Key leaders of the new Democratic Beyond investigations, there will of its origins. majority have pledged to open investigations. undoubtedly be efforts to strengthen the barriers • Congressional interest in restoring the War - TAKE HOPE IN 2007 - Incoming Senate Judiciary Committee chair to war crimes through legislation. Senator Chris Crimes Act has been substantially strengthened Patrick Leahy recently wrote in a letter to Dodd of Connecticut, a presidential candidate by the Supreme Court's forthright stand in the 2006: A Year of Living Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, "The and the son of a Nuremberg prosecutor, has Hamdan v. Rumsfeld case. Dangerously photographs and reports of prisoner abuse in introduced legislation restoring portions of the • The Senate Judiciary Committee's expected Jeremy Brecher & Brendan Smith Iraq, Guantánamo Bay and elsewhere that have War Crimes Act that were gutted by the Military investigation of "rendition" will rely on the The Nation Magazine, 12/19/06 emerged during the past two years depict an Commissions Act. work of European human rights "plane spotters" interrogation and detention system operating who uncovered the CIA's phantom jets secretly he year 2006 will be remembered as contrary to U.S. law and the Geneva Civil Society landing and taking off at their countries' one in which the American people Conventions." The American people deserve Human rights groups, from the Center for airports. and the world rose up to challenge "detailed and accurate information about the Constitutional Rights to the ACLU, have led the As the new year unfolds, there are no Tthe criminal actions and deceit of the role of the Bush Administration in developing way in challenging the legality of Bush guarantees that the Bush Administration will Bush Administration. the interrogation policies and practices that have Administration actions. Hundreds of lawyers be held accountable for its abuse of executive Despite massive evidence that top engendered such deep criticism and concern at from major corporate firms have joined the power or for the war crimes it has committed. Administration officials have been complicit in home and around the world." He has just defense of the Guantánamo captives. Religious Its war in Iraq will almost certainly continue, systematic violations of national and announced that he will establish a new Human groups have formed a National Religious despite the clear disapproval of the American international law through aggressive war, Rights and the Law Subcommittee to be headed Campaign Against Torture; an affiliated group people. But the forces of accountability are illegal occupation, rendition and detention of by Dick Durbin--memorable for his vigorous in Connecticut called Reclaiming the Prophetic assembling. Whether and when they will terror suspects without trial, secret prisons and hearing room confrontation with Alberto Voice successfully projected the issue of pierce the Bush Administration's shield torture, so far they have not been held Gonzales over torture at Abu Ghraib. prisoner abuse at Guantánamo and elsewhere depends primarily on how vigorously the accountable. Incoming Senate majority leader Harry Reid into the Congressional elections--even putting public demands it. Now a diverse array of forces is contesting told the New York Times that "the first order of up billboards on major highways identifying Bush Administration impunity for war crimes business" when Democrats take over in January those in the state's Congressional delegation ACTION: and trying to reassert the rule of law over the will be to reinvigorate Congressional scrutiny of who had voted to "allow torture" through the 1. Live in hope. Join your efforts to one of the executive branch. Each is operating in different the executive branch, with a focus on Iraq. He Military Commissions Act. efforts mentioned above. For more info on how th arenas and pursuing different kinds of told Bob Geiger, "We're going to find out how Some on the left have long called for to do so, contact 8 Day Center. accountability – from public shaming and intelligence was manipulated, taking us to war. prosecution of top US officials for war crimes, 2. For further info to issues mentioned in this political disempower- ment to international We have to look back to be able to look and charges that "war crimes are high crimes" article see the links at http://www.zmag.org/ isolation and even criminal prosecution. While forward." have been part of the campaign to impeach Bush content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=11688 all of these initiatives have been reported in the Senator Jay Rockefeller has promised to and Cheney. Similar calls are also now heard press, their convergence is one of the great complete the Senate Intelligence Committee's from the right. The libertarian Cato Institute underreported stories of 2006. For example: stalled investigation of the political misuse of report, "Power Surge: The Constitutional Record •A court in Italy will decide in January whether intelligence in the lead-up to the Iraq War. of George W. Bush," warns that we now have "a Local Contact: to try twenty-six suspected American Senator Carl Levin says he plans to investigate president who can launch wars at will, and who intelligence agents for abducting an Egyptian "extraordinary rendition." cannot be restrained from ordering the cleric off the streets of Milan. On the House side, Representative Dennis commission of war crimes, should he choose to • The US Supreme Court issued key decisions Kucinich, likely chair of the Government do so." that declared Administration actions in Reform Subcommittee on National Security, Each of these initiatives is occurring in a Guantánamo in violation of national and Emerging Threats, and International Relations, different arena, with its own protagonists, international law. has called for hearings on Iraq. The election, he strategies, targets and timetables. But striking • A US Army lieutenant refused to go to Iraq told Truthdig.com's Joshua Scheer, does not end synergies are emerging: th on the grounds that the war is illegal under US "the questions about those who led us into war • The suits against Rumsfeld and other 8 Day Center for Justice and international law and made plans to use his based on lies." When the people elected policymakers would not have been possible 312-641-5151 [email protected] court-martial to "put the war on trial." Democrats "they also voted for accountability." without the ACLU Freedom of Information Act www.8thdaycenter.org • An international team of lawyers brought a Kucinich, now a candidate for President, is not suits that revealed the role of top officials in criminal complaint in a German court alleging afraid to raise such painful issues as US setting the rules for Guantánamo and Abu that former Defense Secretary Donald responsibility for civilian deaths in Iraq; he Ghraib. Rumsfeld and eleven other top US government recently held a briefing with the authors of the • The 2005 leak in Britain of the Downing Street officials are guilty of war crimes. Lancet study that estimated 650,000 deaths Memo promoted American disillusionment with • Senator Patrick Leahy, incoming Senate under the occupation. the war and the public support for investigations Judiciary Committee chairman, said he will issue subpoenas if necessary to secure Bush crimes. The complaint utilized the recent international crime as well." It means that the government must obey the Administration documents that may have passage of the US Military Commissions Act For the first time since Vietnam, active-duty provisions of the Geneva Conventions – such authorized torture. as evidence that the Bush Administration military personnel have organized to oppose a as the ban on cruel and degrading treatment Here are some of the arenas in which intended to immunize itself from any war that they are fighting via the Appeal for and the obligation of an occupying power to accountability for Bush Administration war possibility of prosecution, even for the most Redress campaign. protect civilians. crimes is being pursued: heinous crimes. Some lower-level military personnel have The Bush Administration has vigorously Devastating testimony to an official British begun refusing to serve in Iraq on grounds that fought the Hamdan decision and its Foreign Governments inquiry from Carne Ross, Britain's key the war there violates national and international consequences. It tried to virtually nullify it The exposure of foreign governments' role in negotiator at the UN, recently released after law. Lieut. Ehren Watada, for example, with provisions slipped into the Military Bush Administration "war on terror" abuses efforts by the Foreign Office to suppress it, defends his refusal to go to Iraq on the grounds Commissions Act of 2006. It is now using has led to condemnation and legal action both reveal that the government knew that there that the Administration's invasion and those provisions to resist in court even the most against US intelligence operations and the were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq occupation was "manifestly illegal." At the minimal protections for its captives, such as governments that may have participated in and that the invasion of Iraq was illegal. Prime press conference announcing his decision, he the right to talk with their lawyers. their clandestine activities. Minister Tony Blair has yielded to pressure to said it "violates our democratic system of Interpretation of the Hamdan decision and the The German Parliament is investigating the hold a parliamentary debate on Britain's role in checks and balances. It usurps international Military Commissions Act is now being fought involvement of German intelligence services in Iraq by the end of January. treaties and conventions that by virtue of the out in the courts; for example, a federal judge the rendition of German citizen Khaled Constitution become American law." Watada just ruled in support of the MCA's ban on el-Masri, who, according to an ACLU suit in International Organizations plans to use his impending court-martial, habeas corpus appeals for Guantánamo Virginia, was illegally abducted by the CIA in While US influence has made it impossible for scheduled to begin February 5, to put the war captives but declared its effort to apply that ban Macedonia in 2003, flown to Afghanistan, the UN to act effectively against US war on trial. He argues the Administration's to legal immigrants is unconstitutional. abused at a CIA-run secret facility and dumped crimes, the international body has been an invasion and occupation of Iraq was The Bush Administration is facing a in Albania five months later. Canada has issued important forum for documenting and "manifestly illegal" because it "violates our powerful counterattack on behalf of the rule of a formal protest to the United States after an publicizing them. For example, after an democratic system of checks and balances. It law. For example, seven retired federal judges official Canadian inquiry established that a eighteen-month study, five independent experts usurps international treaties and conventions from both parties joined Guantánamo detainees Canadian citizen, Maher Arar, was seized by appointed by the UN Commission on Human that by virtue of the Constitution become in urging an appeals court to declare key parts US authorities and deported to his native Syria, Rights concluded early in 2006 that practices American law." of the Military Commissions Act where he was tortured; the case led to the currently conducted at the US prison in In a telephone news conference in unconstitutional. Similarly, a bipartisan group resignation of the head of Canada's national Guantánamo amount to torture. The November, Watada made explicit the tie of former Justice Department officials, police, Royal Canadian Mounted Police Commission's demand to close Guantánamo between his refusal to go to Iraq and the need including former Attorney General Janet Reno, Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli. In was quickly seconded by UN Secretary for official accountability: "The reason I spoke recently filed court papers rejecting the November, the European Parliament issued an General Kofi Annan. And the EU Parliament out, I saw that what was being done in terms of government's claim that it can hold putative investigative report revealing that eleven voted 80 to 1 to ask the United States to close this war was so illegal and so immoral, and not enemy combatants arrested in the United States European governments knew about secret US Guantánamo and give every prisoner "a fair being checked. It was a danger to our troops indefinitely. On December 8, Chief US District jails and that there were 1,245 suspicious CIA and public hearing by a competent, and a danger to our country. So, I think what Judge Thomas Hogan opened a hearing on flights through Europe. independent, impartial tribunal" without delay. needs to be done is some kind of accountability whether nine former prisoners at US military The rendition issue is beginning to have a in Washington and also investigations into how prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan, represented by political impact. Five days before the general US Military this war was started in the first place." lawyers from the ACLU and Human Rights election in the Netherlands in November, the Perhaps the most unexpected charges of war First, can hold Donald Rumsfeld and top campaign was rocked by news reports that crimes have come from within the military and US Legal Establishment military commanders personally responsible members of the Dutch force in Iraq had other parts of the national security In this summer's Hamdan v. Rumsfeld for torture they endured. tortured dozens of Iraqi prisoners in a US bureaucracy. Former Secretary of State Colin decision--which Duke University law professor interrogation facility; the election brought large Powell's top aide, Colonel Larry Wilkerson, Walter Dellinger calls "the most important US Congress gains to the parties of the left that had raised told CNN late last year that the United States decision on presidential power ever"--the For the last six years, the Republican- the issue. has practiced torture and that "there's no Supreme Court rebuked not only the Bush controlled Congress has been the great enabler Also in November, a complaint initiated by question in my mind where the philosophical Administration's Guantánamo tribunals but the of Bush Administration's efforts to subvert the German human rights lawyers in cooperation guidance and the flexibility in order to do so entire view of executive power the Constitution. There will likely be with the US Center for Constitutional Rights originated in the Vice President of the United Administration used to justify them. The Court investigations of Bush Administration under the doctrine of "universal jurisdiction" States' office." Asked by the BBC whether found the President's conduct illegal because it malfeasance by the incoming Democratic asked the German federal prosecutor to indict Cheney was guilty of a war crime, Wilkerson violated international treaties, specifically Congress. Just how far they are likely to go is Donald Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzales and other said the Vice President's actions were certainly Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions. unclear--and highly contested. key Bush Administration figures for war a domestic crime and, he would suspect, "an This has ramifications far beyond Guantánamo.