Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude: 12/12

12/18/2021

this should be the end of both 'sex in the city' and 'and just like that ...'

is 'sex in the city' and its reboot officially dead?

don't see how not. chris north was accused of assault by 2 women ('and just like that ... a rapist'). now it's three:

A third woman has come forward to accuse “Sex and the City” actor Chris Noth of sexual assault.

The 30-year-old tech executive, identified by the pseudonym “Ava,” told The Daily Beast that Noth allegedly forced himself on her in the back office of a Midtown restaurant in 2010.

“At first, it felt as though I was the only person in the universe who could hear me saying no,” she told the website in an article published Friday night.

does every 1 get there's a huge problem?

'mr big' is the dream boat around whom the show was structured. sjp's carrie was in love with him and got her happy ending with him.

now he's accused by 3 women of assault?

and actress and director zoe lister-jones has come forward to say he was inappropriate with her as well.

i think it's time for 'hbo' to put the reboot back in the trash can where it belongs.

let's close with c.i.'s 'Iraq snapshot:'

Friday, December 17, 2021. A lot to cover, Julian Assange, flooding in Iraq, a shoe thrower tosses out some truths, and much more.

Julian Assange, an Australian citizen, is being persecuted by the US government. He not only remains in UK custody, the UK government now says they will hand Julian over to the US. Why? What is the crime?

Not just in terms of the US, but in terms of the UK? How does the uUK justify keeping Julian behind bars when the case against him was already settled. That case against him was dropped by the prosecution which stated that they did not believe they had enough evidence to support the charges. That means you let the person go. Somehow, in the UK, they retain him and hold him with no real chrages. He's not under investigation in the UK, the case was dropped. That means the person is set free. Two years and eight months after the case has been dropped, Julian remains in prison. How do you jusitfy that?

What happened to the rule of law?

Julian's 'crime'? Releasing the truth. Letting the people know. Providing some much needed sunlight in what's supposed to be a democracy. As we've noted many times, such as here, the one person the US government wants to punish for the Iraq War is WIKILEAKS publisher Julian Assange. Julian's 'crime' was revaling the realities of Iraq -- Chelsea Manning was a whistle-blower who leaked the information to Julian. WIKILEAKS then published the Iraq War Logs. And many outlets used the publication to publish reports of their own. For example, THE GUARDIAN published many articles based on The Iraq War Logs. Jonathan Steele, David Leigh and Nick Davies offered, on October 22, 2012:

A grim picture of the US and Britain's legacy in Iraq has been revealed in a massive leak of American military documents that detail torture, summary executions and war crimes.
Almost 400,000 secret US army field reports have been passed to the Guardian and a number of other international media organisations via the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks.

The electronic archive is believed to emanate from the same dissident US army intelligence analyst who earlier this year is alleged to have leaked a smaller tranche of 90,000 logs chronicling bloody encounters and civilian killings in the Afghan war.
The new logs detail how:
• US authorities failed to investigate hundreds of reports of abuse, torture, rape and even murder by Iraqi police and soldiers whose conduct appears to be systematic and normally unpunished.

• A US helicopter gunship involved in a notorious Baghdad incident had previously killed Iraqi insurgents after they tried to surrender.
• More than 15,000 civilians died in previously unknown incidents. US and UK officials have insisted that no official record of civilian casualties exists but the logs record 66,081 non-combatant deaths out of a total of 109,000 fatalities.
The numerous reports of detainee abuse, often supported by medical evidence, describe prisoners shackled, blindfolded and hung by wrists or ankles, and subjected to whipping, punching, kicking or electric shocks. Six reports end with a detainee's apparent death.

How telling of the pathetic and degraded society we currently live in that the only person whom the US government wants to punish for the Iraq War is the one who told the truth.

Last night, Katie Halper devoted her show to the topic of Julian Assange and had many wonderful people on the program -- and one lousy man who doesn't know how the hell to shutp and let women speak. That's a probem he's had for some time and we've called it out here before. He talks over women all the time. He doesn't know how to shut his damn mouth. You know who I'm talking about but Ava and i are thinking of including him in our media peice for THIRD so we'll table that for now. Here's the video of the discussion.

Marianne Williamson: Key to authoritatiasm in secrecy and no secrecy is more dangerous than military secrecy. Everybody [corporte media lapdogs] will be going on about what a 'criminal' he is. And great people will be talking tonight [on the live stream] about how is he and what did he really do. But I I want to talk for a moment about what he did do. What Julian Assange revealed were War Crimes. What he revealed were atrocities. What he revealed were gratuitous deaths. I'll give you just an example: Almost 700 people were killed because -- mainly, by the way, the mentally ill and women who uknowingly got to close to a checkpoint. There were men who were trying to drive their pregnant women to the hospital, got too close to a cheakpoint. This was in 2010 that all these things were revealed. Let's be very clear here everyoneL Vietnam was a debacle, Iraq was a debacle, Afghanistan was a debacle. So when the military establishment tries to go at us with "Nothing to see here, guys"? If anything is clear, there's a lot to see. There's a lot to see. There's a lot we should have been paying very close attention to. And the fact that the US government, rather than wanting to stand for the free press, the right of the people to know and holding the military accountable? You have to have transparency. A military that is not held accountable? And the way that they are able to do what they do is through this completely illegitmate use of the classification system. Classified document, right? They're not supposed to classify a document [when] it's just really they don't want you to know. [The sole man on the panel feels the need to interrupt Marianne while she is speaking; not once but twice.] So millions of documents are made classified. Journalists who would say, "What's in there?" -- "we can't tell you because it's classified. They're only able to classify something if they can prove it's essentail to US security. This is a whole veil that they're putting over it. You're going to hear a lot tonight about how 'Oh, you're putting hte troops in danger.' We don't want to put the troops in danger but we don't want them to put the people of Afghanistan in danger, which they did, and the people of Iraq in danger, which they did, or the people of Iraq in danger, which they did. So you're going to hear about that tonight. All of these issues are extremely important.

Glenn Greenwald, Margaret Kimberly (whom Betty rightly praised), Chris Hedges and Susan Sarandon are among the other strong participants in the discussion.

Susan Sarandon: We need journalists, we need investigative reporters to tell us about things the government is hiding that are illegal, inhumane, immoral acts. And when you have, finally, a whistle-blower that comes forward with information that is really assoutndingly horrifying -- as Chelsea Manning did, God bless her -- and then you have the publisher [Julian] punished ina very -- I mean, right now he could die. And you know, it's gone on for so long and he's so fragile. And on top of that, all the other newspapers, all the mainstream newspapers, benefitted from this information. They pritned it. No one is accusing them of endaring the troops or bringing down America. They all profitted -- THE GUARDIAN, THE WASHINGTON POST. But they've singled him out [the US government] to tell other journalists not to go into this kind of investigative reporting.

The plan is to return to this live stream in next week's snapshot (or snapshots). That said, there's another thing I planned to cover today -- testimoy -- but I'm having to put that on hold because there's too much that has to be in the snapshot today.

In Iraq today? Floodng. AP reports:

At least eight people have died and more are feared injured amid severe flooding caused by torrential rainfall in northern Iraq, Iraqi officials said on Friday.

Omed Khoshnaw, governor of Irbil province in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region, said the deaths occurred primarily in the Daratu district. In comments to local outlet Rudaw, he said seven had died due to the flash flooding and one after a lighting strike. Women and children were feared among the dead, he added.

AFP Tweets:

#UPDATE Eleven people including two foreigners died on Friday in flash floods which swept through northern Iraq after torrential rains in Arbil, capital of the autonomous Kurdistan region, an official said http://u.afp.com/wTNC

7:00 AM · Dec 17, 2021

The Kurdistan government's representative to the US Bayan SamiRahman Tweets:

Deeply saddened by the Erbil floods which killed several people. Kurdistan and Iraq as a whole are the victims of climate change, deliberate environmental damage by the Ba’ath regime and weak planning to mitigate future threats. We need to work together to prevent more disasters

.S. Consulate General Erbil and 8 others

7:35 AM · Dec 17, 2021

ARABY.ORG COMMUNITY Tweets:

8 dead as flash floods devastate northern Iraq  https://english.alaraby.co.uk/news/8-dead-flash-floods-devastate-northern-iraq

 via @The_NewArab

7:03 AM · Dec 17, 2021

She cries to the heavens above
There's a stone in my heart
She lives a life she didn't choose
And it hurts like brand new shoes
Yes, it hurts like brand new shoes
And it hurts like brand new shoes

-- "Pearls," written by Sade Adu, Andrew Hale and Dobet Gnahore, performed by India Arie on her TESTIMONY: VOL. 2, LOVE & POLITICS

Hurts like brand new shoes?

Above is Bully Boy and Nouri al-Maliki as the two celebrated and signed the Strategic Forces Agreement and the treaty masquerading as a Status Of Forces Agreement on December 14, 2008 minutes before Iraqi journalist Muntadhar al-Zeidi declared, "This is a gift from the Iraqis. This is the farewell kiss you dog. This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq" while hurling first one-shoe and the second at Bully Boy. Both shoes missed and Bully Boy grinned and did not take it seriously or perceive it to be a threat ("And if you want some -- if you want the facts, it's a size 10 shoe that he threw. Thank you for your concern, do not worry about it.")

Muntadhar is back in the news. EFE reports:

Ten years after the withdrawal of US troops, the journalist told Efe in an interview that the occupation is far from over and that “the US continues to occupy Iraq,” politically speaking.

“The US Embassy is the one that dominates many sectors of the State and important decisions, from the formation of the Government to the decisions of Parliament,” he added in an interview with Efe in the Iraqi capital.

Al Zaidi (1979) recalls the “totally premeditated” act that made him a hero in the Arab world overnight, but also put him in prison where he was beaten regularly.

“This is a farewell kiss from the people of Iraq, you dog,” Al Zaidi told Bush as he tossed his shoes at him during a news conference in Baghdad on December 14, 2008.

That action was seen as spontaneous, but Al Zaidi said it was “planned” and that he videotaped his will before leaving for the press conference because he was fully aware of the consequences of his actions.

“The greatest honor in the world is to be thrown roses, what I did was change the farce of throwing roses to throwing shoes at the president of the US occupation of Iraq.”

According to Al Zaidi, the president had said that Iraqis would welcome US troops “with flowers” after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which led to the demise of dictator Saddam Hussein but also to years of chaos and sectarian conflict in the Arab country.

To this day, Al Zaidi does not know what happened to his shoes, which were never returned to him despite the fact that he requested them during his trial.

He is correct, the war, the occupation continues. The press lies but that's the reality.

The following sites updated:

12/17/2021

and just like that ... a rapist

last week, i almost wrote about chris north was shooting off his mouth about kim cattrall. i was really ticked and i griped about it to c.i. who told me not to worry about it? why not, i asked. 'it's good that chris is tying himself to sarah right now - very good. you'll understand shortly, i can't say anything else right now.'

well we all know what she meant now, don't we?

2 women have come forward stating that chris north raped them. 'the hollywood reporter' had the story and was sitting on it while they verified it.

good to know chris and sjp are the best of friends.

sarah jessica parker is best friends with a rapist.

knowing sjp, she's desperate to dump him but can't because she'll look like a real asshole.

this really puts 'mr big' and the whole show in a new light, doesn't it?

they never should have done the reboot, but now that they have, they've ensured that the audience is not going to respond well to this. i wouldn't be surprised if 'hbo' quietly walks away from the show - and they should.

let's close with c.i.'s 'Iraq snapshot:'

Thursday, December 16, 2021. The persecution of Julian Assange continues as an unsuspecting Caroline Kennedy stumbles into the fray and water issues in Iraq increase.

Starting with the continued persecution of Julian Assange. Julian is an Australian citizen. Australia's former Minster of Foreign Affairs Bob Carr has called out the persecution and the lack of action on the part of Australia.

"If Australia can’t take up the cause of one of its citizens, what scope for independent action is left?"—former Australian foreign minister @bobjcarr
 on Julian Assange's plight: https://dumptheguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/dec/16/scott-morrison-should-advocate-for-julian-assange-when-talking-to-caroline-kennedy

 #FreeAssangeNOW #BringAssangeHome #auspol

6:19 AM · Dec 16, 2021

Last June, Rob Harris (SYDNEY MORNING HERALD) reported:

Former security analyst turned federal Labor MP Peter Khalil has joined a group of Australian politicians directly lobbying the United States to drop an appeal over a British court’s ruling against the extradition of the WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange.

In a video message to US President Joe Biden released on Wednesday evening Australian time, 11 federal MPs from across the political spectrum have also appealed to Washington to drop its espionage charges against the Australian citizen and for the British government to allow him to return home.

Before entering politics Mr Khalil, the member for the Victorian seat of Wills, was director of National Security Policy of the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq. As a national security adviser to former prime minister Kevin Rudd, he was personally named in diplomatic cables sent to Washington by the US Embassy, which were later released by Wikileaks.

While he has previously criticised Mr Assange’s actions in helping obtain and leak classified information on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Mr Khalil said the case was “not just about one individual”.

“In an era where rising authoritarian regimes are denying and attacking freedom of the press, such as the shut down of Hong Kong’s Apple Daily by the Chinese Community Party, it is more important than ever that when it comes to condemning the denial of press freedom the rhetoric of liberal democracies is actually matched with substantive actions to protect the right of journalists and the media to do their work freely to hold governments to account,” Mr Khalil said.

Into the fray stumbles Caroline Kennedy. US President Joe Biden has nominated her to be the US Ambassador to Australia. She's ready to drag the family name further into the mud? She's never done a damn thing to actually improve the family name. She sits on her millions and waits for freebies.

She wanted to be a US Senator . . . if it could be handed to her. If she could be named the replacement for Hillary Clinton and then run after as the incumbent, she wanted it. She didn't want it enough to compete for it in a race -- not before or since. But if she can be handed something -- because of her name, not because of any accomplishments -- greedy Caroline's going to grab it.

An /author,' Caroline assembles clip jobs that she passes off as books and makes herself availalbe for fawning media interviews to promote them (and enrich herself). She once helped write two book swith Ellen Alderman -- the first of which was IN OUR DEFENSE: THE BILL OF RIGHTS IN ACTION. Now most people know Ellen did the real work on those two books but does Caroline feel any need to even pretend she grasps The Bill of Rights? And if so, why is she not speaking out on behalf of Julian Assange.

Oh, that's right. She's never done a damn thing in her life. Not anything good. She was a huge disappointment to her mother and that started the minute Caroline whored the family name to try to become a journalist. She wasn't qualified for any assignement and her writing was plodding. But using her name and lying that she was a huge fan of Elvis Presley and wanted to represent the Kennedy family at his funeral, she crashed the funeral and then wrote her tacky piece (intended to be tacky from the start) for ROLLING STONE.

For most people, that would be the death knell for their public life. Not Caroline. The media's worked over time to make her 'smart' and 'strong' and 'courageous.' Until she was trying to grab the NY Seante seat most people were unaware of her 'interesting' marriage and the affairs she had had and was then having. I see even WIKIPEDIA has to note the 'strange' marriage (though not the affairs -- check the archives, we went over all of it when she was trying to steal that senate seat) though they date that to a 2015 60 MINUTES report -- it was known years and years before.

SHe's lived off her father's name and pretended the world owed her something. Unlike her brother, she never showed any interest in justice for her father. The only thing she's ever wanted is money, money and more money.

Fine, Caroline. But public face it for once. Admit you don't give a damn about The Bill of Rights or the rights of the press. Admit you don't give a damn about Julian Assange. You are and always have been out for yourself.

Australia's MEAA Tweets:

We welcome Caroline Kennedy as the next US ambassador to Australia and will be seeking a meeting at the earliest possible time to push for the charges against Julian #Assange to be dropped. theguardian.com/us-news/2021/d

#MEAAmedia #PressFreedom

Bob Carr (GUARDIAN) offers:

His meeting with new American ambassador to Australia, Caroline Kennedy, will likely be the happiest event in the prime minister’s diary, flavoured with election and budgetary pressures. But Scott Morrison might attach a coda to their conversation. It should be about the continuation of the US bid to extradite Julian Assange from the United Kingdom to face a possible 175-year sentence in the US. This extradition was recently given new life by a decision of British judges that the US action has merit.

“We think this thing has gone on long enough,” Morrison might say. “Members of my own government including my deputy Barnaby Joyce are saying it’s wrong. We’ve got war crimes trials pending for Australian troops in Afghanistan who might have done the very things Assange exposed in Iraq. Washington can turn this guy into a martyr.”

Caroline, looks like you mis-stepped again. Another easy, unearned post was going to get you news coverage. This time, your father's name might not keep the press easy and sweet.

At TRUTHOUT, Marjorie Cohn writes:

Nowhere in its 27-page decision about Assange’s custodial treatment after extradition to the U.S. did the High Court mention the CIA plot to kidnap and assassinate Assange.

In 2017, WikiLeaks exposed the CIA’s hacking system of electronic surveillance and cyber warfare called “Vault 7.” The CIA called the exposé “the largest data loss in CIA history.” Mike Pompeo, Donald Trump’s CIA director, labeled WikiLeaks a “non-state hostile intelligence service.” CIA and administrative officials made “secret war plans” to kidnap and even kill Assange, according to an explosive Yahoo! News report published two months before the High Court ruling. Senior CIA and administration officials sought “sketches” and “options” for assassinating Assange. Trump himself “asked whether the CIA could assassinate Assange and provide him ‘options’ for how to do so,” the report says.

Two days before the High Court ruling,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken declared at the so-called Summit for Democracy, “Media freedom plays an indispensable role in informing the public, holding governments accountable, and telling stories that otherwise would not be told. The U.S. will continue to stand up for the brave and necessary work of journalists around the world.”

But by vigorously pursuing Assange’s extradition, the U.S. is doing precisely the opposite. The prosecution of Assange is the first time a journalist has been indicted under the Espionage Act for publishing truthful information. The United States has never prosecuted a journalist or news outlet for publishing classified information. If Assange is tried, convicted and imprisoned for doing what journalists routinely do, it will send a chilling message to journalists that they publish material critical of the U.S. government at their peril.

“If extradited to the US, Julian Assange could not only face trial on charges under the Espionage Act but also a real risk of serious human rights violations due to detention conditions that could amount to torture or other ill-treatment,” Amnesty International tweeted.

Julian remains persecuted and the persecution takes place with very little attention. Susan Sarandon rightly speaks out and she's trashed with ''no one cares'' and other Tweets. It's because hatred of Julian is bi-partisan. Margaret Kimberley (BLACK AGENDA REPORT) reminds:

Assange ran afoul of four different U.S. presidents, republicans and democrats alike. Wikileaks revealed war crimes committed during the George W. Bush administration in their Iraq War Logs and Afghanistan War Logs. Private Chelsea Manning leaked the Collateral Murder video, which shows the deaths of civilians, including two Reuters reporters, as they were gunned down by a U.S. army helicopter crew in 2007.

Collateral Murder was released in 2010 when Barack Obama was president. All of the purported differences between democrats and republicans disappear when U.S. hegemony is in need of protection. Obama’s Attorney General, Eric Holder, confirmed that Assange was under investigation. While the Justice Department ultimately chose not to indict, they laid the groundwork for Donald Trump to make Assange a political prisoner. Obama’s unprecedented use of the Espionage Act sent other whistleblowers to jail and gave Trump license to get his hands on Assange. As always, Joe Biden follows Trump policy and he continues the Assange persecution.

The Trump administration built on the work of the Obama DOJ and secured a 17-count indictment in 2018, with charges that could result in a 175-year sentence. Of course they didn’t stop with criminal charges, which were useless as long as the Ecuadorian government gave Assange sanctuary in its London embassy. The Trump administration secured a $4 billion IMF loan for Ecuador, just one month before Assange’s protections were lifted. The timing of the transaction and the arrest were clearly not coincidental.

It isn’t surprising that presidents wage war against the truth tellers of the world. What is especially disheartening is the way that journalists have abandoned Assange and turned into U.S. government spokespeople if they discuss his case at all.

Media outlets such as the New York Times, the Washington Post and The Guardian worked with Assange for years, printing Wikileaks revelations on a regular basis. Yet they have said little in his defense ever since he was arrested on April 11, 2019. Neither have the liberal elites, who parrot the falsehood that Assange is responsible for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 defeat. According to democratic propagandists, Russian operatives hacked the Democratic National Committee computers and gave a trove of embarrassing emails to Wikileaks. Hillary Clinton even refers to the organization as “Russian Wikileaks” just in case anyone forgot to blame others for her political debacle.

Of course, Wikileaks received the DNC documents the same way they received all others. A whistleblower leaked the material and the rest is history. Except history didn’t turn out as most people predicted. Hillary Clinton lost, in large part because of the corrupt behaviors that Assange revealed.

The DNC revelations were as big a threat as the war logs. Assange exposed how the Clinton campaign amplified Trump, in a mistaken belief that he would be the easiest republican to defeat. They also proved that the primary process was rigged against Bernie Sanders, who would have been the better candidate. The revelations had to be squelched and the need to turn Assange into a scapegoat only intensified over time. Russiagate was the means of vilification and made him persona non grata with people who might have been his defenders.

The Collateral Murder video shows the killing of two Iraqis who were employed by Reuters in Baghdad. One would think that some professional courtesy would be extended to their memories, if only for appearance sake. But that isn’t how corporate media operate. They work on behalf of the state and they conveniently forget their past relationship with Wikileaks and the killings of their colleagues so that they might stay in the good graces of the people prosecuting Assange.

Ultimately the U.S. and U.K. couldn’t be bad actors at all if powerful media organizations behaved like independent entities and not as an arm of the state. Assange has no influential friends and sits in Belmarsh prison, having suffered a stroke on October 27, 2021. His physical and mental health deteriorate while unscrupulous people in London and Washington decide his fate.

If you're someone committed to truth and a free press, you speak out on behalf of Julian Assange. If you're a partisan junkie addicted to politicians, you stay slient or, worse, you smear and attack Julian and those who support him. Tonight, Julian will be the focus of a live stream. Katie Halper Tweets:

#FreeAssange livestream Thurs 12/16 @ 7:30 PM ET hosted by me, @marwilliamson
 @krystalball
 @KyleKulinski
 w/ @SusanSarandon
 @ggreenwald
, @RoKhanna
 @rogerwaters
 @esaagar
 @StellaMoris1
 @GabrielShipton
 @freedomrideblog
 @NilsMelzer
 @ryangrim
 + more https://youtube.com/watch?v=8DRVDq8cicg

 @wikileaks

youtube.com

Free Assange! Marianne Williamson, Krystal Ball, Katie Halper, Kyle...

Katie Halper, Krystal Ball, Marianne Williamson & Kyle Kulinski join forces to host a livestream to free Julian Assange, the radical truth-teller and champio...

12:57 PM · Dec 14, 2021

Julian Assange exposed some of the US government's crime in Iraq. The truth is, Iraqis an active crime scene. The US government has destroyed the country and continues to do so. The people suffer and the White House -- whomever occupies it -- always wants to 'celebrate' the great results of the (ongoing) war. There are no great results.

It's a land of orphans and widows.

The corrupt government 00 installed by the US government -- does damn little to help the Iraqi people while doing a great deal to harm them. ARAB WEEKLY reports:

Half of the families living in drought-affected areas of Iraq need humanitarian food aid, the Norwegian Refugee Council said in a study released on Thursday.

Experts have warned that record low rainfall, compounded by climate change, is threatening social and economic disaster in war-scarred Iraq.

The NRC said that its research shows that "one in two families in drought-affected regions require food assistance because of drought, while one in five do not have sufficient food for everyone in the family".

The NGO based its study on interviews in 2,806 homes across seven provinces, among them Anbar in the west, Basra in the south and the north's Nineveh.

These three are traditionally considered to be the breadbasket of Iraq but have been hit hard by the crisis.

The United Nations says that about one-third of Iraq's population lives in poverty, despite the country's oil wealth.

NRC's Jan Egeland Tweets"

Our latest survey in Iraq covering 17,000 people have many alarming findings: children are eating less while young people are giving up and migrating because of lack of livelihoods, water shortages and drought in conflict areas.

nrc.no

One in two families in drought-affected Iraq need food assistance | NRC

The scale of suffering inflicted by drought on Iraq’s populations this year is laid bare in new research by the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC).

1:36 AM · Dec 16, 2021

Sinana Mahmoud (THE NATIONAL) adds:

Insufficient water and inadequate feed or disease over the past six months led to the loss of 37 per cent of their cattle, which pushed the average monthly income in six out of seven provinces surveyed below the monthly survival threshold.

Many people are seeking better chances in cities. In the past 30 days, a family member of one in 15 households surveyed had migrated.

“Many of those had been in displacement at least once before, or had just returned home,” the agency said.

Forty-five per cent of people aged 15 to 24 had left their areas, while 38 per cent had lost a job.

IRA OIL REPORT'S Lizzie Porter Tweets:

Important new research on drought & hunger in #Iraq by @NRC_MiddleEast
 : more than 1/3 of wheat & barley farmers say their crops have failed, & more than 1/3 have had livestock die due to insufficient water, inadequate feed or disease.

6:27 AM · Dec 16, 2021

Lizzie also Tweets:

Authorities in Missan blame Wassit governorate, which lies upstream, for not releasing approved water allocations. Overall, authorities blame Iran, which they say has diverted inland rivers that used to flow into Iraq, to meet domestic demand.

iraqoilreport.com

Water shortages prompt RPG fire near Gharraf oil field

As Iraq begins to suffer the intensifying effects of climate change, competition for water threatens to spark conflict.

1:52 PM · Dec 15, 2021

And:

Our @iraqoilreport
 latest: tribesmen in Dhi Qar province fired an RPG & heavy machine gun bullets at a police patrol in anger over water shortages - in a sign that environmental issues threaten to aggravate instability in southern #Iraq