"World cop" violates int'l law in Iraq
 Updated: 2004-06-07 13:48

The United States, which branded itself as "international police" and asserted that its invasion into Iraq was to bring freedom and democracy to Iraqi people, has been proven by the United Nations as conducting "serious violations of human rights and humanitarian law" in Iraq.

"Willful killing, torture or inhuman treatment ... might be designated as war crimes by a competent tribunal," said the chief UN human rights official, Bertrand Ramcharand, in his report presented to the UN Commission on Human Rights last Friday.

But, unfortunately, such acts were what US-led coalition forces have done to Iraqis since they occupied the country in early 2003.

The UN report, which based on information from Iraqi civilians and officials, governments with troops or personnel in Iraq, UN bodies, inter-governmental and non-governmental organizations as well as coalition authorities, gave a conclusion that "ordinary Iraqis did undergo deprivations in respect of basic economic and social rights."

Iraqis interviewed by the OHCHR (Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights) team in Amman illustrated many examples to voice their distress about the protection of civilians by US-led forces.

Interviewees mentioned that, though some incidents occurred in conjunction with attacks against the coalition forces, too often innocent standers-by were caught in the fighting. They argued that the coalition forces simply overreact.

Under international humanitarian law, distinctions must be made to protect civilians and civilian objects. Civilians should be treated humanely at all times. All humiliating and degrading treatment, any form of indecent assault or other outrage upon personal dignity, are strictly prohibited.

According to the UN report, however, information available indicates that very few members of coalition forces were brought to justice for excesses committed by them upon the civilian population until recently.

While to people in detention, things are even worse.

Iraqis interviewed in Amman all spoke about arbitrary arrests and detention as an ongoing phenomenon since April 2003.

Allegedly in many cases, coalition forces break front doors or windows and throw hand grenades into the room before they access the property. Searches are not conducted with care, no search or arrest warrants are being shown.

In some cases, money or jewelry found during the raid is being taken by soldiers and not being returned. In other cases, the behavior of coalition soldiers is considered humiliating, for example when leading women in their night dress outside of the house or when showing disrespect for the Koran through throwing it on the floor or tearing it apart.

Sometimes, the wife or son is being arrested when the husband or father can not be found. Children are allegedly being interrogated during such raids.

"The fact of the matter is that large numbers of people were incarcerated without it being publicly known how many, for what reasons, where they were kept, in what conditions, and how they were being treated," said the report.

One of the detainees later released said the ill-treatment which he suffered as a politician prisoner under Saddam Hussein was bad, but during his days in Abu Ghraib as a coalition forces detainee he suffered humiliation and mental cruelty in addition ton the physical torture.

The torture methods he was allegedly subjected to included pulling of teeth from his mouth (two teeth were missing), kicking, beating, guards standing on his hands and infliction of mental cruelty, such as telling him he would first be raped by guards and then sent to Guantanamo Bay, if he did not "confess."

Despite all the tortures, he replied to most of the questions with "I don't know" when a Red Cross team visited Abu Ghraib prison in January 2004, because he was warned by coalition soldiers that, if he said anything to the Red Cross visitor that the prison guards would not like, he would never live to regret it.

Even so, detainee abuses by coalition forces were eventually made public and incited rage, revulsion and condemnation from all the international community.

Any practice of torture or other cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment violates international humanitarian law and human rights standards, such as the Geneva Conventions, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.

Torture is absolutely prohibited in times of conflict as well as in times of peace, according to the international law.

While some facts have been disclosed, there are numerous questions still unanswered about control and protection under coalition forces, such as:

What were the control systems in place to safeguard against such excesses? Were acts of depravity against prisoners committed by guards acting on their own or were they part of a systematic process of information-gathering?

Though the "international police" has given its own answers, the world is still waiting for results of further investigation.

(Xinhua)

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