D_Raay
02-04-2005, 01:12 PM
http://www.uruknet.info/?p=9392
CCR Says Attorney General Designate’s Testimony before the Senate Confirms His Rolein Abu Ghraib Torture<7b>
Synopsis
CCR filed new documents on January 31, 2005, with the German Federal Prosecutor looking into war crimes charges against high-ranking U.S. officials including Donald Rumsfeld: one includes new evidence that the Fay investigation into Abu Ghraib protected Administration officials – it is a comprehensive and shocking opinion by Scott Horton, an expert on international law and the Chair of the International Law Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York. The second is a letter that details how Attorney General nominee Alberto Gonzales’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee confirms his role as complicit in the torture and abuse of detainees in Abu Ghraib and elsewhere in Iraq.
Description and Status
In a declaration filed with the prosecutor in Karlsruhe, Germany, Scott Horton, who was asked to consider whether or not the U.S. would conduct a genuine investigation up the chain of command for war crimes, unequivocally states that “…no such criminal investigation or prosecution would occur in the near future in the United States for the reason that the criminal investigative and prosecutorial functions are currently controlled by individuals who are involved in the conspiracy to commit war crimes.” One of the legal issues before the prosecutor is whether the German investigation should be dismissed or deferred so that the U.S. authorities have a chance to conduct their own investigation. The obvious answer from Horton’s affidavit is no. The impossibility of an independent and far-reaching domestic investigation of high-ranking U.S. officials coupled with the United States’ refusal to join the International Criminal Court make the German court a court of last resort.
Horton also reveals that a study he undertook of Major General George R. Fay’s investigation of the Abu Ghraib abuses (The Fay Report, spring 2004) shows that the investigation was in fact designed to cover up the role of high-ranking officials. He reports that “certain senior officials whose conduct in this affair bears close scrutiny, were explicitly ‘protected’ or ‘shielded’ by withholding information from investigators or by providing security classifications that made such investigation possible…in each case, the fact that these individuals possessed information on Rumsfeld’s involvement was essential to the decision to shield them.”
Horton cited appeals by leaders of the legal profession in the United States and by the American Bar Association for investigation and action on obvious war crimes, and noted that the Justice Department had failed to act. With the confirmation of Alberto Gonzales now looming, he states “any serious criminal investigation and prosecution would certainly involve Gonzales.”
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I thought I heard last night that Rumsfeld tried to tender his resignation twice in the last year over the Abu-Ghraib affair...hmmmm... What do you suppose Bush's response to it was? He probably told him "Don't worry about it Rummy, we're above any law, they can't make us testify under oath (see 9/11 hearings) to anything". Their brazen attitude will come back to haunt them,
hopefully in this term and not 20 years down the road when they will all be worm food anyway.
---
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4236489.stm
The US Defence Secretary has said he is considering whether to attend a conference in Germany, where he may face arrest for war crimes.
Donald Rumsfeld is due to attend a gathering of high-level defence officials and experts next week.
But he says he has not yet decided whether or not to attend the conference in the German city of Munich.
US lawyers representing Iraqis who say they were abused in US custody have filed a complaint with a German court.
'War crimes'
"It's certainly an issue. It's something that we have to take into consideration," Mr Rumsfeld said on Thursday.
"Whether I'll end up there, we'll soon know. It'll be a week and we'll find out."
There is no mention of Mr Rumsfeld's attendance on the website for the conference, which runs from 11-13 February.
In a suit filed with German federal prosecutors, the New-York based Center for Constitutional Rights accuses Mr Rumsfeld of war crimes linked to the alleged abuse of detainees at Iraq's Abu Ghraib detention centre.
US investigations into the abuse scandal have concluded that he was not directly responsible.
The complaint was filed in Germany as its laws allow war crimes and human rights violations to be prosecuted across international boundaries.
The prosecutor's office has not taken any action on the complaint, filed last November.
The conference has not always been a welcome event for Mr Rumsfeld - in 2003, German Foreign Minister, Joschka Fischer, publicly challenged Mr Rumsfeld's justifications for possible military action over Iraq, precipitating a deterioration in relations between the two nations.
CCR Says Attorney General Designate’s Testimony before the Senate Confirms His Rolein Abu Ghraib Torture<7b>
Synopsis
CCR filed new documents on January 31, 2005, with the German Federal Prosecutor looking into war crimes charges against high-ranking U.S. officials including Donald Rumsfeld: one includes new evidence that the Fay investigation into Abu Ghraib protected Administration officials – it is a comprehensive and shocking opinion by Scott Horton, an expert on international law and the Chair of the International Law Committee of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York. The second is a letter that details how Attorney General nominee Alberto Gonzales’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee confirms his role as complicit in the torture and abuse of detainees in Abu Ghraib and elsewhere in Iraq.
Description and Status
In a declaration filed with the prosecutor in Karlsruhe, Germany, Scott Horton, who was asked to consider whether or not the U.S. would conduct a genuine investigation up the chain of command for war crimes, unequivocally states that “…no such criminal investigation or prosecution would occur in the near future in the United States for the reason that the criminal investigative and prosecutorial functions are currently controlled by individuals who are involved in the conspiracy to commit war crimes.” One of the legal issues before the prosecutor is whether the German investigation should be dismissed or deferred so that the U.S. authorities have a chance to conduct their own investigation. The obvious answer from Horton’s affidavit is no. The impossibility of an independent and far-reaching domestic investigation of high-ranking U.S. officials coupled with the United States’ refusal to join the International Criminal Court make the German court a court of last resort.
Horton also reveals that a study he undertook of Major General George R. Fay’s investigation of the Abu Ghraib abuses (The Fay Report, spring 2004) shows that the investigation was in fact designed to cover up the role of high-ranking officials. He reports that “certain senior officials whose conduct in this affair bears close scrutiny, were explicitly ‘protected’ or ‘shielded’ by withholding information from investigators or by providing security classifications that made such investigation possible…in each case, the fact that these individuals possessed information on Rumsfeld’s involvement was essential to the decision to shield them.”
Horton cited appeals by leaders of the legal profession in the United States and by the American Bar Association for investigation and action on obvious war crimes, and noted that the Justice Department had failed to act. With the confirmation of Alberto Gonzales now looming, he states “any serious criminal investigation and prosecution would certainly involve Gonzales.”
-----
I thought I heard last night that Rumsfeld tried to tender his resignation twice in the last year over the Abu-Ghraib affair...hmmmm... What do you suppose Bush's response to it was? He probably told him "Don't worry about it Rummy, we're above any law, they can't make us testify under oath (see 9/11 hearings) to anything". Their brazen attitude will come back to haunt them,
hopefully in this term and not 20 years down the road when they will all be worm food anyway.
---
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4236489.stm
The US Defence Secretary has said he is considering whether to attend a conference in Germany, where he may face arrest for war crimes.
Donald Rumsfeld is due to attend a gathering of high-level defence officials and experts next week.
But he says he has not yet decided whether or not to attend the conference in the German city of Munich.
US lawyers representing Iraqis who say they were abused in US custody have filed a complaint with a German court.
'War crimes'
"It's certainly an issue. It's something that we have to take into consideration," Mr Rumsfeld said on Thursday.
"Whether I'll end up there, we'll soon know. It'll be a week and we'll find out."
There is no mention of Mr Rumsfeld's attendance on the website for the conference, which runs from 11-13 February.
In a suit filed with German federal prosecutors, the New-York based Center for Constitutional Rights accuses Mr Rumsfeld of war crimes linked to the alleged abuse of detainees at Iraq's Abu Ghraib detention centre.
US investigations into the abuse scandal have concluded that he was not directly responsible.
The complaint was filed in Germany as its laws allow war crimes and human rights violations to be prosecuted across international boundaries.
The prosecutor's office has not taken any action on the complaint, filed last November.
The conference has not always been a welcome event for Mr Rumsfeld - in 2003, German Foreign Minister, Joschka Fischer, publicly challenged Mr Rumsfeld's justifications for possible military action over Iraq, precipitating a deterioration in relations between the two nations.