“Let this man Bush be impeached
and cleansed from office for the lies he has told. These are not
innocent lies. The dead remember.”
William Rivers Pitt; New York;
June 3,
2003
Since George W. Bush came to
power, he has systematically flouted international agreements that the
US had previously signed up to. While previous US administrations might
not be able to claim much better records, it is clear that Bush is not
even making an attempt to stick to these numerous treaties, laws and
obligations.
It is clear that those who were
kidnapped from Afghanistan and Pakistan by US forces qualify as
prisoners of war within the meaning of the Third Geneva Convention of
1949, and therefore have all the rights of prisoners of war within the
meaning of that convention. Right now, all those rights are being
denied. This is a serious war crime.
Apart from the scandalous
activities of the Bush administration, several other government leaders
currently also face charges of war crimes and violations of
international law. The following is a summarized account of the various
lawsuits that have been filed against Tony Blair, George Bush, Jose
Maria Aznar, Ariel Sharon, and Shimon
Peres respectively:
On Monday 29 July 2003, lawyers from
the Athens Bar Council in Greece filed a lawsuit with the International
Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague against senior UK officials, in an
attempt to indict Prime Minister Tony Blair and other senior members of
the UK government and military for allegedly breaching international law
by attacking Iraq. The ICC was established last
year with the purpose of trying cases of war crimes, genocide and crimes
against humanity.
The lawyers have compiled a dossier
of “strong evidence” against the officials including more than 20 alleged
war crimes, which includes the killing of Iraqi civilians, depriving the
population of drinking water in cities such as Basra, the destruction of
food supplies and the bombardment of residential areas. The allegations
are based on dozens of reports about the conflict, printed in newspapers
and broadcast on television. The case also
intends to call innumerable international witnesses, including the UN
secretary general Kofi Annan, the former chief UN weapons inspector
Hans Blix, and the European commission president, Romano Prodi.
As human
rights organizations continue to raise concerns about appalling conditions
at Guantanamo Bay and the unclear legal status of detainees, a
Pakistani man who was imprisoned by America at Guantanamo Bay is preparing
to sue the US Government for $10.4m. Mohammed Sagheer was released last
November after 10 months in captivity alongside around 600 other inmates.
On being handed to the American authorities he says he was deprived of
food, forbidden to pray and made to shave off his beard.
Mohammed
Ikram Chaudhry, the lawyer of Mohammed Sagheer, has served legal notice on
10 July 2003 to the U.S. authorities and will sue if they do not respond
within a month. He believes his client’s mental health had been affected
during his captivity. Another Pakistani
released from the notorious camp in Cuba said in May 2003 that most of the
600-plus prisoners still held there on suspicion of ‘Al-Qaeda’ links had
become mentally disturbed.
German attorneys on
20 May 2003,
registered a claim against US President George W.
Bush in the General Office of the Public Prosecutor in Germany. In
addition to Bush, the claim includes members of the German and British
governments, who are all alleged to be in violation of international law
in launching the war in Iraq. Registration of this claim became possible
by new legislation adopted in Germany last year, where courts of the
country can consider cases connected with violations of international law
even in situations
where the violation doesn't concern Germany directly.
On 02 April
2003 a broad coalition of anti-war activists, lawyers and judges took
legal action against Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, charging
that his support for the US-led war on Iraq is illegal. The Culture
Against the War group, together with the Free Association of Lawyers and
two groups called Judges for Democracy and Magistrates for Democracy,
filed the complaints before the Supreme Court.
On 12
February 2003 Belgian’s highest appeals court (Cour de Cassation) ruled
that Ariel Sharon can be tried once he ceases to be prime minister,
regardless of whether he is in Belgium or not. It also cleared the way for
war crimes trials against Israeli General Amos Yaron (currently Defense
Ministry director-general and former commander of the Israeli invasion
forces in Beirut), former chief of staff Rafael Eitan and Major General
(res.) Amir Drori.
The
Belgian court ruling is a landmark ruling, because it marks the end of a
period of more than fifty years when Israel was permitted to stand above
international law and Israeli perpetrators of war crimes could expect
impunity. The fact that Israel – in line with its policy of exempting
itself from all international law enforcement mechanisms – has never made
a commitment to accept advisory rulings issued by the International Court
of Justice (ICJ) might effectively prevent the Israeli government from
seeking redress with the ICJ.
The case was first lodged in Belgium
on 18 June 2001 by 28 survivors of the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacres
charging Ariel Sharon, as well as other Israelis and Lebanese, with war
crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. Building on the evolving
principles and mechanisms of universal jurisdiction, the petitioners
demanded that those responsible for the massacres committed between 16-18
September 1982 in the two refugee camps in Beirut be brought to justice in
Belgium, especially since an Israeli investigation committee (Kahan
Commission, 1983) had found then Minister of Defense Ariel Sharon
“indirectly responsible” but failed to bring legal charges against him.
On 3 September 2002, Ms Sasha Evans instituted action against Mr.
Shimon Peres, Foreign Minister of the State of Israel, through the High
Court of South Africa (Witwatersrand Local Division) for payment of R10
135 000,000 (SA Rands), during Peres’ visit to South Africa.
The action was taken on the grounds
that in the period September 1997 to December 2001 Evans was resident and
employed in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, during which time she
was severely traumatised as a direct result of witnessing the uncivilized,
illegal, violent, brutal, forceful and inhuman actions of the Israeli
occupation army which, inter alia, took the form of illegal, forceful and
unlawful demolition of homes and businesses: arbitrary arrest and
detention for indeterminate periods, torture and physical violence in
detention with withholding of water; collective punishment imposed on
entire communities of her fellow Palestinians coupled with blockades,
curfews, denial of access to medical/hospital treatment; denial of the
right to freedom of movement, return and association: refusal of access to
places of employment and worship; closure of places of learning; and
denial of other human rights, including: shelling from fighter jets, tanks
and helicopter gunships of civilian areas including schools, hospitals and
especially refugee camps, and illegally withholding revenues legally due
to the Palestinian Authority, thereby preventing the said Authority from
providing the basic services required in Palestine, including the areas
where Evans resided.
Source:
by courtesy & ©
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