Kenneth O'Keefe - Human Shield Action To Iraq

Human Shield Action To Iraq

In December 2002, O'Keefe started the human shield action to Iraq group. Intended to "make it politically impossible for them to bomb" Iraq by placing western civilians as "shields" at non-military locations, about 75 activists traveled over land from London to Bahgdad in two double-decker buses. Critics of the human shields argued that their mission would only protect Saddam Hussein. O'Keefe argued the "people of Iraq" would suffer the most from a war and publicly acknowledged Hussein as a "violent dictator". At its height about 300 human shields were in Baghdad, but due to challenges internally, with the Iraqi dictatorship and O'Keefe's deportation from Iraq, the numbers dwindled.

Read more about this topic:  Kenneth O'Keefe

Famous quotes containing the words human, shield and/or action:

    The most dangerous word in any human tongue is the word for brother. It’s inflammatory.
    Tennessee Williams (1914–1983)

    The lichen on the rocks is a rude and simple shield which beginning and imperfect Nature suspended there. Still hangs her wrinkled trophy.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    All real freedom springs from necessity, for it can be gained only through the exercise of the individual will, and that will can be roused to energetic action only by the force of necessity acting upon it from the outside to spur it to effort.
    Anna C. Brackett (1836–1911)