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The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings, Torture and Big Money |
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April 3rd,
2008 - Blackwater VP: Too Soon to Judge Baghdad Shootings |
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Blackwater VP: Too Soon to Judge
Baghdad Shootings By Claudia Parsons Reuters April 3, 2008 New York - A top official in
the U.S. private security firm Blackwater said on Thursday it was too soon to
pass judgment on the killing of 17 Iraqi civilians by its employees last
September and urged critics to await an FBI report. The company, which has 800
to 900 private security guards operating in Iraq, came under fire over the
incident at a New York University School of Law conference called
"Privatizing Defense: Blackwater, Contractors and American
Security." The Sept. 16 killings by
Blackwater security guards escorting a convoy in a central Baghdad square
enraged Iraqis who complained private security firms had operated with
impunity since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion. An FBI investigation is
under way but The New York Times has reported the bureau's agents found at
least 14 of the shootings were unjustified. It said the findings indicated
the company's employees violated deadly force rules in effect for security
contractors in Iraq. Jeremy Scahill, author of
"Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army,"
told the conference a separate military investigation concluded all the
deaths were the result of "unjustified and unprovoked fire." Asked about the incident,
Blackwater Vice President Marty Strong said, "I spent nine months in
Iraq, it's a very difficult place." "Irrespective of The
New York Times or any other newspaper saying they think they know what's
going on, the FBI is going to complete an official investigation, not one
done by the seat of the pants," said Strong, a panelist at the
conference. "At that time we're
going to find out exactly what they found out," he said, adding
Blackwater had not conducted its own investigation so he could not comment
further. "We're awaiting the
government's investigation." Accountability Several panelists at the
conference said that despite efforts by the Defense and State Departments to
improve oversight of private security contractors since the Blackwater
incident, the industry was still lacking accountability. Laura Dickinson, a professor
at the University of Connecticut Law School whose forthcoming book
"Outsourcing War and Peace" examines the privatization of military
functions, said the Blackwater incident was a warning of the dangers in the
growing use of private companies in conflict situations. "We need accountability
if we're going to continue with privatization," Dickinson said. Scott Horton, a lecturer at
Colombia Law School, faulted the Justice Department for going
"AWOL" and not taking any interest in enforcing the law. He said in
five years of war with an estimated 180,000 contractors working in Iraq,
there had been only two or three prosecutions for any offenses. "What we're seeing now
is an astonishing failure to enforce criminal law," Horton said. He said the Defense
Department had started to do more recently to hold its civilian contractors
accountable, due partly to concerns expressed by soldiers in the field that
impunity was undermining the U.S mission in Iraq. Horton said Harper's
magazine, to which he is a contributor, would be reporting this week on the
case of a Canadian contractor in Iraq who was charged in March after a brawl
involving a knife in what could be a test case for holding contractors
accountable through military justice. © Reuters 2007. All rights
reserved. External link: http://www.reuters.com/article/middleeastCrisis/idUSN03479290 |