More Evidence Indicts U.S.

Inter Press Service
Dahr Jamail

ISTANBUL, Jun 27 (IPS) - New evidence on U.S. war crimes and violations
of international law was presented at the concluding session of the
World Tribunal on Iraq at hearings in Istanbul Sunday.

The World Tribunal on Iraq (WTI) is a 'peoples' court' set up by
academics, human rights campaigners and non-governmental organisations
to take an independent look at the Iraq record of the United States and
other occupying powers such as Britain. The tribunal was inspired by the
Russel Tribunal of the Vietnam war days.

The three-day tribunal, the 21st in a series of meetings held over the
last two years, was held against a background of another spurt of
violence that left 41 people dead in bombings Sunday. The dead included
four U.S. soldiers, three of them women.

The tribunal says it derives its legitimacy from the fact that a war of
aggression was launched on Iraq ”despite the opposition of people and
governments all over the world.” It adds: ”However, there is no court or
authority that will judge the acts of the U.S. and its allies. If the
official authorities fail, then authority derived from universal morals
and human rights principles can speak for the world.”

The last sitting took place before a 'jury of conscience' that included
author Arundhati Roy and Francois Houtart who participated in the
Bertrand Russell War Crimes Tribunal on U.S. Crimes in Vietnam. In all
54 persons gave testimony on several aspects of the invasion and the
occupation of Iraq.

”The assault on Iraq is an assault on all of us: on our dignity, our
intelligence, and our future,” Roy said at the hearings.. ”We recognise
that the judgment of the World Tribunal on Iraq is not binding in
international law. However, our ambitions far surpass that. The World
Tribunal on Iraq places its faith in the consciences of millions of
people across the world who do not wish to stand by and watch while the
people of Iraq are being slaughtered, subjugated, and humiliated.”

Denis Halliday, former assistant secretary-general of the United Nations
who resigned in protest against sanctions on Iraq said during his
testimony that ”the UN silently accepted the totally illegal no-fly zone
bombing by the U.S../UK of Iraq culminating in softening up attacks
preliminary to the unlawful invasion of 2003.”

Halliday said that ”by these various means, the UN has itself destroyed
the basic human rights of the Iraqi people through the wilful neglect of
Articles 22-28 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The UN
failed to protect and safeguard the children and people before and after
the 2003 invasion.”

Thomas Fasy, associate professor of pathology at the Mount Sinai School
of Medicine in New York, provided evidence of a seven-fold increase in
congenital malformations of Iraqi babies from 1990-2001.

Fasy also testified that childhood cancers and leukemia in children
below five in the Basra governorate increased 26-fold over 1990-2002.

Fadhil Al Bedrani, a BBC and Reuters journalist who was in Fallujah
during the November siege, provided evidence of collective punishment of
civilians by U.S. forces.

Iraqi women's rights supporter Hana Ibrahim said women suffer 90 percent
unemployment, and are often the victims of rape, lawlessness, forced
prostitution and kidnappings.

”From the day that the occupation started in Iraq there was a systematic
violation of women and their rights,” she said.

Herbert Docena, researcher with the group 'Focus on the Global South'
who has studied Iraq's reconstruction and political transition pointed
to the economic and political forces behind the invasion and occupation
of Iraq.

”As early as February 2003, the U.S. had finished drafting what the Wall
Street Journal called 'sweeping plans to remake Iraq's economy in the
US's image',” Docena said. ”Just as the U.S. bombed out and physically
obliterated almost all of Iraq's ministries, the plan entails the repeal
of almost all of its current laws and the dismantling of its existing
institutions, except those that already fit in with the U.S. design.”

The jury in its ruling ”recognised the right of the Iraqi people to
resist the illegal occupation of their country.”

It recommended ”immediate, unconditional withdrawal of all occupation
forces” and called on ”the governments of the coalition to pay full
compensation to Iraqis for any and all damages, and that all laws,
contracts, treaties and institutions created under the occupation that
Iraqi people deem harmful or un-useful to them be banished.”

Other recommendations included immediate investigation of crimes against
humanity by U.S. President George W. Bush, British Prime Minister Tony
Blair, and every other president of countries belonging to the coalition.

In addition, the jury called for a process of accountability to bring to
justice journalists and media outlets that lied and promoted the
violence against Iraq, as well as corporations who have profited from
the war.

** Dahr Jamail's Iraq Dispatches **
** http://dahrjamailiraq.com/ **