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British activists to protest U.N. sanctions for Iraq

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November 11, 2000 

BAGHDAD, NOV 10 (AP) - A group of British peace activists flew into Baghdad on Friday after chartering a Hungarian plane and flying out of a British airport under the cover of darkness, becoming the first flight from Britain in a decade.

British lawmaker George Galloway, an outspoken critic of U.N. sanctions imposed on Baghdad a decade ago, led the group and said it did not seek permission from the U.N. committee overseeing the sanctions or the British Foreign Office.

"The most important thing about this flight is that we didn't ask permission from anyone. We didn't even notify anyone. We didn't notify the British government, the United Nations - we came here as free citizens of the world to this country that we love," Galloway told state-run Iraqi television after arriving at the Baghdad airport.

In a statement faxed to The Associated Press in London, Galloway said he was aware the group committed an offense in Britain by not informing the Department of Trade and Industry of its flight plan or of allowing its inspectors to check out the plane.

The flight, the statement said, took off "under the cover of darkness and subterfuge from Manston airfield in Kent."

"I hope that the government won't take action against us, but if they do, then we'll relish our days in court," Galloway was quoted in the statement as saying.

However, a foreign office official told The Associated Press in London that Britain did not consider the flight a violation of the sanctions and said it did not create any problems. The official spoke on customary condition of anonymity.

The Air Dassault Falcon 50 carried eight passengers, including Galloway and Catholic priest Noel Barry. They were expected to attend a three-day forum sponsored by the Iraqi government aimed at seeking a quick end to sanctions.

Friday's flight was paid for by private donations to the Mariam Appeal, an organization fighting to end the embargo blamed by Iraqi authorities for the deaths of more than 1 million people, most of them children.

Galloway frequently has visited Iraq to voice his criticism of the U.N. trade sanctions imposed for Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait. In November 1999, he drove from London to Baghdad in a classic British double-decker bus full of Britons, Moroccans, Algerians, French and Jordanians in a move to publicize his call for an end to the sanctions. He was given hero's welcome in Baghdad, with tens of thousands greeting him in the streets.

The sanctions are to be lifted only once U.N. weapons inspectors certify Iraq has scrapped all its weapons of mass destruction. The government says it has done so, and since December 1998, has barred the United Nations from weapons inspections.