Iraqis demand an end to the occupation
The Iraqi government apparently thinks that the security agreement between the U.S. and Iraq must respect Iraqi sovereignty. A letter to Congress about the treaty, signed by a majority of the parliament, insists that:
The majority of Iraqi representatives strongly reject any military-security, economic, commercial, agricultural, investment or political agreement with the United States that is not linked to clear mechanisms that obligate the occupying American military forces to fully withdraw from Iraq.
Ouch. Did no one explain it to them? Are they missing the last few pages of the script? The U.S. doesn’t recognize Iraqi sovereignty. That much was clear as soon as Bush invaded. Since then there have been some half-hearted efforts to create the pretense of Iraqi sovereignty, but really, what sovereignty does a country have that is under military occupation by a foreign power? The U.S. appointed collaborators to run the government, exerted complete physical control of the 2005 election (U.S. troops handled all the ballot boxes and decided which districts would get ballot boxes at all), and operates beyond the reach of Iraqi law. What part of the word “colony” do they not understand?