MERIP Media Resource List, June 10, 2004

AVAILABLE FOR INTERVIEWS on the following topic:

-Evaluating Reagan’s foreign policy legacy

CHRIS TOENSING

Chris Toensing is executive director of the Middle East Research and Information Project and editor of Middle East Report. Commenting on Reagan’s legacy, Toensing said: "Citizens of the two countries the Bush administration has 'liberated' may not share the administration's appreciation for the legacy of Ronald Reagan. In Afghanistan, Reagan's administrations escalated the funding and armament of the mujahideen, many of whose commanders are now known as warlords. Reagan reestablished US diplomatic relations with the regime of Saddam Hussein and blocked a Senate resolution that would have imposed sanctions upon that regime for its use of chemical weapons. Will these uncomfortable facts find their way into George W. Bush's eulogy of the late president?"

SINAN ANTOON

Sinan Antoon is an Iraqi-born poet and novelist who teaches Arabic literature at Dartmouth College and is a member of a collective that recently produced a documentary about post-Saddam Iraq. Commenting on Reagan’s legacy, Antoon said: “Undoubtedly, one of the people around the globe grieving for President Reagan is Saddam Hussein himself because for two terms he was one of the main beneficiaries of President Reagan’s myopic foreign policy. For many Iraqis, Reagan is just another world leader who condoned, if not encouraged, Saddam’s crimes. As a teenager, I remember sitting in front of our living room TV watching Donald Rumsfeld, Reagan’s emissary, shaking Saddam’s hand to signal the reestablishment of diplomatic relations.”

ZAMA COURSEN-NEFF
Zama Coursen-Neff is a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch and is the co-author of three reports on human rights in Afghanistan. Commenting on Reagan’s legacy, Coursen-Neff said: “Reagan doesn't have a legacy when it comes to women’s human rights in Afghanistan. Afghan women were invisible in Reagan’s policies. Many of the warlords who rule Afghanistan today -- with severe consequences for women’s rights -- got early support from the Reagan administration. The women of Afghanistan deserved more then and deserve more now and they’re not getting it.”

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