Bigley: The Occupation Eats Its Own

again, from the London Independent

T[he video message from hostage Ken Bigley
23 September 2004

An edited transcript of Ken Bigley's video statement

"I am Ken Bigley from Liverpool ... and I think this is possibly my last chance to speak to someone who will listen from Europe.

I don't want to die, I don't deserve it and neither do those women held in the Iraqi prisons. Please, please release the female prisoners who are held in Iraqi prisons. Please help them, I need you to help, Mr Blair. You are now the only person on God's earth that I can speak to.

I also now realise how much the Iraqi people have suffered. The Iraqi children who haven't got their mothers, it's not fair. A child wants his mother, it's of no use keeping a mother in prison ... Let the mothers go back to their children, give these people a chance.

Mr Blair, I am nothing to you, it's just one person in the whole of the United Kingdom that's all. With a family like you've got a family, with children, like your children, your boys, your wife.

Please you can help, I know you can. These people are not asking for the world, they're asking for their wives and the mothers of their children.

Please Mr Blair, please show some of the compassion you say you have. Please, I don't know what I can say. Please I wish you could talk back to me, I wish you could tell me what I've got to do.

And ... also if there's anyone else that can can help me within the British political world, the Liberal party or the Conservative Party, if you can talk with Mr Blair and assist him. I know things aren't easy, I know things aren't black and white, white and black, but we can overcome this. I need to live. I've been here a week and they've taken good care of me. They have, under the circumstances, they've taken very good care of me.

You look at yourselves and think of your wife or think of your husband not being home, not because they committed a crime but because they just get arrested and are guilty by association, just thrown inside a jail and the families want these people home like you would want your family.

Would you like the Germans or any other country walking down the street with a gun, in England, in Scotland. I don't think so. And the Iraqis don't like foreign troops on their soil walking down the street with guns, it's not right and it's not fair. We need to pull the troops out and let the Iraqis run their own country, their own destiny.

They need to be left alone to rebuild their country and their own futures at the speed they want to do it and not be pushed and shoved.

People of Britain and people of Liverpool particularly, you are very special people, you are people who can say enough is enough. Enough is enough of playing with Iraq like a toy. Pack your bags and get out and let's hope we can come back and visit the country as a guest.

I've been in Iraq some months now, believe me they have nothing, they have nothing only their pride. They're kind people, please talk to, talk to everybody that you know who can ... who can let the decision makers know. And the Asian community, the Asian community in England, please, please open your mouths and be listened to and speak up for the freedom of Iraq. Please."

The video then shows three frames of text, written white on black in Arabic and English. The first reads: "Does a British (sic) worth anything to Blair." The second: "Will he try to save the hostage or will he not care?" A third asks: "Do leaders really care about their people?"]

--Richard Estes
Davis, CA