Det danske Fredsakademi

Kronologi over fredssagen og international politik 22. december 2005 / Time Line December 22, 2005

21. December 2005, 23. December 2005

12/22/2005
U.S. violates three human rights treaties
By the Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute
www.mcli.org
Berkeley, Dec. 21: "Government spying on peace demonstrators and animal rights activists isn't all the Government has been doing to violate human rights," according to Barbara Blong, President of Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute. "The U.S. has violated three human rights treaties it ratified by not filing the required periodic reports on human rights violations in the U.S. And when the Government finally filed its late report with the UN Human Rights Committee in Geneva, it was full of nice words covering serious human rights violations, from Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo to airport screeners in San Francisco and racism in dealing with Katrina victims."
Blong spoke out as the New York Times revelations on NSA spying were compounded by the latest Status Report of the House Judiciary Committee Democratic Staff on the Downing Street Minutes and attacks on those who disagreed with Bush policy on the Iraq War. The Meiklejohn Institute, a center for peace law and human rights, submitted 13 Issues to the Human Rights Committee in Geneva to use in its dialog with the U.S. Government over the tardy U.S. report required under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Ann Fagan Ginger, Executive Director of the Institute, said: "Our Issues include denial of the right to privacy through the recently revealed NSA spying operations, local police killing several innocent civilians and treating people differently based on their race, and other racist actions leading to different life expectancies of Black men and women, higher rates of unemployment and poverty due to race and gender, and less money for good schools in Black/Latino neighborhoods. While the report says the Government has 'reached out' to Arab/Muslim Americans, in fact we must report many attacks on individuals and their community organizations. The United Electrical Workers Union (UE) is also reporting many actions forbidding labor unions in many government job classifications. And NGOs are concerned about racist military recruiting on campuses, and failure to make adequate plans to help injured Service members returning from duty in Iraq."
These Issues will be presented on March 13 at the New York meeting of the Committee, along with issues from many other U.S. human rights organizations. They will be part of the Committee dialog with the U.S. Government representatives in July in Geneva, according to Ginger.
The full list of Issues presented to the Human Rights Committee is attached.
submitted to UN Human Rights Committee, 12/20/05.
ISSUES based on report submitted by City Council of Berkeley, "Challenging U.S. Human Rights Violations Since 9/11," described by Hon. Claudia Morcom[1] at the Human Rights Committee meeting Oct. 13, 2005 for Meiklejohn Civil Liberties Institute, an NGO in Berkeley, California.
ISSUES
Issue 1 on Reporting Requirements:
Article 40
There are at present six problems with U.S. reporting to the Committee: ⁽¹⁾ The U.S. stated that it doubled the resources for preparing reports in the fall of 2003, yet it did not meet the Committee deadlines in 2004 or 2005, or its reporting deadline for CERD.⁽²⁾ The Report is based solely on federal government agency reports, and does not include information submitted in a timely manner by at least one City Council based on information from knowledgeable and concerned NGOs, and the Government did not even acknowledge receipt of the material.[2] ⁽³⁾ A few City officials and many NGOs working at the state and local levels find no awareness of the provisions of the Covenant, although the Report states that "There is extensive awareness at the state and federal levels," but gave no statistics or examples. ⁽⁴⁾ Will the federal government immediately send copies of its Report to each state governor and attorney general, and send copies of the Committee Suggestions and Recommendations after the Report is discussed by the Committee in its Geneva meeting in 2006? ⁽⁵⁾ Does the Government plan to request information from each state for the 4th Report due in 2009? ⁽⁶⁾ How does the Government plan to get the attention of the U.S. media concerning its Report and the Committee's responses?
Issue 2 on Violations of the Right to Privacy through Surveillance
Article 17 and Articles 2.1 and 20.1
While the U.S. Government was preparing its 2d/3d Report, the President and top officials knew that he had ordered the National Security Agency to conduct an electronic eavesdropping program in the U.S. without first obtaining warrants. This program was not described in the U.S. Report. The program includes interception of communications of Americans and terrorist suspects inside the U.S. without first obtaining warrants from the secret court that enforces the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, 50 U.S.C. §501. The program "included monitoring the communications of as many as 500 Americans and other people inside the United States without search warrants at any one time," Eric Lichtblau and James Risen reported in the New York Times on Dec. 16, 2005, after waiting one year for White House approval. Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, immediately said, "Our government must follow the laws and respect the Constitution while it protects Americans' security and liberty." The Committee chair said he would hold a hearing on the subject.
This procedure must be included in the discussion of the U.S. Report under Art. 17.
The right to privacy, the right not to be discriminated against based on political opinion, and the prohibition of propaganda for war were reportedly violated by the President and Vice President, according to an Investigative Status Report of the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee Democratic Staff issued Dec. 20, 2005. The Report, "The Constitution in Crisis: The Downing Street Minutes and Deception, Manipulation, Torture, Retribution, and Coverups in the Iraq War," describes White House actions against members of the Administration,⁽³⁾ the military,⁽⁴⁾ a reporter,⁽⁵⁾ a Gold Star Mother,⁽⁶⁾ the CIA and its employees,⁽⁷⁾ and a contracting officer.⁽⁸⁾
This Report, like the New York Times report, was based on surveillance and collection of information on the named individuals. Since these events occurred before the U.S. Report was submitted in October 2005, they need to be discussed with the U.S. Government as part of its 2d/3d Report so that the Committee of the UN[9] can make comments to help overcome obstacles to the exercise of human rights in the U.S. during the declared war on terror.
Issue 3 on Practices of Local Police:
Article 6
The Government failed to discuss numerous reports they received[10] of police killing men and women in New York City[11], Cincinnati[12] and the Virgin Islands[13], and injuring many peaceful protesters in: Oakland, CA.[14] New York City[15], Miami, FL.[16], and Portland.[17]
The Government did not discuss whether the civil suits and criminal charges brought by the federal government against police officers[18] have led to new practices to prevent "any excessive use of force by the police, including the use of weapons."[19] Is the federal government setting up training sessions to ensure that U.S. and UN law is obeyed by police departments?
What is the federal government doing to avoid a repetition of State prison guards who tortured their prisoners being sent by the U.S. Government to Iraq to deal with prisoners there.[20]
Issue 4 on Racial Discrimination by Local Police in the Criminal Justice System:
Articles 2, 26, 18
Certain practices at the federal and local levels need deeper discussion than given in the Report, including the denial of competent counsel to indigent defendants (who are more often Black than the percentage of Blacks in the community), and frequent denial of the right to a trial by a jury of peers by permitting exclusion of all minority prospective jurors.[21]
What actions has the U.S. Government taken under U.S. law[22] to investigate, and act against, city police and county sheriffs charged with racial discrimination in their arrests, and in their use of force against people of color? Has the Justice Department collected statistics on the number of African American and Latino/Hispanic/Chicano men short, wounded, and killed by police compared with the number of Whites subjected to such actions?[23] What steps has the U.S. Government taken to train local police agencies with records of racism in their treatment of suspects, arrestees, and prisoners? Is the DOJ careful not to fund local police and prisons with records of racist actions?
Issue 5 on Race and Gender Discrimination Leading to Differences in Life Expectancy:
Articles 2, 3, 6, 26, 27
The U.S. reported[24] that: "Whites have a longer life expectancy than minorities. For example, the life expectancy for Whites is 77 years, but for African Americans it is only 71.4. From 1998 to 1999, life expectancy has increased for males, but decreased for females. For Black males is has increased from 67.6 to 67.8... For Black females, life expectancy has decreased from 74.8 to 74.7."
The Report does not describe specific steps the U.S. Government is taking to help decrease these disparities based on race and to increases the life expectancy of both male and female African Americans. Many NGOs oppose the Administration budget cuts because they have sent more single mothers into poverty[25] and have caused cuts in city services provided by cities and counties.[26] Is the Administration going to stop proposing cuts in cancer care[27] and Veterans benefits,[28] which will cause decreases in lie expectancy, including among both Whites and Blacks?
The U.S. Report did not discuss[29] the surge of public concern about racism and capital punishment as a result of the award-winning film, "Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story" released in 2004 and shown all over the world as Williams faced execution in California and the California Governor considered his application for clemency.
The Government faces increasing citizen concerns about the proper response to the dramatic description of the racial and economic and educational and social factors that lead to gang violence in the U.S. and the factors that can lead to a rejection of gang violence by someone incarcerated as a youth.
Issue 6 on Labor Union Membership:
Article 22
Due in large part to Government action and inaction over the last ten years, union membership in the United States has sharply declined and labor rights have been restricted.[30] Since 2002, the Administration has used executive orders and agency directives to eliminate collective bargaining rights for 1,000 federal employees in the U.S. Attorneys' offices and for 2,000 employees in the National Imagery and Mapping agency.[31] The U.S. Government also prohibited 56,000 federal baggage screeners from organizing 2 and tried to eliminate collective bargaining rights for 170,000 federal employees in the new Department of Homeland Security - all under a broad interpretation of national security.[32]
The US Supreme Court has ruled that state employees can no longer sue their employers for violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, or the Fair Labor Standards Act, which covers overtime compensation, among other things.[33] Moreover, the federal Government has done nothing to notify state governments officials about Article 22 of the ICCPR and that it is a treaty and part of the supreme law of the land under the U.S. Constitution. About half of the states have failed to provide for collective bargaining for public employees; North Carolina, Virginia and Texas specifically prohibit public employers and employees from signing collective bargaining agreements. In early 2005, public employee rights were further reduced when the governors of Indiana and Missouri eliminated state employees' collective bargaining rights and invalidated existing labor agreements by executive order.
In the private sector, the National Labor Relations Board recently removed labor protections for graduate student employees and disabled workers, made it almost impossible to organize temporary workers by requiring consent by both the temporary employment agency and the contracting employer, narrowed the scope of protected concerted activities under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), and is currently reviewing long standing precedent on voluntary recognition of unions by employers.[34] Finally, the Supreme Court's decision in Hoffman Plastic Compounds v. NLRB, 535 U.S. 137 (2002), mentioned in the US report, has been found by both the ILO and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to violate international law by restricting labor rights of undocumented workers.[35] Nevertheless, the Hoffman decision continues to be applied in the NLRA context and its application has been used to restrict backpay remedies in discrimination and workers' compensation cases as well.[36] A recently-filed complaint with the ILO underscores the discriminatory impact of the lack of collective bargaining on low wage African American workers.[37]
Issue 7 on the Unemployment Rates for Women and Minorities:
Articles 2, 3, 27
The Government needs to confront the issue of unemployment, which is only mentioned once in its Report[38] even though the Core Document indicates that the unemployment rate for women was 5.4%, and for men, 5.6%.[39] These rates are far higher than the rate of 3% set in the Humphrey Hawkins Full Employment and Balanced Growth Act of 1978, 15 U.S.C. 1022.[40]
These figures do not describe the loss of human dignity felt by many workers when they lose their jobs, particularly, as in the current economic situation in the U.S., workers with many years of seniority with large corporations. This leads to life and death problems documented by Johns Hopkins University Prof. M. Harvey Brenner for the Subcommittee on Economic Goals and Intergovernmental Policy of the Joint Economic Committee of Congress in 1984. Brenner found that for every one per cent increase in unemployment, there will be an increase in homicides; suicides; cirrhosis mortality; mental hospitalization; infant, fetal, and maternal mortality, and alcohol abuse.[41]
What steps is the Administration taking to decrease the unemployment rate down to 3 % for adults and 4% for workers under 20 that will help carry out the commitments to human rights in the ICCPR?
And what is the U.S. Government doing to work with local and state governments to increase training of youth and unemployed adults so that they can get jobs? What is the Government doing to create jobs for U.S. residents who came to the U.S. seeking employment and to improve their living conditions and are not yet citizens?
Issue 8 on Racism and the Loss of Human Dignity through Poverty:
Articles 2 and 26
Many NGOs are recommending that the U.S. Government comment on the findings of Arjun Sengupta, the UN Independent Expert on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights of the UN Commission on Human Rights, who came to study situation in Mississippi and Louisiana after Katrina,[42] since his stark statistics on poverty based on race and national origin for 2004 were easily accessible. He found that:
24.7 percent of African Americans lived in poverty;
21.9 percent of Hispanics lived in poverty;
only 8.6 percent of non-Hispanic Whites lived in poverty.
The Government needs to comment on the conclusions in his initial report: "a multitude of Federal and state social benefit systems and means-tested programs have been designated to provide assistance to poor people. At the same time, the persistent and increasing numbers of people experiencing poverty and the testimonies of people and civil society organizations indicated significant gaps in the current system." The Government should discuss the factors he listed leading to poverty: "the high costs of health care, inadequate access to quality education and vocational training, low wages, limited protection of tenants and lack of low-cost housing." And the Government should discuss his conclusion:
"Resource constraints have limited the reach of the assistance programmers, and social discrimination has aggravated the problems in many situations resulting in poverty clearly seen as a violation of human rights. If the United States designed and implemented the policies according to the human rights standards much of the problem of poverty could be resolved ..." [43]
Issue 9 on Government and Arab-American and Muslim-American Communities:
Articles 2, 18, 26, 27
The Government needs to provide some examples of the federal government reaching out to Arab-American and Muslin-American communities it mentioned.[44]
The Report did not mention the highly publicized arrest in October 2001 of four young men from the large Arab American/Muslim American community in Detroit, Michigan that ended, in 2004, with the Department of Justice asking the federal judge to throw out the convictions and drop the terrorism charges because of misconduct by the Assistant U.S. Attorney.[45]
What if any actions did the U.S. Government take to reach out to the Arab-American and Muslim American community in Detroit after these events?
The U.S. Report did not discuss the racial profiling by a flight crew that refused to permit an Arab American to enter a plane flying to Saudi Arabia until he proved he was a member of Congress from California.[46] Nor did the Report discuss many of the 21 other reports of unwarranted violations of the rights of Arab Americans and Muslim Americans by Government officials including actions by the new Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and its short-lived "registration" program;[47] problems of racial profiling,[48] the DOD detention of a U.S. Army Muslim Chaplain,[49] or many hate crimes committed by U.S. White citizens.[50] The number of students from Middle Eastern countries who were not permitted to re-enter the U.S. after going home for vacations in 2001 and 2002 is in the tens of thousands.[51] These and similar incidents need to be addressed by the Government.
Issue 10 on Immediate Steps To Provide Equal Education:
Articles 2 and 26
The Report describes litigation to end racial discrimination in some schools pending for 40 years[52],. The U.S. Government is continuing to fight a war in Afghanistan and in Iraq because the overthrown governments discriminated against some of their citizens. NGOs working on issues of education, racism and the effects of the war are concerned about the message this sends to U.S. citizens discriminated against in public schools and universities? And what kind of message does this send to people in Iraq and Afghanistan who feel discriminated against by one or another national/religious group?
Statistics show large drops in African Americans entering leading colleges and universities due to an end to affirmative action programs, particularly in states with large minority populations: California, Georgia, Florida and Texas.[53]
Issue 11 on Disproportionate Number of Blacks in the Military:
Articles 2, 26 and 6
The U.S. Report does not mention the current statistics: Blacks make up 12 per cent of the U.S. population but 20% of military enlistees; and from March 19, 2003 through February 26, 2004, 14.3 per cent of combatant deaths were black soldiers. Nor does the Report discuss why these African American deaths should surpass the percents in the Korean War ( 8.4 percent) and 12.4 percent in the Vietnam conflict.[54]
Some NGO newsletters report hearing from members that that the Government is permitting or encouraging military recruiters to target public schools in African American and Hispanic American and poor communities. There are allegations that recruiters are making promises to students who need money for college or to help poverty-stricken families, promises students, on entering the Service, will not be sent to Iraq and will be put into training programs for nursing, etc. The targeting and the promises need to be discussed as part of the U.S. report.
Issue 12 on Programs To Protect Human Rights of Returning Veterans:
Articles 23 and 24
The Report does not discuss[55] what, if anything, the Government is doing, or planning, to deal with the massive increase in disabled people coming back from the war in Iraq with both physical and deep mental injuries that will take years to heal and be dealt with. This issue is on the minds of many who have read the statistics on the high percentage of homeless people who came back from the war in Vietnam.[56]
Issue 13 on Reparations for Slavery:
Articles 2, 8, 26 and 27
The U.S. Government walked out of the World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban, South Africa in 2001 over the inclusion of paras. 165 and 166 urging nations to redress past grievances, such as slavery, These paragraphs had been approved by all other nations that had permitted slavery in the past -- United Kingdom, France, Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Portugal, et al. In view of presentations to the U.S. Congress on this issue by Representative John Conyers (D-MI)[57] and other Representatives, what actions is the U.S. Government taking to improve conditions in Black neighborhoods -- as to education, police protection but not racist police actions, equal opportunities for employment, health care, libraries, etc., which many African Americans attribute to the slave system that existed in this country from 1500 until 1865, including 77 years after the U.S. Constitution was adopted?

Notes

(2) Copy of 180 reports in "Challenging U.S. Human Rights Violations Since 9/11" was sent to the Department of State on March 29, 2005 by the City Council of Berkeley, California, return receipt requested. The book was delivered according to the U.S. postal service.

(3) Former Secretary of Treasury Paul O'Neill and Economic Advisert Lawrence Lindsey, p. 123.

(4) Former General Eric Shinseki and others, p. 122..

(5) Jeffrey Kofman, p. 127.

(6) Cindy Sheehan, o, 126.

(7) p. 131.

(8) Bunnatine Greenhouse.

12/22/2005
Iraq and the Laws of War : US as Belligerent Occupant
By Francis A, Boyle
On 19 March 2003 President Bush Jr. commenced his criminal war against Iraq by ordering a so-called decapitation strike against the President of Iraq in violation of a 48-hour ultimatum he had given publicly to the Iraqi President and his sons to leave the country. This duplicitous behavior violated the customary international laws of war set forth in the 1907 Hague Convention on the Opening of Hostilities to which the United States is still a contracting party, as evidenced by paragraphs 20, 21, 22, and 23 of U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956). Furthermore, President Bush Jr.'s attempt to assassinate the President of Iraq was an international crime in its own right. Of course the Bush Jr. administration's war of aggression against Iraq constituted a Crime against Peace as defined by the Nuremberg Charter (1945), the Nuremberg Judgment (1946), and the Nuremberg Principles (1950) as well as by paragraph 498 of U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956).
Next came the Pentagon's military strategy of inflicting "shock and awe" upon the city of Baghdad. To the contrary, article 6(b) of the 1945 Nuremberg Charter defined the term "War crimes" to include: ". . . wanton destruction of cities, towns or villages, or devastation not justified by military necessity. . ." The Bush Jr. administration's infliction of "shock and awe" upon Baghdad and its inhabitants constituted the wanton destruction of that city, and it was certainly not justified by "military necessity," which is always defined by and includes the laws of war. Such terror bombings of cities have been criminal behavior under international law since before the Second World War: Nagasaki, Hiroshima, Tokyo, Dresden, London, Guernica-Fallujah.
On 1 May 2003 President Bush Jr. theatrically landed on a U.S. aircraft carrier off the coast of San Diego to declare: "Major combat operations in Iraq have ended." He spoke before a large banner proclaiming: "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED." As of that date, the United States government became the belligerent occupant of Iraq under international law and practice.
This legal status was formally recognized by U.N. Security Council Resolution 1483 of 22 May 2003. For the purpose of this analysis here, the relevant portions of that Security Council Resolution 1483 (2003) are as follows:
Noting the letter of 8 May 2003 from the Permanent Representatives of the United States of America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland to the President of the Security Council (S/2003/538) and recognizing the specific authorities, responsibilities, and obligations under applicable international law of these states as occupying powers under unified command (the "Authority"),
5. Calls upon all concerned to comply fully with their obligations under international law including in particular the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and the Hague Regulations of 1907; . . .
In that aforementioned 8 May 2003 letter from the United States and the United Kingdom to the President of the Security Council, both countries pledged to the Security Council that: "The States participating in the Coalition will strictly abide by their obligations under international law, including those relating to the essential humanitarian needs of the people of Iraq." No point would be served here by attempting to document the gross and repeated violations of that solemn and legally binding pledge by the United States and the United Kingdom from that date until today since it would require a separate book to catalog all of the war crimes, crimes against humanity, and grave human rights violations inflicted by the United States and the United Kingdom in Iraq and against its people.
Suffice it to say here that no earlier than President Bush's 1 May 2003 Declaration of the end of hostilities in Iraq, and certainly no later than U.N. Security Resolution 1483 of 22 May 2003, both the United States and the United Kingdom have been the belligerent occupants of Iraq subject to the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, the 1907 Hague Regulations on land warfare, U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956) or respectively its British equivalent, the humanitarian provisions of Additional Protocol I of 1977 to the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, and the customary international laws of war. I do not take the position that the United States is the belligerent occupant of the entire state of Afghanistan. But certainly the laws of war and international humanitarian law apply to the United States in its conduct of hostilities in Afghanistan as well as to its presence there.
It is not generally believed that the United States is the belligerent occupant of Guantanamo, Cuba. But those detainees held there by United States armed forces who were apprehended in or near the theaters of hostilities in Afghanistan and Iraq are protected by either the Third Geneva Convention protecting prisoners of war or the Fourth Geneva Convention protecting civilians. In any event every detainee held by the United States government in Guantanamo is protected by the International Covenant on a Civil and Political Rights, to which the United States is a contracting party. A similar analysis likewise applies pari passu to those numerous but unknown victims of torture and detention facilities operated around the world by the Central Intelligence Agency. America's own Gulag Archipelago. No wonder the Bush Jr. administration has done everything humanly possible to sabotage the International Criminal Court!
The United States government's installation of the so-called Interim Government of Iraq during the summer of 2004 did not materially alter this legal situation. Under the laws of war, this so-called Interim Government of Iraq is nothing more than a "puppet government." As the belligerent occupant of Iraq the United States government is free to establish a puppet government if it so desires. But under the laws of war, the United States government remains fully accountable for the behavior of its puppet government.
These conclusions are made quite clear by paragraph 366 of U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956):
366. Local Governments Under Duress and Puppet Governments
The restrictions placed upon the authority of a belligerent government cannot be avoided by a system of using a puppet government, central or local, to carry out acts which would be unlawful if performed directly by the occupant. Acts induced or compelled by the occupant are nonetheless its acts.
As the belligerent occupant of Iraq, the United States government is obligated to ensure that its puppet Interim Government of Iraq obeys the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, the 1907 Hague Regulations on land warfare, U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956), the humanitarian provisions of Additional Protocol I of 1977 to the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, and the customary international laws of war. Any violation of the laws of war, international humanitarian law, and human rights committed by its puppet Interim Government of Iraq are legally imputable to the United States government. As the belligerent occupant of Iraq, both the United States government itself as well as its concerned civilian officials and military officers are fully and personally responsible under international criminal law for all violations of the laws of war, international humanitarian law, and human rights committed by its puppet Interim Government of Iraq such as, for example, reported death squads operating under the latter's auspicies.
Furthermore, it was a total myth, fraud, lie, and outright propaganda for the Bush Jr. administration to maintain that it was somehow magically transferring "sovereignty" to its puppet Interim Government of Iraq during the summer of 2004. Under the laws of war, sovereignty is never transferred from the defeated sovereign such as Iraq to a belligerent occupant such as the United States. This is made quite clear by paragraph 353 of U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956): "Belligerent occupation in a foreign war, being based upon the possession of enemy territory, necessarily implies that the sovereignty of the occupied territory is not vested in the occupying power. Occupation is essentially provisional."
If there were any doubt about this matter, paragraph 358 of U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956) makes this legal fact crystal clear:
358. Occupation Does Not Transfer Sovereignty
Being an incident of war, military occupation confers upon the invading force the means of exercising control for the period of occupation. It does not transfer the sovereignty to the occupant, but simply the authority or power to exercise some of the rights of sovereignty. The exercise of these rights results from the established power of the occupant and from the necessity of maintaining law and order, indispensable both to the inhabitants and the occupying force. . . .
Therefore, the United States government never had any "sovereignty" in the first place to transfer to its puppet Interim Government of Iraq. In Iraq the sovereignty still resides in the hands of the people of Iraq and in the state known as the Republic of Iraq, where it has always been. The legal regime described above will continue so long as the United States remains the belligerent occupant of Iraq. Only when that U.S. belligerent occupation of Iraq is factually terminated can the people of Iraq have the opportunity to exercise their international legal right of sovereignty by means of free, fair, democratic, and uncoerced elections. So as of this writing, the United States and the United Kingdom remain the belligerent occupants of Iraq despite their bogus "transfer" of their non-existent "sovereignty" to their puppet Interim Government of Iraq.
Even U.N. Security Council Resolution 1546 of 8 June 2004 "Welcoming" the installation of the puppet Interim Government of Iraq recognized this undeniable fact of international law. Preambular language in this Resolution referred to "the letter of 5 June 2004 from the United States Secretary of State to the President of the Council, which is annexed to this resolution." In other words, that annexed letter is a legally binding part of Resolution 1546 (2004). Therein U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell pledged to the U.N. Security Council with respect to the so-called Multinational Force (MNF) in Iraq: "In addition, the forces that make up the MNF are and will remain committed at all times to act consistently with their obligations under the law of armed conflict, including the Geneva Conventions." Pursuant thereto, the United States and the United Kingdom still remain the belligerent occupants of Iraq subject to the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, the Hague Regulations of 1907, U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956) or respectively its British equivalent, the humanitarian provisions of Additional Protocol I of 1977 to the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, and the customary international laws of war.
This brings the analysis to the so-called Constitution of Iraq that was allegedly drafted by the puppet Interim Government of Iraq under the impetus of the United States government. Article 43 of the 1907 Hague Regulations on land warfare flatly prohibits the change in a basic law such as a state's Constitution during the course of a belligerent occupation: "The authority of the legitimate power having in fact passed into the hands of the occupant, the latter shall take all the measures in his power to restore, and ensure as far as possible, public order and safety, while respecting, unless absolutely prevented, the laws in force in the country." This exact same prohibition has been expressly incorporated in haec verba into paragraph 363 of U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956). To the contrary, the United States has demonstrated gross disrespect toward every law in Iraq that has stood in the way of its imperial designs and petroleum ambitions, including and especially the pre-invasion 1990 Interim Constitution for the Republic of Iraq.
Most recently, to the same effect is U.N. Security Council Resolution 1637 of 9 November 2005, which extends the foreign military occupation of Iraq until 31 December 2006 but expressly subject to Annex II thereof setting forth a 29 October 2005 letter by U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to the President of the Security Council guaranteeing that: "The forces that make up the MNF will remain committed to acting consistently with their obligations under international law, including the law of armed conflict." Thereunder, the new Iraqi government that will be installed after the self-styled elections of 15 December 2005 will still remain a puppet government according to the laws of war.
As for any subsequent Security Council Resolutions, the United Nations Security Council has no power or authority to alter one iota of the laws of war since they are peremptory norms of international law. For the Security Council even to purport to authorize U.S. violations of the laws of war in Iraq would render its so-voting Member States aiders and abettors to U.S. war crimes and thus guilty of committing war crimes in their own right. Any Security Council attempt to condone, authorize, or approve violations of the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, the 1907 Hague Regulations, the humanitarian provisions of Additional Protocol I of 1977 to the Four Geneva Conventions of 1949, and the customary international laws of war by the United States and the United Kingdom in Iraq would be ultra vires, a legal nullity, and void ab initio.
In fact, the United Nations Organization itself has become complicit in U.S. and U.K. international crimes in Iraq in violation of the customary international laws of war set forth in paragraph 500 of U.S. Army Field Manual 27-10 (1956): ". . . complicity in the commission of, crimes against peace, crimes against humanity, and war crimes are punishable." The United Nations Organization is walking down the path of the League of Nations toward Trotsky's "ashcan" of history. And George Bush Jr. and Tony Blair are heading towards their own Judgment at Nuremberg, whose sixtieth anniversary the rest of the world gratefully but wistfully commemorates this year. Never again!

12/22/2005
CONTRACTS from the United States Department of Defense
McDonnell Douglas Corp.,St. Louis, Mo., is being awarded a $995,000,000 firm-fixed-price requirements performance based logistics contract for performance based logistics support for the F/A-18E/F aircraft. This contract includes one five-year base period, with an additional five-year option period, which, if exercised, will bring the total estimated value of the contract to $2,900,000,000. Work will be performed in St. Louis, Mo., and is to be completed by September 2010. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. This contract was not competitively procured. The Naval Inventory Control Point is the contracting activity (N00383-06-D-0001J).
Raytheon Co., Tucson, Ariz., is being awarded a $152,454,637 firm fixed price modification to previously awarded contract N00024-05-C-5482, to procure 198 (ea) Evolved SEASPARROW Missiles (ESSM), 59 (ea) shipping containers and spares for the NATO SEASPARROW Consortium. This modification procures ESSMs for Germany, Greece, Norway, Spain, The Netherlands, Norway, and the United States. The NATO SEASPARROW consortium, which includes the United States and 9 other countries, will fund the effort. Work will be performed in Tucson, Ariz. (38 percent); Andover, Mass. (10 percent); Camden, Ark. (5 percent); Minneapolis, Minn. (1 percent); Camden, Australia (13 percent); Canada (7 percent); Germany (7 percent); Norway (7 percent); The Netherlands (6 percent); Spain (3 percent); Denmark (1 percent); Greece (1 percent); and Turkey (1 percent), and is expected to be completed by October 2008. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. The Naval Sea Systems Command, Washington, D.C. , is the contracting activity.

12/22/2005
MPRI INC. AWARDED CONTRACT FOR OPERATION AND MAINTENANCE
IPR Strategic Business Information Database December 22, 2005
MPRI Inc., Alexandria, Va., was awarded on Dec. 13, 2005, an $ 8,773,871 modification to a firm-fixed-price contract for Operation and Maintenance of the Butler Military Artillery Range. Work will be performed in Baghdad, Iraq, and is expected to be completed by Dec. 31, 2006. Contract funds will not expire at the end of the current fiscal year. There were an unknown number of bids solicited via the World Wide Web on Dec. 11, 2004, and three bids were received. The Victory Contracting Office, Baghdad, Iraq, is the contracting activity (W27P4C-05-C-0796).

12/22/2005

Top