and get to the Olympics a Jamaican bobsled team...

Iraqi athletes should just compete with Americans, after all we all know who really runs the country.

Iraqi athletes should just compete with Americans, after all we all know who really runs the country.

Yeah well some people like to pretend to the press that its different.

Iraqi athletes should just compete with Americans, after all we all know who really runs the country.
Yep we do. The Iraqis.

Yep we do. The Iraqis.
That's a joke.

Maybe that's what the bourgeois media feed you day and night, but in reality Iraq is a puppet state of US corporate imperialism. Which is why the dictatorship put in place after the invasion (headed by Paul Bremer the neocon) privatized all state assets and sacked all public sector workers.

These days Iraq is basically a slum of poverty and crime except in the Green Zone, which is an erry corporate utopia of clean streets, perfect hospitals full the brim with well-paid professionals (although they never treat anyone hardly).

That's a joke.

No it is not a joke. It is only a joke to people who love conspiracies.

*snip*

Give it up. No one is buying it.

Dear Iraq, you are a bad man, and you made me cry...

:D

No it is not a joke. It is only a joke to people who love conspiracies.



Give it up. No one is buying it.

Lesson 1#: To support the bourgeois means to deny reality, because anyone who accepted reality would never support them (barring mental psychopathy).

Lesson 1#: To support the bourgeois means to deny reality, because anyone who accepted reality would never support them (barring mental psychopathy).
You really are a funny man. Excuse me while I go off and believe reality over conspiracy.

You really are a funny man. Excuse me while I go off and believe reality over conspiracy.
Your going to become a Marxist-Leninist?

Eh? They're Iraqis, not Americans.

Why?

oh come now I'm sure you both have a little Jihadist in you screaming about the American empire :)

Your going to become a Marxist-Leninist?

surely if that was true he would join the oppressive bourgeoisie because they like have donuts and stuff?

Your going to become a Marxist-Leninist?
HAHA!! No. It has been proven that it does not work.

Your going to become a Marxist-Leninist?

You have a very amusing sense of reality.

You have a very amusing sense of reality.
Fixed.

Eh? They're Iraqis, not Americans.

"Their" "country" is under a forced and oppressive occupation by the USA, if you haven't noticed...

"Their" "country" is under a forced and oppressive occupation by the USA, if you haven't noticed...
We are not occupying it at all, if you have not noticed.

You have a very amusing sense of reality.

http://img291.imageshack.us/img291/7383/perspectivezq2.th.jpg (http://img291.imageshack.us/my.php?image=perspectivezq2.jpg)

so how many time has this been posted on NS?

"Their" "country" is under a forced and oppressive occupation by the USA, if you haven't noticed...

thats why the US is their on a UN mandated peacekeeping mission :) (and it hurts when people ignore Britain's contribution)

Fixed.

no you just made a mess of it

Actually Iraqis had their own popular elections right away Saddam was overthrown, the candidates called for full employment under the public sector and welfare for the masses, and Paul Bremer banned them and broke up the elections, saying 'Iraq wasn't ready', he made sure that when Iraq got 'democracy' all the trade unionists and anti-imperialist candidates were dead or in prison, and he also wrote into the Iraqi constitution the neoliberal rape of Iraqs resources to US corporations.

America fought democracy in Iraq at every stage possible.

America fought democracy in Iraq at every stage possible.

That's the first thing I've heard you say I agree with.

SNIP

*gasp* you mean the US made sure that the new regime in Iraq was friendly to it?!!

*gasp* you mean the US made sure that the new regime in Iraq was friendly to it?!!
No, it made sure it supported it's rape of the resources while it left the country to ruins.

pitty the iraqi athletes can't attend. If i was an Iraqi I would be glad for any opportunity that lets me spend even a minute outside of that damn country.

It is a shame considering how well the Iraqi soccer team performed in 2004.

*gasp* you mean the US made sure that the new regime in Iraq was friendly to it?!!

American capitalism in Iraq is now at the stage of impotent imperialism. War can create markets that would not otherwise exist by wrecking massive devastation on a society, which then requires reconstruction! America can thus "liberate" the survivors, provide huge loans to that society so American politically-connected corporations can begin the process of rebuilding and providing 'security'.

You'll notice also that Iraq's economy was never 'rebuilt' in the way of creating a self-sufficient national industry, it was carefully integrated into the US capitalist market to serve as a oil-field for American corporations.

Bremer wrote the neoliberal laws into the Iraqi Constitution such as a flat corporate tax and no limits on foreign ownership, which mean Iraqi oil is now owned by America. Bremer started the process of limiting Iraq's production simply to the bare essentials such as oil, which were to be sent for industrial processing to America. In other words, Bremer wanted the Iraqi economy to be a mere appendage of the American economy, which it is to this day.

We are not occupying it at all

Wow, you bitch about Andaras being deluded, and come with such a little gem of complete dementia yourself? Let me guess, you're not occupying the Iraqis by waging a war of aggression against them and subduing their territory with military might and keeping your forces there for half a decade, you're just... nope, I don't even have the imagination to come up with a satirical version of the lies you've no doubt fed yourself.

No, it made sure it supported it's rape of the resources while it left the country to ruins.

so friendly to the US and able to make considerable oil profits to fund redevelopment instead of a high tax rate? (not that I would support such a thing but this is republican thinking)

thats why the US is their on a UN mandated peacekeeping mission :)

Hah! Hilarious. You get a cookie for that one. :)

Hah! Hilarious. You get a cookie for that one. :)
Even though Call to power is right?

so friendly to the US and able to make considerable oil profits to fund redevelopment instead of a high tax rate? (not that I would support such a thing but this is republican thinking)
Nothing is being 'developed' in Iraq, that's the purpose of a colony, you keep the people uneducated and in poor flimsy slums scratching out a living off rocks. And in the mean time you funnel all funds into oil so the country merely serves as a fuel outpost for the 'pampered' American consumers back home who won't complain too much if the price is kept down.

Iraq will never be developed, it will remain forever (as long as the US remains) a 'rich' country where the people are poor.

We are not occupying it at all, if you have not noticed.

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA no.

"Their" "country" is under a forced and oppressive occupation by the USA, if you haven't noticed...

I'd noticed. :rolleyes: Not being US citizens, however, they cannot represent the US at the Olympics.

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA no.
You forget that the Iraqis have full soveriegnty over their nation. We are not telling them what to do. They can ask us to leave at anytime. Seems like Maliki wants to discuss this very thing. If they were occupied, they would not even have the ability to tell us to get out of their nation. If they were occupied, they would not have had a free and fair election. If they were occupied, we would not be training a new Iraqi Army.

Yep, we are not occupying the nation at all. We are there with a UN mandate to help the Iraqis with security now. That is all our mission is. Oh and let us not forget that the Iraqi Army and police is doing things mostly by themselves with little assistance from us.

Hah! Hilarious. You get a cookie for that one. :)

How come he gets a cookie for being (perceivedly) wrong and never asking for one, and I get no cookies, ever, despite being chronically right and always asking for cookies?


you would think the IOC would bend over backwards to help the more disadvantaged nations athletes

Bend over backwards? You mean, like accepting that the body elected in accordance with the rules has been kidnapped at gunpoint and subtituted by a political body against the rules, and trying to work with that new, against-the-rules body that's built on the probably fatal fate of the real body? Yeah, they do/did that, even though I personally think they shouldn't have.

Bending backwards and then, if even that doesn't help, just abandon all and any rule whatsoever? Nah.

Bremer wrote the neoliberal laws into the Iraqi Constitution such as a flat corporate tax and no limits on foreign ownership, which mean Iraqi oil is now owned by America. Bremer started the process of limiting Iraq's production simply to the bare essentials such as oil, which were to be sent for industrial processing to America. In other words, Bremer wanted the Iraqi economy to be a mere appendage of the American economy, which it is to this day.

which sort of makes sense when the Iraqi economy should be rebuilding its tattered agricultural industry to export to a region of high food prices

but then you have to remember that this is conservative economic thinking and that in such minds flat taxes and other methods work (which they sort of have done in eastern Europe)

Wow, you bitch about Andaras being deluded, and come with such a little gem of complete dementia yourself? Let me guess, you're not occupying the Iraqis by waging a war of aggression against them and subduing their territory with military might and keeping your forces there for half a decade, you're just... nope, I don't even have the imagination to come up with a satirical version of the lies you've no doubt fed yourself.

its a good thing the Iraqi government is not only asking for a timetable of American troop reduction after so many years but also throwing hissy fits at British withdrawals

otherwise keeping American peacekeeping operations in the area would make sense and you would seem very silly

Hah! Hilarious. You get a cookie for that one. :)

can I have a smartie one?

Paul Bremer also wrote laws into the iraqi constitution that say that foreign companies can buy assets in the oil industry, but do not need to reinvest any of the money that they earn back in Iraq (!), so Iraq is basically being drained of resources without the iraqi people being able to profit from it.

You forget that the Iraqis have full soveriegnty over their nation. We are not telling them what to do. They can ask us to leave at anytime. Seems like Maliki wants to discuss this very thing. If they were occupied, they would not even have the ability to tell us to get out of their nation. If they were occupied, they would not have had a free and fair election. If they were occupied, we would not be training a new Iraqi Army.

Yep, we are not occupying the nation at all. We are there with a UN mandate to help the Iraqis with security now. That is all our mission is. Oh and let us not forget that the Iraqi Army and police is doing things mostly by themselves with little assistance from us.
It wasn't a free and fair election, as I said the Iraqi's had their own election after Saddam was overthrown (as well as free trade unions), both were banned by Paul Bremer the US dictator of Iraq. What we got with Maliki was a the only candidates who hadn't been dragged off to Abu Ghrad for being a trade unionist or opposed to the occupation.

Nothing is being 'developed' in Iraq

The efforts to aid Iraq’s development have resulted in heavy international donations, including a donation of $18.4 billion by the US Congress and $13 billion by other global organisations.

http://www.iraqdevelopmentprogram.org/

sadly the world doesn't work on what you want to believe :<

How come he gets a cookie for being (perceivedly) wrong and never asking for one, and I get no cookies, ever, despite being chronically right and always asking for cookies?

fass just loves me more : P

Bending backwards and then, if even that doesn't help, just abandon all and any rule whatsoever? Nah.

yes we wouldn't want the Olympics to become some sort of sick twisted joke that is all about political penis waving now would we?

which sort of makes sense when the Iraqi economy should be rebuilding its tattered agricultural industry to export to a region of high food prices

Which keeps the people in poverty forever slaving away so the ruling class gets its foreign currency and forever robbs Iraq of it's independent and it will forever be paying off the endless debt heaped onto it by Bremer (I believe even KFC claimed millions of losses because of the Kuwaiti invasion.

As you might know, Iraq is one of the most indebted societies in the world, Iraq of course has a right to declare these debts odious and default (because the money was lent by nations who knew Iraq was using it to oppress his own people and fund war abroad), but Bremer forbade this also in his policies, which makes Iraq forever an indebted country trying to pay off impossible loans slaving away as a colony producing raw materials for their colonial mother country.

Yeah, it makes sense, if you an imperialist.

http://www.iraqdevelopmentprogram.org/

Yeah, 'develop' the oil industry so it keeps the nice foreign currency pouring into the Green Zone for Maliki and his rich millionaire friends. Meanwhile outside the Green Zone it's a different story.

I did not say what you quoted me as saying Andaras.

Yeah, 'develop' the oil industry so it keeps the nice foreign currency pouring into the Green Zone for Maliki and his rich millionaire friends. Meanwhile outside the Green Zone it's a different story.
Yep. It is getting better outside the green zone too despite your attempt to prove otherwise.

Yep. It is getting better outside the green zone too despite your attempt to prove otherwise.
No, I'd say it's not, the whole country is a giant slum except the nice pristine Green Zone where the bourgeois hang out. And it can't get any better as long as Iraq's people are enslaved in debt forever to produce raw materials for the 'developed world'.

Imperialism is a system of capitalist competition which seeks to create 'artificial' markets by creating economic crisis in nations, usually by military force. It's usually a sign that the nation in question (America) is running out of options (credit, hording, speculation) to prevent the eventual decay and destructive breakdown of capitalism in society.

I'll bet over the next decade America's economy will decline even more, forcing the US to take more military action against even more resource rich countries, to make them more Iraq's for raw materials to postpone the decline of capitalism. Iran, Sudan, who knows what next, but what is sure is that capitalism will go down with a bang.

Which keeps the people in poverty forever

yes no nation on Earth has ever done well by building itself on Agricultural exports!

Bremer forbade this also in his policies

because it would ruin Iraq's credit history at a crucial time when it needs money

thats the thing about debt you see you have to pay it back or people might find you a tad shifty (and thus leave you in the position of Imperial France)

Yeah, 'develop' the oil industry so it keeps the nice foreign currency pouring into the Green Zone for Maliki and his rich millionaire friends. Meanwhile outside the Green Zone it's a different story.

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan has praised the Oil-for-Food Programme for accomplishing one of the largest, most complex and unusual tasks ever entrusted to the Secretariat.

In a statement to the Security Council (20 November 2003), he noted that the Programme, which closed on 21 November was the only humanitarian programme ever to have been funded entirely from resources belonging to the nation it was designed to help.

He said that in nearly seven years of operation, the Programme had been required to meet "an almost impossible series of challenges", using some $46 billion of Iraqi export earnings on behalf of the Iraqi people. Under the Programme, nine different United Nations agencies, programmes and funds developed and managed humanitarian operations in Iraq, meeting the needs of the civilian population across some 24 economic and social sectors.

The Secretary-General paid tribute to the national and international staff of the Programme and said that in accordance with Security Council resolutions, the UN would hand operational responsibilities, together with remaining funds and assets ranging from schools to electrical power stations and some $8.2 billion worth of food, medicines and other essential supplies – to the Coalition Provisional Authority.

http://www.un.org/depts/oip/

guess not then

fass just loves me more : P

Must be my lack of penis. ;(

yes we wouldn't want the Olympics to become some sort of sick twisted joke that is all about political penis waving now would we?

We don't want that to be overt policy, no.

No, I'd say it's not, the whole country is a giant slum except the nice pristine Green Zone where the bourgeois hang out. And it can't get any better as long as Iraq's people are enslaved in debt forever to produce raw materials for the 'developed world'.

Your humor is greatly appreciated this time of the morning.

Imperialism is a system of capitalist competition which seeks to create 'artificial' markets by creating economic crisis in nations, usually by military force.

That explains the USSR then does it not? Oh and let us not forget all the greatest empires that spread their tenticles out for the glory of the monarchy.

It's usually a sign that the nation in question (America) is running out of options (credit, hording, speculation) to prevent the eventual decay and destructive breakdown of capitalism in society.

*yawns*

I'll bet over the next decade America's economy will decline even more, forcing the US to take more military action against even more resource rich countries, to make them more Iraq's for raw materials to postpone the decline of capitalism. Iran, Sudan, who knows what next, but what is sure is that capitalism will go down with a bang.

I will take that bet.

but what is sure is that capitalism will go down with a bang.


Well then, capitalism and communism have something in common then.

I don't know, when a duly elected body of the larger event you want to participate in is kidnapped in part, and the rest fired, and you refuse to obey the rules of the parent organization in, I don't know, working out how to elect a new group... what do you expect?

It sucks horribly for the athletes, but if the IOC caved on this, it would say that force and intimidation are fine when you don't like the rules of the game, and that you don't have to answer to the IOC if you want to be in the Olympics.

Had they but gone to work it out with the IOC, as indicated, they would have been in the games. Since Iraq decided they could do as they liked, the IOC did as THEY had the authority to do and disinvited them.
Still, not participating in the Olympics has to be better than participating, but having Uday beat the soles of your feet to motivate you.

Must be my lack of penis. ;(

I figure its more your lack of style :P

welcome to the internet says: its okay you can hold mine for awhile

We don't want that to be overt policy, no.

but think of all the money that gets made selling on the used national flags!

I will take that bet.

careful now, I hear if you wish hard enough it will eventually come true!

*waits for another few hundred years*

yes we wouldn't want the Olympics to become some sort of sick twisted joke that is all about political penis waving now would we?
Why do you hate freedom, Call to power?

You forget that the Iraqis have full soveriegnty over their nation. We are not telling them what to do.

Maliki wanted Blackwater out after the killings by Blackwater mercenaries. Blackwater, under US auspices, came back before the trial was even halfway done. Who, exactly, is telling Iraq what it can and can't do? Or rather, who is telling Iraq what it can't do about what the teller is doing?

Lesson 1#: To support the bourgeois means to deny reality, because anyone who accepted reality would never support them (barring mental psychopathy).

Tell you what. You go to Iraq with Corny and come back and tell us all what you've seen. I wouldn't trust the media accounts of what's "really" happening there, even if all they did was tell me where Iraq WAS. Spin and selective reporting has made getting the real situation on the ground in Iraq virtually impossible to judge based solely on media reports. It's a shithole, it's a paradise; it's divided, it's united; it's productive, it's stagnant; it's dangerous, it's safe.

This thread is about the athletes and the IOC's decision based on the Iraqi OC's actions. Debating about the true nature of the political situation there is little better than masturbation. The difference is, when I jerk off, I've got a little something to show for it.

Iraqi athletes should just compete with Americans, after all we all know who really runs the country.

Who runs the country has no bearing on who can represent that country in the Olympics.


Of course, you don't care about that, you just want to use the word 'bourgeois' over and over again until it loses all meaning.

Why do you hate freedom, Call to power?

things haven't been the same since I cheated on it with logic and now she just won't answer my calls :(

Tell you what. You go to Iraq with Corny and come back and tell us all what you've seen.

pass the donation hat round and I'm sure we could make such a holiday happen (with pics of course)

though it turns out its a bitch to find any estimates so we will have to take a short hop onto Jordan first

The difference is, when I jerk off, I've got a little something to show for it.

I'm sure your mother will be so proud when you show her : P

Who runs the country has no bearing on who can represent that country in the Olympics.

lets not give the isle of man any ideas now

I'm sure your mother will be so proud when you show her :P

Nice. :rolleyes:

Nice. :rolleyes:

you have to admit that it is a rather odd phrase to use, especially when your trying to use it to seem a smart arse :p

you have to admit that it is a rather odd phrase to use, especially when your trying to use it to seem a smart arse :p

Uh...no.

Using the phrase "mental masturbation" and then continuing the analogy was not being a smart-ass, it was using an analogy. Admittedly a fairly graphic one, but one that's hardly unprecedented.

Poor guys, they've worked hard and are being denied their chance

That's a joke.

Maybe that's what the bourgeois media feed you day and night, but in reality Iraq is a puppet state of US corporate imperialism. Which is why the dictatorship put in place after the invasion (headed by Paul Bremer the neocon) privatized all state assets and sacked all public sector workers.

These days Iraq is basically a slum of poverty and crime except in the Green Zone, which is an erry corporate utopia of clean streets, perfect hospitals full the brim with well-paid professionals (although they never treat anyone hardly).

You say that like its a bad thing. :D

surely Iraqi athletes would compete on the US team :confused: (: P)

It has happened before. Athletes competing for another country without being a citizen of that country.

of course, the medal count would be going to that country and athlete, and not the home country of the athlete.

pass the donation hat round and I'm sure we could make such a holiday happen (with pics of course)

though it turns out its a bitch to find any estimates so we will have to take a short hop onto Jordan first

I always wanted to visit Jordan :D

No it is not a joke. It is only a joke to people who love conspiracies.


Conspiracies? Ohhhhh. Okay. So, it's just a conspiracy that Iraq was invaded, its government overthrown and the country is now occupied by the invading forces.

I guess since all that's a conspiracy, you will happily admit that Iraq is a sovereign and independent nation, and so those purely fictional US military forces have no further reason to be there, no?