thedrifter
06-16-07, 06:38 AM
Iraqis face noose in U.S. attacks
By CHARLES J. HANLEY, AP Special Correspondent
Fri Jun 15, 4:29 PM ET
In a northern corner of this baking hot city, inside a broad bend of the Tigris River, dozens of men, and a few women, sit in prison cells and await a rendezvous with Baghdad's hangmen.
Although polls show many Iraqis favor attacking U.S. occupation troops, some prisoners face the death penalty for doing just that — for shooting down a U.S. helicopter, firing mortars toward the U.S. Embassy, being caught with the makings of a roadside bomb.
Human rights groups acknowledge that the Iraqi government has an inherent right to prosecute and punish those fighting to bring it down. But they deplore the way it's being done.
Hina Shamsi, a lawyer with New York-based Human Rights First, said that after Iraq reclaimed sovereignty from the U.S. occupation in 2004, the insurgency became a "non-international armed conflict." This means that under international law, Iraqi militants are considered "unprivileged belligerents ... mere criminals," not entitled to the Geneva Conventions' full prisoner-of-war protections, she explained.
Rights advocates say, however, that the death penalty law is too sweeping and Iraq's closed-door trials too perfunctory. It's part of wider campaigns by activists for greater openness in an Iraqi justice system that operates with little outside scrutiny, no easy access to records, and close but murky ties to U.S. military jailers and investigators.
Iraqi officials reject accusations that their system is too quick to convict and send suspects to the gallows.
"Sometimes people accuse the judges of being too lenient with terrorists because they're sentenced to 15 or 20 years instead of the death penalty," Busho Ibrahim, deputy justice minister, told The Associated Press.
He wouldn't discuss numbers of death sentences and executions. But the U.N. mission here reports 256 people condemned and 85 hanged between 2004 and this Feb. 25.
Updating that, a U.S. official with knowledge of the Iraqi courts said more than 100 have been executed, and 50 to 60 sit on death row in the sprawling high-security prison in Baghdad's Kazimiyah district, where ousted president Saddam Hussein was hanged Dec. 30. The remaining approximately 100 cases presumably are on automatic appeal awaiting decisions.
The U.S. official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.
Some capital cases involve ordinary homicides and kidnappings, but a steady stream of death sentences also are handed down by judges of the Central Criminal Court of Iraq for anti-U.S. attacks or planned attacks. Among those condemned, as reported by the U.S. command:
_On April 30, an Algerian who reportedly confessed he was a member of the Islamic Army in Iraq who attacked a U.S. military convoy, shot down a U.S. helicopter, and took part in an attack that killed seven U.S. Marines.
_On April 10, a "self-admitted member" of the Sunni insurgent 1920 Revolution Brigades who reportedly confessed to participating in four mortar attacks on Baghdad's Green Zone, the fortress-like enclave housing the U.S. Embassy.
_On April 4, a foreigner of undisclosed nationality reportedly captured with a suicide-bomb vest and who "admitted he was in Iraq to kill Americans."
_Throughout March, six individuals reportedly found with components or other evidence related to improvised explosive devices, the roadside bombs taking a heavy toll on U.S. troops.
Targeting U.S. troops has support among Iraqis. Western-sponsored opinion surveys the past year found that between 50 percent and 60 percent of Iraqis favored such attacks.
That doesn't legitimize the violence, said David Crane, an international criminal law specialist at New York's Syracuse University.
"If the Iraqi people rose up as one" — a "levee en masse," in legal terms — "then the Geneva Conventions would apply" and anti-U.S. resistance fighters would generally be immune from prosecution, he said.
But "this is not the case, because we have a sitting government, an elected government that is not resisting the U.S.," said Crane, a former U.S. Army lawyer who served as chief prosecutor for the U.N. war crimes tribunal in Sierra Leone.
Amnesty International and others say the theory may be fine but the practice is deeply flawed, beginning with Iraq's anti-terrorism law, which an Amnesty report said defines the crime in "broad and vague terms" as a criminal act against individuals or property designed to "instill fear, terror and panic."
No one needs to have been killed to be considered a capital crime, and mere damage of public property or affiliation with a violent group could produce a death sentence, said the April 20 report. In addition, it said, "the right to fair trial and other basic safeguards are absent."
The U.N. mission's reports have repeatedly pointed out there are too few judges in the jury-less Central Criminal Court to handle a huge caseload and ensure fair trials.
"The trials aren't fair because the judge doesn't have enough time to read or think about each case," said defense lawyer Qais Salman, who represents two women whose death sentences in kidnappings are on appeal. "The judge announces the verdict in haste, without thinking, because he has to finish 10 to 20 cases a day."
Deputy minister Salman defended the closed-door proceedings.
"The Iraqi trials are fair," he said. "The court is in conformity with regulations and principles. There are judges, defense lawyers, prosecution and an appeals court. There are cases that took as long as six months or a year."
Shamsi of Human Rights First raised some final questions: What standards does the U.S. military use in turning over detainees for Iraqi trial? What kind of evidence is there? How well can U.S. soldiers gather evidence in a war zone? What record keeping exists?
Air Force 1st Lt. Jonathan Carlo, a spokesman for the U.S. detention system, said without elaboration that transfers occur in "cases with substantial evidence."
The command did not immediately reply, however, to a query about whether the Iraqi court is providing fair trials. The United States does not routinely send observers to the Iraqi trials.
Ellie
By CHARLES J. HANLEY, AP Special Correspondent
Fri Jun 15, 4:29 PM ET
In a northern corner of this baking hot city, inside a broad bend of the Tigris River, dozens of men, and a few women, sit in prison cells and await a rendezvous with Baghdad's hangmen.
Although polls show many Iraqis favor attacking U.S. occupation troops, some prisoners face the death penalty for doing just that — for shooting down a U.S. helicopter, firing mortars toward the U.S. Embassy, being caught with the makings of a roadside bomb.
Human rights groups acknowledge that the Iraqi government has an inherent right to prosecute and punish those fighting to bring it down. But they deplore the way it's being done.
Hina Shamsi, a lawyer with New York-based Human Rights First, said that after Iraq reclaimed sovereignty from the U.S. occupation in 2004, the insurgency became a "non-international armed conflict." This means that under international law, Iraqi militants are considered "unprivileged belligerents ... mere criminals," not entitled to the Geneva Conventions' full prisoner-of-war protections, she explained.
Rights advocates say, however, that the death penalty law is too sweeping and Iraq's closed-door trials too perfunctory. It's part of wider campaigns by activists for greater openness in an Iraqi justice system that operates with little outside scrutiny, no easy access to records, and close but murky ties to U.S. military jailers and investigators.
Iraqi officials reject accusations that their system is too quick to convict and send suspects to the gallows.
"Sometimes people accuse the judges of being too lenient with terrorists because they're sentenced to 15 or 20 years instead of the death penalty," Busho Ibrahim, deputy justice minister, told The Associated Press.
He wouldn't discuss numbers of death sentences and executions. But the U.N. mission here reports 256 people condemned and 85 hanged between 2004 and this Feb. 25.
Updating that, a U.S. official with knowledge of the Iraqi courts said more than 100 have been executed, and 50 to 60 sit on death row in the sprawling high-security prison in Baghdad's Kazimiyah district, where ousted president Saddam Hussein was hanged Dec. 30. The remaining approximately 100 cases presumably are on automatic appeal awaiting decisions.
The U.S. official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.
Some capital cases involve ordinary homicides and kidnappings, but a steady stream of death sentences also are handed down by judges of the Central Criminal Court of Iraq for anti-U.S. attacks or planned attacks. Among those condemned, as reported by the U.S. command:
_On April 30, an Algerian who reportedly confessed he was a member of the Islamic Army in Iraq who attacked a U.S. military convoy, shot down a U.S. helicopter, and took part in an attack that killed seven U.S. Marines.
_On April 10, a "self-admitted member" of the Sunni insurgent 1920 Revolution Brigades who reportedly confessed to participating in four mortar attacks on Baghdad's Green Zone, the fortress-like enclave housing the U.S. Embassy.
_On April 4, a foreigner of undisclosed nationality reportedly captured with a suicide-bomb vest and who "admitted he was in Iraq to kill Americans."
_Throughout March, six individuals reportedly found with components or other evidence related to improvised explosive devices, the roadside bombs taking a heavy toll on U.S. troops.
Targeting U.S. troops has support among Iraqis. Western-sponsored opinion surveys the past year found that between 50 percent and 60 percent of Iraqis favored such attacks.
That doesn't legitimize the violence, said David Crane, an international criminal law specialist at New York's Syracuse University.
"If the Iraqi people rose up as one" — a "levee en masse," in legal terms — "then the Geneva Conventions would apply" and anti-U.S. resistance fighters would generally be immune from prosecution, he said.
But "this is not the case, because we have a sitting government, an elected government that is not resisting the U.S.," said Crane, a former U.S. Army lawyer who served as chief prosecutor for the U.N. war crimes tribunal in Sierra Leone.
Amnesty International and others say the theory may be fine but the practice is deeply flawed, beginning with Iraq's anti-terrorism law, which an Amnesty report said defines the crime in "broad and vague terms" as a criminal act against individuals or property designed to "instill fear, terror and panic."
No one needs to have been killed to be considered a capital crime, and mere damage of public property or affiliation with a violent group could produce a death sentence, said the April 20 report. In addition, it said, "the right to fair trial and other basic safeguards are absent."
The U.N. mission's reports have repeatedly pointed out there are too few judges in the jury-less Central Criminal Court to handle a huge caseload and ensure fair trials.
"The trials aren't fair because the judge doesn't have enough time to read or think about each case," said defense lawyer Qais Salman, who represents two women whose death sentences in kidnappings are on appeal. "The judge announces the verdict in haste, without thinking, because he has to finish 10 to 20 cases a day."
Deputy minister Salman defended the closed-door proceedings.
"The Iraqi trials are fair," he said. "The court is in conformity with regulations and principles. There are judges, defense lawyers, prosecution and an appeals court. There are cases that took as long as six months or a year."
Shamsi of Human Rights First raised some final questions: What standards does the U.S. military use in turning over detainees for Iraqi trial? What kind of evidence is there? How well can U.S. soldiers gather evidence in a war zone? What record keeping exists?
Air Force 1st Lt. Jonathan Carlo, a spokesman for the U.S. detention system, said without elaboration that transfers occur in "cases with substantial evidence."
The command did not immediately reply, however, to a query about whether the Iraqi court is providing fair trials. The United States does not routinely send observers to the Iraqi trials.
Ellie