Support this! You should be ashamed!!!!

[Blub2k]

The US and the British government have done something extremely cynical by employing civilian contractors in Iraq to circumvent the Geneva convention yet you can claim that it is only a few of them. tschah is all I say to that.

[GreenPiggy]

What does that have to do with soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners?

[Blub2k]

Because the contractors are working alongside the soldiers and have set a precedent for them to follow, I can only assume from your answer just now that you have not gone further than the headlines and actually read up on this.

[DaBeeeenster]

What does that have to do with soldiers abusing Iraqi prisoners?

Read this:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story...208259,00.html

and this thread:

http://forums.hexus.net/showthread.php?t=18802

[GreenPiggy]

I know there are US contractors in Abu Ghraib prison Blub.

If found to be involved, the individuals should not escape prosecution. Such crimes merit harsher punishment than simply the end of a good paycheque. This may require breaking new legal ground, such as testing extra-territorial standards for civilian prosecution, detention until the Iraqi legal system is well established, or even handover to the international court - but the stakes for US credibility are too high to do nothing.

Whether a US court martial or something else, the contractors and the troops will be dealt with.
It's ridiculous to say that the contractors are only over there so that they can torture people with no fear of the Geneva convention.

[GreenPiggy]

Like I said in post 16, this has happened twice. Everyone has condemned it and the authorities will deal with those responsible. Seems like a perfectly correct response to me. What is the problem here?
Sure if there are more reports of this or if the contracters go unpunished then fine, go nuts, but I just think your current "I told you so" position is incorrect.

[Blub2k]

Well you may think it is ricidulous but personally I think they are there to circumvent Geneva as I am not as trusting of the UK or US governments as you seem to be. Dont forget your government occupied this country in a dirty war for years and this is in the ha'penny place compared to what they are capable of.
The revisions are only happening since they were caught, before that they thought they would get away with it.
They have done the same with "Gitmo" bay where they are also trying to circumvent the law.

[Blub2k]

And I say this has not happened just once anyway, did you not see the pictures of the prisoners that the Brits were hanging in cargo nets???

[GreenPiggy]

The position might make sense if it was targeted abuse - eg trying to get information out of prisoners. But these pictures on the face of it just seem to be for the soldiers own amusement. Are you really saying that the governments would go to all the trouble of finding a way to circumvent the Geneva convention just to humiliate a few people.
It makes no sense, especially in an election year when Iraq is probably the defining issue.

[GreenPiggy]

And I say this has not happened just once anyway, did you not see the pictures of the prisoners that the Brits were hanging in cargo nets???

Terribly sorry, post edited. That was 11 months ago. I think 2 reports in a year is hardly evidence of systematic abuse

[DaBeeeenster]

GreenPiggy. you say that "this has happened twice". That's not quite accurate is it? As far as we know, this has happened AT LEAST once. The UK photos are of dubious authenticity.

The point is that these are the only photos that have made it to the news media. How can you be certain that this is not happening up and down Iraq? I'm not saying it is, I'm just saying that I dont know if it is not. See what I mean?

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/04/in...st/04CONT.html

WASHINGTON, May 3 — More than two months after a classified Army report found that two contract workers were implicated in the abuse of Iraqis at a prison outside Baghdad, the companies that employ them say that they have heard nothing from the Pentagon, and that they have not removed any employees from Iraq
For one of the employees, the Army report recommended "termination of employment" and revocation of his security clearance. For the other, it urged an official reprimand and review of his security clearance.
But J. P. London, chief executive of CACI, one of the companies involved, said in an interview on Monday that "we have not received any information or direction from the client regarding our work in country — no charges, no communications, no citations, no calls to appear at the Pentagon."

Hardly being strung up, is it?

[Blub2k]

It is targetted abuse they use contractors to interrogate prisoners cos their soldiers are not allowed to and it appears that some soldiers got caught up in the "festivities".
I am not saying that it is to humiliate a few people, it is the method they are using to gather intelligence from the captured prisoners and using them to circumvent the convention on human rights.

[DaBeeeenster]

The contractors are working in a legal black hole.

Normally, an individual's crimes would then fall under the local nation's laws. But there are no established Iraqi legal institutions - that is why we are running their prisons in the first place - and, in any case, coalition regulations explicitly state that contractors don't fall under them. In turn, because the acts were committed abroad, and also reportedly involve some contractors who are not US citizens, the application of US law is problematic. As one military lawyer said: "There is a dearth of doctrine, procedure, and policy."

This leaves a vacuum. Phillip Carter, a former US army officer now at UCLA Law School, notes: "Legally speaking, they [military contractors] fall into the same grey area as the unlawful combatants detained at Guantánamo Bay."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story...208259,00.html

[GreenPiggy]

The point is that these are the only photos that have made it to the news media. How can you be certain that this is not happening up and down Iraq?

I can't. What i said at the top of the post was that I hope people don't take this as evidence that this is official policy or portraying the US troops in the way we've become accustomed to.

My only position here is that all these people whether they be Troops or contracters be held responsible for their actions. If, as DaBeeeeenster suggests this is not happening in the case of the contracters then something needs to be done about it.
I don't buy into the theory that the contracters are there specifically for that purpose.

[DaBeeeenster]

I dont think the contractors were there SPECIFICALLY for that reason, but I think the US was aware of the legal situation when they started outsourcing jobs like that.

I mean, really, Uutsourcing of Prison Interrogation Officer! It's absurd.

I think this sort of thing is going on a lot more than we hear about.

[Blub2k]

Well we will agree to differ on that one, I am more of a cynic and believe their specific purpose there is to work in the legal " black-hole" that Beenster describes.(not necessarily as torturers, but they definitely had it in mind)
What do the US/UK care about legality anyway? Blair should be tried ffs never mind soldiers on the ground.