Arabic edition of War Crimes Report published: English edition also here

Download Arabic edition here. - PDF

Download English edition here.-PDF

Please download, print and distribute these reports and forward these links.

A message from Sunny Miller, Traprock’s Executive Director:

“Some may be concerned that translating these realities into Arabic will increase hostilities. In fact people in Iraq know these things and our admitting to them and objecting to them with transparency can increase understanding. Most importantly, addressing these wrongs through legal and nonviolent action increases hope that one day soon the corporate plunder and military mayhem will end! Soldiers can return to their sworn duty to uphold the constitution, rather submit to illegal orders. In the wake of Martin Luther King’s birthday I have to speak truth to power. I urge you to print the War Crimes Report and take it with you. It’s our duty to all the children of this Earth. When we recognize reality, we can begin to change it. Veterans, parents, students, teachers, doctors, nurses, … all of us are needed to right these wrongs!”

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

JANUARY 17, 2006

CONTACTS: Nick Mottern, Director of Consumers for Peace
914.806.6179; nickmottern@earthlink.net
Karen Parker, President of Association of Humanitarian Lawyers
415.533.1066; ied@igc.org

“U.S. War Crimes in Iraq and Mechanisms for Accountability” - published on October 11, 2006 by ten organizations concurrently, has now been translated into Arabic. The report is now fully accessible by Iraqis and other Arabic speakers in the Middle East.

“We are making ‘U.S. War Crimes in Iraq and Mechanisms for Accountability’ available in Arabic because we want to increase its accessibilty to the people of Iraq so that they may have knowledge of the scope and illegality of certain U.S. conduct there,” said Nick Mottern, Director of ConsumersforPeace.org. “We hope that this will assist the Iraqi people in preventing further war crimes and in getting reparations for what has been done.”

We thank Dahr Jamail for coordinating the translation, which includes all references in his extensively researched report.

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The English language edition had been prepared by Consumers for Peace -
http://www.consumersforpeace.org - with the advice of Karen Parker, noted lawyer in human rights and humanitarian law. Ms. Parker is President of the San-Francisco-based Association of Humanitarian Lawyers and Chief Delegate to the United Nations for the Los Angeles-based International Educational Development/Humanitarian Law Project (IED/AHL), an accredited non-governmental organization on the U.N. Secretary-General’s list.

Endorsements from the forward:
Howard Zinn, a historian, playwright, and social activist, is perhaps best known for A People’s History of the United States, which presents American history through the eyes of those he feels are outside of the political and economic establishment. He writes:

This report on the war crimes of the current administration is an invaluable resource, with a meticulous presentation of the evidence and an astute examination of international law.

Kathy Kelly, co-coordinator of Voices for Creative Non-Violence and three-time Noble Peace Prize nominee, has visited Iraq 28 times in the last 15 years. She writes:

“After spending four days in the fortified and secure Green Zone, in Iraq, during September ’06, former Secretary of State James Baker III assured that the investigative panel he led had not spent any time “wringing our hands over what mistakes might or might not have been created in the past.” (NYT, September 20, 2006). The “Consumers for Peace” report on war crimes committed in Iraq helps us understand our responsibility not to wring our hands but rather to demand accountability from elected representatives by delivering this report to them and to local media. How many people killed? How many families torn apart? How many homes destroyed? How many livelihoods gone? How many lives ruined? How many cities sacrificed? We bear responsibility to end the war in Iraq, insist on just reparations for suffering caused, and promote careful, legal scrutiny of the crimes committed. This report beckons all who read it to stop collaborating with illegal, immoral warmongers who recklessly afflict Iraq.”

Dahr Jamail, noted independent journalist who spent more than eight months reporting from occupied Iraq, writes the following about the report:

“I cannot endorse strongly enough this report prepared by Karen Parker regarding U.S. war crimes in Iraq. Having witnessed much of what is so well documented in this report, it is a clear and encompassing indictment of the Bush Administration for the war crimes they are directly responsible for in Iraq. Until evidence such as this begins to see the light of day in a court of law and the perpetrators brought to justice, the world remains unsafe and unstable from an administration determined to rule the world. After witnessing what they are capable of in Iraq, I have no doubt these people will not stop in their quest for world domination. Instead, they must be stopped. And the only way to do that is bring the guilty to justice. This document will help achieve that goal.”

Neil MacKay, multi-award winning Home Affairs and Investigations Editor of the Sunday Herald (Scotland), writes:

“What has happened in Iraq is a great sin and a great crime. The invasion and occupation have stained the concepts of democracy, freedom and liberty; and disgraced the good name of the people of both the United States of America and Great Britain. As a journalist who has investigated the roots of this war, and the on-going horror of what is happening in Iraq, I fully commend this report to readers. It is an important reminder of the blood which is on the hands of our leaders, and the shame that the governments of the UK and the USA have brought to the British and American people by perpetrating a criminal war in our name.”

Ann Wright, 29 year US Army veteran who retired as a Colonel and US diplomat who resigned in March, 2003 in opposition to the war in Iraq commented on the War Crimes Report:

“While in the US Army at Ft Bragg, NC, I taught to US military officers and non-commissioned officers the responsibilities of military forces under the Geneva Convention and the Law of Land Warfare, as well as the obligations of an Occupying Power.

The War Crimes Report is an extraordinarily comprehensive and important presentation of international law that governs the conduct of nations and their military forces. The Report documents the blatant violations of international and domestic law by the Bush administration and US military forces including the use of illegal military tactics and illegal weapons.

Because of a huge media failure in the United States, many Americans do not realize how many times the Bush administration has violated international law. But, the rest of the world knows very well the extent of these crimes.

As a retired military officer, I know that accountability is one of the foundation elements of the US military. The Bush administration has undercut the professionalism of our military forces by encouraging and condoning the violation of international and domestic war in treatment of detainees, torture and use of illegal tactics and weapons. For the sake of our own military we must demand accountability from civilian leaders, as well as our military forces. This report provides specific mechanisms for much-needed accountability of criminal behaviour by Bush administration policy makers and by US military forces.”

Charles Jenks, human rights attorney (1981), Past President of Traprock Peace Center (1998-2005) and Chair of its Advisory Board, and consultant to Consumers for Peace writes:
This war crimes report accurately and succinctly states the case that US officials in the Executive Branch and military have committed grievous war crimes in Iraq. Of course, this is not to say that US culpability stops at the Executive Branch and military. It was the US Congress that authorized the Bush Administration to go to war against Iraq and that has funded the war through every request made by the Executive Branch.

In addition to the fact that this was an illegal war to begin with, the war has been conducted in myriad ways that violate international humanitarian law, including the use of uranium munitions, chemical weapons (white phosphorus), cluster bombs, torture, the indiscriminate killing of civilians and laying waste to cities and the land.

No treatment of crimes, criminals or atrocities could completely describe the wrongs of this tragic conflict. This war crimes report strikes a balance. It manages to be concise at 37 pages, yet has sufficient scope, factual detail and exposition on the law to be useful in both considering the war crimes committed, and the grounds and theories of prosecution for those crimes. Further, it is a treasure trove of resources, with 120 notes and references.

Consumers for Peace
http://www.consumersforpeace.org