Who Will Protect Iraqi Children Now?
By KATHY KELLY BAGHDAD, March 12, 2003. Late in the evening on March 10, we learned from a UN worker that remaining support staff for UN organizations other than UNMOVIC inspectors would be shuttling out of Baghdad on March 12, in accordance with involuntary departure orders. Many of the UN staff had already left in a slow attrition accomplished through applications for vacation leave or re-assignments. We lined the departure road in early morning hours on March 12 holding enlarged photos, on vinyl banners, of Iraqi people, many of them children, who’ve befriended us during seven years of regular visits to Iraq. Our banner, strung in front of a tent encampment across from the UN Compound, read: Farewell UN Please Advise: Who will protect Iraqi children? Rumors proliferate around us. The diplomatic community will evacuate embassies on Saturday, March 15. The inspectors will pull out on Monday, March 17. Who knows if any of them are true? But we do know is that time is very short. Within
