Private Contractors Who Torture

[seemslikeadream]

But what of the civilian contractors who worked hand in glove with the military at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison? Will the atrocities they committed be, at most, bad for their careers - a source of negative letters in their employment files? Or will the civilians who shared responsibility for the criminal abuse meted out to detainees at Abu Ghraib be tried, convicted, and sent to prison?

To facilitate its outsourcing of the business of war, the Pentagon has extended generous legal protection to civilian contractors in Iraq. Under a June 2003 order of the Coalition Provisional Authority, civilian contractors are protected from prosecution in Iraq for crimes committed as part of their official duties. (The exact, though convoluted, language is: "acts performed by them within their official activities pursuant to the terms and conditions of a contract between a contractor and Coalition Forces or the CPA.")

The most serious crimes could be prosecuted under the War Crimes Act of 1996. War crimes, as defined in the law, include grave breaches of the 1949 Geneva Conventions (such as torture or inhuman treatment) and violations of the Conventions' common article 3 (such as "outrages upon personal dignity" and "humiliating and degrading treatment").

Rather than sending FBI agents to Iraq to investigate the crimes, Ashcroft has said that federal prosecutors would await the result of the Pentagon's investigation. But while military investigators may be expert in gathering evidence for court-martial proceedings, it is the FBI's job to respond to civilian crimes. In 1998, for example, after the bombing of two U.S. embassies in Africa, more than 900 FBI agents were sent on-site to investigate.

The government's lack of enthusiasm for a vigorous investigation is a worrying sign. To successfully prosecute crimes committed in Iraq would require a serious commitment of resources. Who would, for example, bring the victims to the United States to testify? And would an American jury really convict an American contractor responsible for harming a foreign - or even an enemy - detainee?

more
http://writ.news.findlaw.com/mariner/20040510.html

[saigon68]

1. MILITARY ENABLERS OF TOTURE

MEYERS AS OFFENSIVE LINEMAN FOR NEOCON CORPORATIONS



WITHOUT A STRONG LAPDOG RUNNING INTERFERENCE
THERE WOULD BE NO BROWN AND ROOT RECEIVING BILLIONS
Of TAXPAYER $$$$$ TO “RECONSTRUCT IRAQ”




There would be no BLACKWATER USA to have its private MERCENARY ARMY flying its
own PRIVATE MERCENARY AIR FORCE




to do WHATEVER under the sun it does..




THERE WOULD BE NO MERCENARY THUGS ACTING LIKE RAMBO WITHOUT THIS
PATHETIC LITTLE MAN

[seemslikeadream]

7. Partners in Crime

U.S. President George W. Bush said if the prisoners are not treated humanely as is required by the Geneva Convention they will dealt with harshly.

"If not, the people who mistreat the prisoners will be

treated as war criminals," he said Sunday morning.

[gottaB]

2. interesting perspective

but check this out:

Section 2441. War crimes

• (a) Offense. - Whoever, whether inside or outside the United States, commits a war crime, in any of the circumstances described in subsection (b), shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death.
  
• (b) Circumstances. - The circumstances referred to in subsection (a) are that the person committing such war crime or the victim of such war crime is a member of the Armed Forces of the United States or a national of the United States (as defined in section 101 of the Immigration and Nationality Act).
  
• (c) Definition. - As used in this section the term ''war crime'' means any conduct -
  
  • (1) defined as a grave breach in any of the international conventions signed at Geneva 12 August 1949, or any protocol to such convention to which the United States is a party;
    
  • (2) prohibited by Article 23, 25, 27, or 28 of the Annex to the Hague Convention IV, Respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land, signed 18 October 1907;
    
  • (3) which constitutes a violation of common Article 3 of the international conventions signed at Geneva, 12 August 1949, or any protocol to such convention to which the United States is a party and which deals with non-international armed conflict; or
    
  • (4) of a person who, in relation to an armed conflict and contrary to the provisions of the Protocol on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Mines, Booby-Traps and Other Devices as amended at Geneva on 3 May 1996 (Protocol II as amended on 3 May 1996), when the United States is a party to such Protocol, willfully kills or causes serious injury to civilians.
    

IMCnO (In my Conspiracy Nut Opinion) the whole system put together under the umbrella of "transformation" (PNAC buzzword) was designed to circumvent US laws, and dollars to donuts the most egregious offenses are being perpetrated by the Pinochetans and the boys from RENAMO, under orders from US commanders or agents, you betcha, but not beholden to US law. See my fledgling case against Thomas White, Enron, Seditious Conspiracy, Abu Ghraib.

Anyway, if they ever suspected that Ashcroft would try to prosecute the real bad guys, they never would have allowed him in.

[Tellurian]

26. Well then, doesn't someone have to fight for Jurisdiction to relieve Ass-

croft of this tedious investigation?

[Kagemusha]

3. If they charge these men with war crimes,

they will attempt to have Rumsfeld testify on their behalf, restating his contempt for the Geneva Conventions in an unconventional war.

In the multiple senses of 'unconventional'.

[izzie]

4. Their is something in the Geneva Convention I think.

I did also hear that Congress made laws to take these people under their wing. Looks to me it is going to be a job as they look like retired Gen who own these corp and they all have their hands in the pie plus money goes to RNC. I do believe it will take us years to sort out the looting of the tax payers on all this. Top of that I guess these corp also have been really treating their Indian workers like shit. Question? Did we sign on to the Geneva Convention? I have heard both said in the last few days. I think these people are mixing it up with this law on service men over seas, that we have backed out of or not signed at all.

[LagaLover]

5. We are signatories to the Geneva Conventions. N/T

[seemslikeadream]

8. The United States also signed the Santiago Treaty

but that didn't stop bush from aiding the coup in Haiti

[LagaLover]

9. I wasn't commenting on our ability/inability

to abide by signed treaties. Nor was I commenting on perceptions of who does/does not violate a treaty. I was merely stating that we are signatories to the GCs. :-)

[0007]

11. Who are "We"?

You may speak for yourself but not for everyone.

[LagaLover]

12. Sorry, this is a board based in the US

The "we" refers to the US. The treaty binds the entire country; so in this case, I MAY speak for everyone.

[0007]

14. Please inform the Secretary of Defense

[LagaLover]

15. Has he said we are not signatories of the GCs?

I must admit I have never heard Powell say that.

[0007]

23. My bad - correction

[seemslikeadream]

16. Let them know about these guys while you're at it

*

Erinys is an international Security Services



Erinys is an international Security Services and Risk consultancy. We provide clients with a range of services and capabilities to reduce the impact of operating in volatile, uncertain or complex environments such as sub-saharan Africa and the Middle East.

Formed in 2001 by senior managers and executives of the security & risk management industry our combination of skills and experience has enabled Erinys to rapidly establish a pre-eminent reputation in its field. A reputation exemplified by a client list representative of some of the world's largest and most important corporations.




Apartheid Enforcers Guard Iraq For the U.S.

By Marc Perelman

02/21/04: (The Forward) In its effort to relieve overstretched U.S. troops in Iraq, the Bush administration has hired a private security company staffed with former henchmen of South Africa’s apartheid regime.

The reliance on apartheid enforcers was highlighted by an attack in Iraq last month that killed one South African security officer and wounded another who worked for the subsidiary of a firm called Erinys International. Both men once served in South African paramilitary units dedicated to the violent repression of apartheid opponents.

François Strydom, who was killed in the January 28 bombing of a hotel in Baghdad, was a former member of the Koevoet, a notoriously brutal counterinsurgency arm of the South African military that operated in Namibia during the neighboring state’s fight for independence in the 1980s. His colleague Deon Gouws, who was injured in the attack, is a former officer of the Vlakplaas, a secret police unit in South Africa.

“It is just a horrible thought that such people are working for the Americans in Iraq,” said Richard Goldstone, a recently retired justice of the Constitutional Court of South Africa and former chief prosecutor of the United Nations International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda.

The Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq and the Pentagon did not return requests for comment.
In Iraq, the U.S. government has tapped into the ever-growing pool of private security companies to provide a variety of defense services, including protecting oil sites and training Iraqi forces. Observers worry that a reliance on these companies and the resulting lack of accountability is a recipe for further problems in a volatile region.

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article5723.htm

Guarding a Vital Asset
Are Iraqis ready to protect their valuable, vulnerable oil?By Joe Cochrane
Newsweek InternationalFeb. 16 issue - It might be a stretch to call Ali and Muhammad the guardians of Iraq's future. Pulling guard duty recently in the rain-soaked northern town of Kirkuk, home of one of the world's largest oilfields, the two men sport mismatched uniforms and clutch rusty AK-47s. But looks are deceiving. Faced with continuing attacks by anti-U.S. insurgents and, according to some, insufficient ground troops to stop them, the U.S. military is counting on Ali and Muhammad (not their real names) and thousands of other private guards to protect Iraq's vast oil infrastructure. The task is daunting: dozens of oilfields, refineries and pumping stations, along with thousands of kilometers of pipeline that crisscross Iraq, are prime targets for insurgents bent on denying the U.S.-led occupying force money for long-term reconstruction. They also hope to exacerbate ongoing fuel shortages in hopes of further enraging a population already angered by long queues for petrol and kerosene. "Production at the refineries is already down 40 to 50 percent," says Asim Jihad, a spokesman for Iraq's Oil Ministry, "so any attacks seriously affect the flow of oil for export and our ability to provide things for the people."

advertisement

The vast majority of the attacks around the country each day are directed at U.S. troops and the Iraqis who support them, including the Feb. 1 bombing in Arbil that killed 100 Kurds and wounded 247 more. Similar strikes at targets like the Kirkuk fields or Daura oil refinery in Baghdad could seriously disrupt production and oil exports, and have major implications for Iraq's recovery. "One attack could be catastrophic to the oil industry," says Col. Tom O'Donnell, commander of Task Force Shield, which oversees the security of Iraq's oil infrastructure. Anti-U.S. fighters have launched at least 100 attacks against the oil infrastructure since Baghdad fell, including two last fall on a northern pipeline route that halted crude-oil exports to Turkey. The Coalition has been forced to buy oil products from neighboring countries to meet domestic needs.

U.S. war planners gave high priority to seizing Iraq's northern and southern oilfields before Saddam Hussein could sabotage them. But after major combat operations ended, manpower was shifted elsewhere, leaving the oil industry dangerously exposed. To protect its infrastructure, last September the Pentagon awarded a $40 million contract to Erinys International, a private, Britain-based security firm. In only four months Erinys has trained, armed and deployed more than 9,000 Iraqi guards across the country, and plans to expand its force to nearly 15,000 in the coming months. The U.S. military also struck deals with tribal leaders to provide an additional 5,000 guards in their areas.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4208603 /


South African mercenary question in Iraq

Is Iraq a zone of conflict? A war zone? Or is it a peace-building situation? On the answer to these questions rests the fate of more than 1,500 South Africans now working in Iraq.
Among them are some of the known assassins and torturers from the apartheid era. Most have been recruited as bodyguards, security consultants or security guards at salaries ranging up to $10,000 a month.
The issue came to a head after the bombing of the Shaheen hotel in Baghdad earlier this month, which South African Frans Strydom died and another South African, Deon Gouws, was seriously injured.
Gouws, a former policeman, was linked to the notorious South African Vlakplaas death squad.
The murderous activities of Vlakplaas were exposed when its commander, Colonel
Eugene de Kock, gave full details of the unit. Gouws and others associated with it were exposed and applied for amnesty to South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).
The TRC granted amnesty to Gouws for at least 15 murders and the petrol bombings of the homes of between 40 and 60 anti-apartheid activists. He was discharged from the police force in 1996 as medically unfit and apparently had difficulty finding or settling down to another job.
Strydom was a former warrant officer in the Koevoet (‘Crowbar’) counterinsurgency unit that achieved notoriety for being paid bounties for the bodies of ‘terrorists’ in Namibia. They conducted a reign of terror in the northern parts of that country in the years before independence.
The backgrounds of these men are not yet widely known in Iraq, let alone the wider region. But those officials who have become aware expressed shock and anger that such ‘mercenaries’ could have been recruited.
As this information spreads and undoubtedly becomes embellished, there is likely to be a backlash against private security companies operating in Iraq.

http://www.muslimnews.co.uk/paper/index.php?article=1497




Johannesburg - Francois Strydom learnt about killing in the Koevoet, the apartheid-era paramilitary police unit, notorious for violence, torture and murder.

In Iraq, Strydom found his skills were in demand.

Employed by US-based firm SAS International, Strydom was one of a number of South Africans in Iraq working as private "security experts" before a January 28 bomb outside the Shaheen Hotel prematurely terminated his contract.

The aftermath of the blast sent shockwaves through the media, as Strydom"s death revealed an embarrassing situation. It was estimated that 1 500 former soldiers and policemen were operating in Iraq, in defiance of stringent legislation forbidding the practice.

It emerged that the men make up along with US and British personnel the largest contingent of commercial "military service providers" on the ground in Iraq.

Most are said to be members of former elite units, disbanded following the end of apartheid, their members suddenly finding themselves unemployed, their skills no longer required.

http://www.africancrisis.org/ZZZ/ZZZ_News_2085.ASP

[0007]

18. Mercenaries don't go by no stinking law, do they?

Thanks for the links

[seemslikeadream]

22. Just fighting for truth and justice and the law

[seemslikeadream]

13. I was just commenting that treaties mean nothing to bush

23 April 2004 at 09:28


CLOSE PROTECTION? THE SHADOWY WORLD OF PRIVATE MILITARY COMPANIES


They travel in armoured SUVs, ostentatiously carrying powerful weapons - assault rifles, sidearms, grenades - and they shoot and arrest people just as the soldiers do but minus the uniform and legal status. They're paid around $1,000 a day, considerably more than the regular soldiers or police officers which they used to be, work six weeks on and three off with paid flights home at the end of each tour. The advantage for the US is that their deaths and injuries don't show up on the figures for troop casualties. They are the bodyguards.

Jo Wilding said it best in her piece on the incident when four 'contractors' were killed, sparking off the siege of Falluja by US Marines.

"We arrived back just after the incident in Falluja where the contractors were shot, burnt, mutilated and dragged through the streets. The scenes themselves, on satellite TV in a friend's house, were shocking, all the more so because the dead men were described as civilians.

But what if they were soldiers, armed men who signed up for war and were paid to fight it? They were shot dead in an ambush - what was done to their bodies afterwards was distressing no matter what, but if they were soldiers, they were killed in action. The truth of course is that they were somewhere in between, mercenaries from US firm Blackwater Security, given a contract by USAID to protect contractors".



And it's not just the US government engaging the services of these private armies, operating on the very edges of legality in the shadowy world of close protection. Britain's own Foreign and Commonwealth Office employs civilian close protection officers from UK firm Control Risks Group amongst others to look after its staff and secondees deployed to Iraq. Global Risk International, another British private military contractor has had as many as 1,200 of its personnel in Iraq making it effectively the sixth-largest contributor to the Coaliton Forces. Most of its uniformed troops are either Nepalese Gurkhas or demobilised Fijian soldiers.

I must admit, I hadn't given the concpet of being provided with my own close protection team a great deal of thought prior to my arrival in Baghdad, other than pondering on the motivations of someone who felt their life, should it come to it, was worth less than mine. After all, as a last resort, a bodyguard's role is to protect his principal's life with his own. And in the strange reality that is life within the Green Zone, I soon got used to the men who, looking like extras straight from central casting, arrived at my accommodation each morning to escort me through Baghdad to wherever my assignments took me. It was only later, upon my return that I paused to consider the deeper implications - both legal and moral - of governments using hired guns.

With soldiers still having to battle insurgents and defend themselves, the job of protecting everyone else in Iraq - from journalists like myself, engineers and those involevd in the country's reconstruction to government contractors to the US' head of the CPA, L. Paul Bremer - is largely being done by private security companies. It's believed that as many as 30,000 former soldiers, special forces personel, police officers - and anyone else with the right skills - are working for private security firms in Iraq. With Blackwater charging its clients between $1,500 and $2,000 per day for each close protection officer - and even I attracted a team of four, plus two two armoured SUVs for each excursion - it's clearly a lucrative business.

[0007]

10. Accordingly, Rumsfeld made statements contrary to your point

about the Geneva Convention and it's laws pertaining to the fiasco in Iraq.

[LagaLover]

17. My point is a factual one and VERY specific

The US is a signatory to the Geneva Conventions. Period.

Has Rummy said we have NOT signatories? If so, show me where he said that we have not signed on to the GCs.

[seemslikeadream]

19. What difference does it make?

But our list of Rumsfeld's crimes is just beginning. Fast-forward from 1983 to the war in Afghanistan, which began shortly after 09-11. We took lots of prisoners. We could have respected their rights according to the Geneva Convention, to which the U.S. was an enthusiastic signatory. But no-o-o-o-o-o! Instead Rumsfeld and his cronies invented a fantasy name for the people captured, "Illegal Enemy Combatant." All were paraded before television cameras, bound, shackled, hooded, tied, humiliated. Some were then spirited off to "Camp X-Ray" in Cuba, there to be held under inhumane conditions, with no contact with lawyers, family, or indeed, any other human being in the world. Others were held in Afghanistan, where we know they have been subjected to torture while in U.S. control; two recently died and their official death reports specify "blunt force trauma" as the cause.

It would have cost us little to make a big show of adhering to the Geneva Convention. True, we would have had to let some people go, people for whom we could provide no evidence whatever of any guilt whatsoever. Uhhh, what's wrong with that, again? How does that cost us? Instead, we're locking up an endless number of people, many of whom are in all likelihood completely innocent of any crime. And what's that gaining us, again? Other than another sink-hole for that unending stream of tax dollars I'm expected to provide each year? And another ratcheting up of the anger of the world against us?

But Rumsfeld and Company decided that the United States is SO strong we'd just tell the rest of the world to f*** off. We're holding these people; we're calling them "enemy combatants", and we're NOT going to adhere to the Geneva Convention. None of you piss ants can stop us!

[0007]

20. Your trying to mix oil and water now

Everyone knows that the United States of America is a signed member of the Geneva Convention.

The Iraq fiasco is not a war!!

hasta la vista young lady.

[LagaLover]

21. That was my only point. I was responding to a question

that asked if we had signed the GCs. My answer to that question was yes. That is all. You veered off into a totally different direction.

Don't call me "young lady." That is condescending and sexist.

[0007]

25. Sorry!!

Have a nice day kid

[leftchick]

27. LOL...

good one... :)

[izzie]

6. Well we know where all those crazies who 'played' at war on.......

week-ends went now. Been wondering why we have not heard from them. Bring out the paint balls the crazies and KKK rides to night, with new name and uniform. I would not be shocked to find a cross on their uniforms. It is like living in a Dr. Stranglove movie. My God the water is not safe, I need a bottle of gin to drink. Oh well John Paul AKA Jones went to sea with barrels of rum.

[UpInArms]

24. UPI editorial - an astounding read

http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=20040510-075105-6834r

excerpt:

What happened to the four guys in Fallujah is indeed horrible. I have written about it dozens of times, and so have others. But let's rewind the tape a bit and try and look at the unfolding of events as objectively as possible. I stress the word objectively, so if for the duration of this message, you can suspend your political affiliations and beliefs and please bear with me.

First of all, let me restate that no one -- including the Bush administration's staunchest opponents -- supports the heinous crimes that took place in Fallujah. It was horrible, and no one deserves to die this way. But as we later found out, the Fallujah four were armed "civilian contractors." In other wars such people were called mercenaries. We have become a more politically correct society, and the word mercenary has been sidelined for the more sociably acceptable "civilian contractor." But they are one and the same.

In the African wars of the 1950s and 60s, mercenaries were often hacked to death when caught by the "other side." Again, please understand that I do not condone such actions, but I am simply trying to place things in context.

There are roughly 20,000 armed mercenaries working in Iraq (correct, this is not a typo, 20,000). I say "roughly," because no one -- neither the Pentagon nor the Coalition Provisional Authority -- knows exactly how many mercenaries are operating in Iraq, nor can they tell us whom many of these people answer to. The reason there are so many armed mercenaries in Iraq is because Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, acting against the advice of many of his generals, has reduced the size of the U.S. military to the point where they are forced to hire outside help to maintain the occupation of Iraq and to function adequately.

...more...

The Moonie-owed UPI?