Colin Powell, Key Figure in Iraq Invasion, Dies at 84
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His family cited COVID-19 complications as the main reason.
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Powell holds up a vial that he claimed was the size that could contain anthrax at the UN Security Council on Feb. 5, 2003. (AFP)
Colin Powell, the former US Secretary of State who lied to the UN Security Council in order to justify the US invasion of Iraq, had died today at the age of 84 due to COVID-19 complications.
"General Colin Powell, the former US Secretary of State and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, passed away this morning from complications from the Covid-19 virus. He was fully vaccinated," Powell's family wrote on Facebook.
The former Secretary of State played a prominent role in shaping US foreign policy with several Republican administrations in the later years of the 20th century and the early years of the 21st century.
Colin Powell was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under President George Bush during the 1991 Gulf War, when US-led Western forces invaded Kuwait to drive Iraqi forces out. The Republican general later served as Secretary of State in the George W. Bush administration.
His name emerged before the US occupation of Iraq in 2003, when he presented to the UN Security Council a string of US-concocted lies and claims of Iraq’s possession of weapons of mass murder as a pretext for the invasion. The war claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and left the country in shambles for years to come.
It was later revealed that these allegations were fabricated, pushing Powell to describe his intense pushing of the propaganda as a "blot" in his history.
