This brings the total estimated casualty figure to more than 7,000 killed and 13,000 injured since January

TO BE NOTED: From AI:

"UN Security Council must act immediately to stop "bloodbath" in Sri Lanka

Yolanda Foster, Amnesty International's Sri Lanka expert, describes the situation in the country, 11 May 2009

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Children injured by shelling, Kilinochchi, Sri Lanka, 10 May 2009.

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Child injured by shelling, Kilinochchi, Sri Lanka, 10 May 2009.

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11 May 2009

The horrific condition facing civilians in north eastern Sri Lanka has been described as a “bloodbath” by the United Nations. Amnesty International has said that it demands immediate action by the United Nations Security Council.

In the last few days, more than 400 people – including more than 100 children – are reported to have been killed in a two-day bombardment of the 2 square kilometre area designated as a “Safe Zone” by the Sri Lankan army. This brings the total estimated casualty figure to more than 7,000 killed and 13,000 injured since January. There are an estimated 50,000 civilians still trapped in the area.

Medical personnel in the area have told Amnesty International that the artillery barrage continued throughout the weekend. The Sri Lankan government has denied using artillery, instead blaming the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.

Both the Tigers and Sri-Lankan Military have been violating the laws of war. Over the last several months, the Tamil Tigers have used civilians trapped in the conflict zone as a buffer against government forces.

When civilians have tried to flee, they have been attacked by the Tigers. The Sri Lankan military has in the past used heavy artillery, which is indiscriminate under the circumstances, causing civilian deaths and injuries.

“The controversy over who is responsible for these devastating attacks underlines the need for the Security Council to demand immediate access to the area by humanitarian organizations as well as UN observers,” said Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International’s Asia-Pacific director. “The Security Council should emphasize that both the government and the LTTE will be held fully accountable for any breaches of their obligations under international humanitarian and human rights law.”

There are grounds to fear that the Sri Lankan military will launch an even heavier military offensive after 13 May, when general elections end in neighbouring India. India’s powerful regional Tamil political parties have made protection of civilians in Sri Lanka a key election issue.

“There are real fears that the ‘bloodbath’ will turn into a flood of misery after 13 May. The Security Council must act on its responsibility to protect the civilians in Sri Lanka before hundreds more are killed and wounded by the two sides or succumb to malnutrition and disease,” said Sam Zarifi.

Amnesty International called on all international donors to Sri Lanka to ensure that their money is not used to fuel human rights abuses. In a joint letter [http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2009/05/10/japan-back-un-action-sri-lanka] to the government of Japan, Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the International Crisis Group, and the Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect called on Japan, one of Sri Lanka’s largest international donor, to support formal action by the Security Council and implement aid policies that help protect the rights of Sri Lankan civilians.

The Sri Lankan government has repeatedly claimed that it will stop the use of heavy artillery in the ‘Safe Zone’.

“The Sri Lankan’s frequently broken promises of not using heavy artillery against civilians shows that it is not a credible source of information,” said Sam Zarifi.

Amnesty International has urged the Sri Lankan authorities to allow immediate and unhindered access to the troubled areas – including the "No Fire Zone" – to international monitors and agencies, who can assess the situation first hand and help ensure that the humanitarian and human rights crisis is addressed.

Hospitals in northern Sri Lanka have become overrun with dead and wounded people after a weekend of shelling caused heavy civilian casualties in the region.

"Due to the huge number of injured civilians, the hospital is unable to give services to all patients," a local Sri Lankan doctor told Amnesty International. "Many wounded civilians are being left without treatment for more than 24 hours and over half of hospital staff is not reporting for duty because their homes are under attack."

"Many civilians' temporary tarpaulin houses were shelled," confirmed the doctor.

Amnesty International has called on the government of Sri Lanka and the opposition Tamil Tigers to take immediate action to prevent further civilian casualties.

“Civilians are suffering injuries and dying because both the Tigers and the government troops are violating international humanitarian law,” said Zarifi. “The civilians caught in the cross-fire also face an alarming lack of life saving humanitarian aid including medical supplies, food and water.”

The government’s restrictions on media have escalated sharply in recent months. At least 16 media workers have been unlawfully killed in Sri Lanka since the beginning of 2006. Others have been arbitrarily detained, tortured and allegedly disappeared while in the custody of security forces.

Last week, the Sri Lankan government expelled three British television journalists who had managed to provide the first uncensored information about conditions inside the internment camps housing tens of thousands of people displaced from the conflict area."

choosing to excuse many of the atrocities committed in eastern Congo

TO BE NOTED: From Enough:

Amnesty and the Culture of Impunity in Congo

Posted by Laura Heaton on May 10, 2009

News out of Kinshasa this week about the Congolese parliament’s decision to grant amnesty to rebels in the eastern region is certainly raising a few eyebrows, even as Congolese officials touted it as step toward peace.

"We want to open new paths to peace in our country. The nation truly hopes to turn the page," said Information Minister Lambert Mende, according to Reuters.

However, impunity is widely seen as a driving force behind the ongoing conflict in the east, where fighting between various rebel groups -- some aligned with and some against the Congolese army -- has displaced an estimated one million people. In this lawless environment, it’s difficult to even guess how many people have had a hand in the violence that has long destabilized eastern Congo.

Of course, this same logic explains the practical thinking behind the parliament’s decision; in a region where rebels are often loosely affiliated and motivated by opportunistic rather than ideological goals, it would be a massive undertaking to try to locate and bring to justice all those who served in rebel group. (As an aid worker in North Kivu once memorably explained to me, “A farmer can arm himself with his shovel and become a Mayi Mayi one day, and then put it down and return to being a civilian the next.”)

However, the national government has now effectively rubber stamped this culture of impunity by choosing to excuse many of the atrocities committed in eastern Congo. The parliament rightly drew the line at pardoning those accused on war crimes, but a transitional justice process -- challenging, as it would be -- must be put in place to send the message that there are legal consequences for all those who commit abuses."

investigators would take a "law-based approach", analysing alleged violations committed by both sides

TO BE NOTED: From Reuters:

"U.N. experts prepare to investigate war crimes in Gaza

08 May 2009 14:11:01 GMT

Source: Reuters

* U.N. investigators plan to travel soon to Gaza and Israel * Former war crimes prosecutor Richard Goldstone heads team GENEVA, May 8 (Reuters) - International human rights experts examining alleged war crimes in the Gaza Strip said on Friday they planned to visit soon, and renewed a call for Israel to support their investigation. An Israeli government official said last month that the Jewish state would not cooperate with the United Nations inquiry into violations by Israeli troops and Hamas militants during the Dec. 27-Jan. 18 offensive in Hamas-ruled Gaza. Former U.N. war crimes prosecutor Richard Goldstone heads the team of four investigators who were appointed last month and held their first closed-door meetings in Geneva this week. "In the course of its work, the mission intends to conduct visits to affected areas of southern Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories, including Gaza, and has requested the cooperation of the government of Israel in this regard," the team said a statement issued by the U.N. in Geneva on Friday. Goldstone stressed the investigators would take a "law-based approach", analysing alleged violations committed by both sides, rather than a political approach when they prepared a report for the U.N. Human Rights Council in July. "I believe that an objective assessment of the issues is in the interests of all parties, will promote a culture of accountability and could serve to promote greater peace and security in the region," the South African judge said. U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay has called for an investigation into whether Israeli forces committed war crimes in the coastal strip of 1.5 million people.She raised specific concerns about the Israeli shelling of a home that killed 30 Palestinian civilians and a lack of care for young, starving children whose mothers died in the attack. The New York-based group Human Rights Watch has said that the Israeli army unlawfully fired white phosphorus shells over densely populated areas of Gaza, needlessly killing and injuring civilians, and cited it as evidence of war crimes. Goldstone's fellow investigators are Pakistani human rights lawyer Hina Jilani, British international law professor Christine Chinkin and retired Irish colonel Desmond Travers. The Human Rights Council, which is dominated by Muslim countries and their allies, gave the U.N. inquiry team a broad mandate in a resolution adopted in January. The experts will look into violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law committed in the context of the December-January military operations. According to a Palestinian rights group, 1,417 Palestinians, including 926 civilians, were killed in the fighting. Israel disputes those figures. Militants fired hundreds of rockets into southern Israel during the period. (Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; Editing by Laura MacInnis and Samia Nakhoul)"

War crimes have undoubtedly been committed by the Tigers. They may well have been committed also by the Sri Lankan military

TO BE NOTED: From the Guardian:

"Silence over Sri Lanka

Why do those in the international community who expressed outrage over Gaza stay silent while Tamils die?

Comments (188)

• 
• • Geoffrey Alderman
  • guardian.co.uk, Monday 27 April 2009 11.00 BST
  • Article history

In Sri Lanka a bloody conflict is reaching its bloody conclusion. Some 30 years ago, the Tamil population that inhabits the north and east of the island began an insurrection against the government, establishing for this purpose an organisation known as the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. The ultimate aim of the Tamil Tigers was to establish an independent Tamil state, thus partitioning the island. The means chosen to bring this about was to create terror and mayhem throughout the island, and, if necessary, beyond it. Not content with common-or-garden political assassinations and random murders, the Tamil Tigers pioneered the use of the suicide bomb and the suicide belt. Banned and proscribed as a terrorist organisation by more than 30 countries, including the US and the European Union, the Tigers are said to have been responsible for more suicide attacks than Hamas, Islamic Jihad and al-Qaida combined.

Now the endgame is in sight. Using methods pioneered by the British army in its successful campaign against the Boer insurgency more than a century ago, the Sri Lankan army has systematically removed civilians from the war zone while simultaneously refusing to heed international calls for a ceasefire because of the inevitable loss of civilian lives in coastal strips that remain under Tiger control. War crimes have undoubtedly been committed by the Tigers. They may well have been committed also by the Sri Lankan military.

Yes, this bloody conflict is reaching its bloody conclusion. So where, I ask myself, is the international outrage against the government of Sri Lanka? Why haven't we heard calls from, say, the Arab League for an immediate, unconditional ceasefire on the island and for Sri Lankan forces to leave Tamil areas? Why did President Ahmadinejad not condemn Sri Lanka from the Geneva podium that he occupied so shamelessly last week? Why, in this country, have we not heard calls for an economic boycott of Sri Lanka? Why have the offices of travel agencies offering package holidays to Sri Lanka not been picketed? Why has the Royal Court theatre not promoted a play highlighting the plight of the Tamil population? Why has the Lib-Dem leader, Nick Clegg, not demanded an immediate cessation of British arms shipments to Sri Lanka, and the EU not suspended all economic cooperation with the country? Why has Gordon Brown's international development secretary, Douglas Alexander, not announced that British taxpayers' money is to be used to fund a scheme to highlight Sri Lankan human rights abuses in Tamil areas and that the UK government will give legal assistance in Sri Lanka to individuals and institutions challenging (to quote a brochure recently issued by Alexander's department) "military policies that violate human rights"?

I'll tell you why. Because Sri Lanka is not Israel. Because the Tamils are not Arabs. And because here, in the UK, the Tamil vote is negligible whereas the Muslim vote is not.

Yes, I know there have been some violent scenes in Parliament Square, which is even now occupied by Tamil protesters. But that's the point. The protesters and the hunger strikers are all Tamils. Where are the homegrown cheerleaders that spearheaded protests in London during the recent military action by Israel in Gaza? Tony Benn, for example? George Galloway? Jenny Tonge? Come to that, where is the saturation media coverage of the Sri Lankan assault on the remaining Tamil strongholds?

Whenever I complain about the British media's obsession with Israel and its problems with some of its Arab neighbours, I can count on someone to tell me that I'm paranoid. But I'm not, am I? The human tragedy unfolding in Sri Lanka, and its totally peripheral treatment by the media, the British government and the British political elite – not to mention the international community – does, I am very sorry to say, prove my point."

The UN’s human rights chief, Navi Pillay, has suggested that both may be guilty of war crimes.

TO BE NOTED: From the Economist:

"Sri Lanka's war

Killing civilians

Apr 9th 2009 | COLOMBO
From Economist.com

A doctor describes a slaughter in Sri Lanka

AFP/AP

Get article background

OVER 60 refugees are reported to have been killed by shellfire in north-eastern Sri Lankan on Wednesday April 8th. They were among thousands trapped by fighting between the army and surviving Tamil Tiger rebels, who are making a last stand on Mullaitivu beach, a sandy-spit between the Indian Ocean and a long lagoon.

The beach, which is roughly 17km in length and 1.5km wide, has been designated as a “no-fire zone” by the army, which claims to have surrounded it. Yet the civilians encamped there—perhaps 150,000 in all, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)—have been regularly bombarded, for which each side blames the other. The UN’s human rights chief, Navi Pillay, has suggested that both may be guilty of war crimes.

The army says it has engaged in almost no fighting since April 5th, when it emerged victorious from a three-day battle outside the no-fire zone, where it killed 525 Tigers. An army spokesman says it has not used indirect fire in the region—including artillery and mortar rounds—for several weeks. According to a doctor working in a makeshift hospital in the no-fire zone, however, it saw unprecedentedly heavy shellfire and civilian casualties on Wednesday.

By phone from the war-zone, he said that 296 wounded refugees had been brought to the hospital, a converted school building, and that 47 had died there. Typically with “big lacerations in the abdomen, in the chest, very bad head injuries”, the wounded included 52 children under the age of 15. The doctor, who requested that his name not be published, said that the hospital, which has eight doctors and 20 nurses employed by the government to work in the Tigers’ formerly extensive fief, had been overwhelmed by this influx. Already, he said, a dire shortage of drugs had driven them to carry out surgery on people dosed with painkillers, but not anaesthetic. Over 100 of the newly wounded were therefore evacuated (along with 400 others) aboard small fishing boats to a ship manned offshore by the ICRC. The doctor said he had heard that at least three of these evacuees subsequently died.

Shortly after 7am, the doctor said he had seen the effect of the first bombardment of the day. He said five shells had landed, a few minutes and up to 30m apart, in an area thick with refugees: three of their jerry-built shelters, constructed of sticks and plastic sheeting, took direct hits. The doctor said 13 people, including a mother of four children and at least one child, were killed by the volley, and 55 were seriously wounded.

“It’s a very fearful situation,” he said. “Everywhere you look, people are dying, like hunted animals.” Because the government has barred journalists and most aid workers from the battlefield, it was not possible to verify his report. But the figures it contains are consistent with those quoted to the BBC by another doctor at the hospital, and with reports sent, from various sources, to foreign diplomats in Colombo. The ICRC has said that one of its workers was killed in the no-fire zone by shellfire on Wednesday.

The doctor said that in March nearly 2,800 wounded refugees were admitted to the hospital, of whom over 500 had died there. Many others, he said, had been killed and buried without reaching the hospital. These figures are broadly consistent with other estimates. Of 2,400 sick and wounded evacuated from Mullaitivu beach from January to mid-March, 1,900 underwent surgery for shrapnel and splinter wounds.

Though the government denies shelling the no-fire zone, it has admitted doing so to foreign diplomats, to return the Tigers’ fire, and only where it could ensure no civilian would be harmed. Given that artillery fire is said to be accurate with a 250m-margin for error, this may explain some of the casualties. But the government suggests it is the Tigers who are firing on the refugees, who they are certainly holding hostage, in an effort to smear the army and provoke international outrage and a ceasefire. For their part, the Tigers, who the army says are down to 200 hardened fighters, accuse it of killing the refugees.

According to the doctor on Mullativu beach, each bombardment provokes a clamour of refugees wanting to escape. Over 20,000 have done so in the past three weeks. But the doctor said that many are being deterred from trying because of the dangers of crossing a battle-field-and because of the “local police”, a possible euphemism for the Tigers. Contrary to official reports, the doctor said that sporadic fighting appeared to be continuing outside the no-fire zone."

Israel's military assault on densely populated Gaza appeared to constitute a grave war crime

TO BE NOTED: From Reuters:

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By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) - A United Nations human rights investigator said on Thursday that Israel's military assault on densely populated Gaza appeared to constitute a grave war crime.

Richard Falk, U.N. special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, said the Geneva Conventions required warring forces to distinguish between military targets and surrounding civilians.

"If it is not possible to do so, then launching the attacks is inherently unlawful and would seem to constitute a war crime of the greatest magnitude under international law," Falk said.

"On the basis of the preliminary evidence available, there is reason to reach this conclusion," he wrote in an annual 26-page report submitted to the U.N. Human Rights Council.

Falk gave the same death toll from Israel's offensive in December and January -- 1,434 Palestinians, including 960 civilians -- as the Palestinian human rights center.

Israel, which lost 13 people during the war, disputes the figures and has accused Hamas fighters in Gaza of using civilians as human shields during the conflict -- an allegation which Falk said should be investigated.

He called the Israeli attacks a "massive assault on a densely populated urbanized setting" in which the entire civilian population had been subjected to "an inhumane form of warfare that kills, maims and inflicts mental harm."

"As all borders were sealed, civilians could not escape from the orbit of harm," he said.

This denial of people's right to flee the war zone as refugees may also constitute a crime against humanity, he said.

WAR CRIMES PROBE

Falk called for an independent experts group to probe possible war crimes committed by both Israeli forces and Hamas. It should gather eyewitness testimony as well as explanations from Israeli and Palestinian military commanders.

Violations included Israel's alleged "targeting of schools, mosques and ambulances" during the offensive, which lasted from December 27 to January 18, and its use of weapons including white phosphorus, as well as Hamas's firing of rockets at civilian targets in southern Israel.

Falk said that Israel's blockade of the coastal strip of 1.5 million people violated the Geneva Conventions and this suggested further war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity.

The aggression was not legally justified and may represent a "crime against peace" -- a principle established at the Nuremberg trials of Nazi war criminals, according to Falk, an American law professor who serves as the Human Rights Council's independent investigator.

Falk, who is Jewish, suggested the Security Council might set up an ad hoc criminal tribunal to establish accountability for war crimes in Gaza, noting Israel has not signed the Rome statutes establishing the International Criminal Court.

He was denied entry to Israel two weeks before the assault started, forcing him to abort a planned mission to Gaza. In his report, he said that the refusal had set an "unfortunate precedent" for treatment of a special rapporteur.

On Monday, he is to present his report formally to the Human Rights Council, a 47-member forum where Islamic and African countries backed by China, Cuba and Russia have a majority. Neither Israel nor its chief ally the United States are members.

(Editing by Mark Trevelyan and Jonathan Wright)

© Thomson Reuters 2009 All rights reserved"

investigation that looks at all alleged violations of international law - by Israel, by Hamas and by other Palestinian armed groups involved

TO BE NOTED: From AI:

"UN urged to 'find truth' about Gaza conflict

Researching allegations of war crimes in Israel and Gaza

© Amnesty International

© APGraphicsBank">

Aftermath of Israeli airstrike, Gaza Strip, 6 January 2009

© APGraphicsBank

16 March 2009

A group of 16 of the world's leading war crimes investigators and judges - backed by Amnesty International - has urged the United Nations to launch a full inquiry into alleged gross violations of the laws of war committed by both sides during the recent conflict in Gaza and southern Israel.

An open letter - entitled 'Find the truth about Gaza war' - was sent to the UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Monday. The letter's signatories include Archbishop Desmond Tutu, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson and judge Richard Goldstone, formerly Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and for Rwanda.

A UN inquiry is currently investigating attacks which were carried out against UN facilities and personnel in Gaza during the three-week conflict.

"The UN investigation is not sufficient as a response to the grave violations that were committed during the conflict. Hundreds of civilians were killed or killed, and it is vital that the circumstances in which they were attacked are fully investigated," said Malcolm Smart, Director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Programme.

"Those responsible for war crimes or other serious violations of international humanitarian law and human rights abuses must be held to account."

"What is needed is a comprehensive international investigation that looks at all alleged violations of international law - by Israel, by Hamas and by other Palestinian armed groups involved in the conflict."

The letter's signatories - who have led investigations of crimes committed in former Yugoslavia, Kosovo, Darfur, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, South Africa, East Timor, Lebanon and Peru - say that they have been "shocked to the core" by events in Gaza.

They have urged world leaders "to send an unfaltering signal that the targeting of civilians during conflict is unacceptable by any party on any count."

The letter calls for the establishment of a UN commission of inquiry into the Gaza conflict that:

• Has a mandate to carry out a prompt, thorough, independent and impartial investigation of all allegations of serious violations of international humanitarian law committed by all parties to the conflict
• Acts in accordance with the strictest international standards governing such investigations
• Can provide recommendations as to the appropriate prosecution of those responsible for gross violations of the law by the relevant authorities

Prof. William A. Schabas, former member of the Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission, said: "The international community must apply the same standard to Gaza as it does to other conflicts and investigate all abuses of the laws of war and human rights."

Both Israel and Hamas used foreign-supplied weapons to attack civilians according to fresh evidence released by Amnesty International.

TO BE NOTED: From AI:

"Foreign-supplied weapons used against civilians by Israel and Hamas

© APGraphicsBank">

Israeli artillery fires towards southern Gaza Strip, from Israel side of the border

© APGraphicsBank

© Amnesty International">

Label on the remains of a missile that killed three paramedics and a child, Gaza, January 2009

© Amnesty International

© Amnesty International">

Rocket remants collected at Sderot police station, Israel, 28 January 2008

© Amnesty International

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© APGraphicsBank">View all 4 images

20 February 2009

Both Israel and Hamas used foreign-supplied weapons to attack civilians according to fresh evidence released by Amnesty International.

Munitions from the USA, Israel’s main foreign arms supplier, were used by Israel forces during three-week conflict in Gaza and southern Israel. Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups fired hundreds of rockets that had been smuggled in or made of components from abroad at civilian areas in Israel.

Amnesty International has called on the UN to impose a comprehensive arms embargo on the parties to the conflict.

"Israeli forces used white phosphorus and other weapons supplied by the USA to carry out serious violations of international humanitarian law, including war crimes," said Donatella Rovera, who headed Amnesty International's fact-finding mission to southern Israel and Gaza.

"Their attacks resulted in the killing of hundreds of children and other civilians and massive destruction of homes and infrastructure. At the same time, the firing of rockets by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups, though far less lethal than the weaponry used by Israel, also caused several civilian deaths and constitute a war crime."

For many years, the USA has been the major supplier of conventional arms to Israel. Under a 10-year agreement to 2017, the USA is due to provide $30 billion in military aid to Israel, a 25% increase compared to the period preceding the Bush administration.

"To a large extent, Israel's military offensive in Gaza was carried out with weapons, munitions and military equipment supplied by the USA and paid for with US taxpayers’ money," said Malcolm Smart, Amnesty International's Director for the Middle East.

In Gaza, as the fighting ended, Amnesty International researchers found fragments and components from munitions used by the Israeli Army - including many that are US-made – littering school playgrounds, in hospitals and in people’s homes. They included artillery and tank shells, mortar fins and remnants from Hellfire and other airborne missiles and large F-16 delivered bombs, as well as still smouldering highly incendiary white phosphorus remains.

They also found remnants of a new type of missile, seemingly launched from unmanned drones, which explodes large numbers of tiny sharp-edged metal cubes, each between 2mm and 4mm square in size. These lethal purpose-made shrapnel had penetrated thick metal doors and were embedded deep in concrete walls, and are clearly designed to maximize injury.

In southern Israel, Amnesty International also saw the remains of "Qassam", Grad and other indiscriminate rockets fired by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups against civilian areas. These unsophisticated weapons cannot be aimed accurately and stand no comparison with the weaponry deployed by Israel but they have caused several deaths of Israeli civilians, injuries to others and damage to civilian property.

Even before the three week conflict, those who armed the two sides will have been aware of the pattern of repeated misuse of weapons by the parties.

"As the major supplier of weapons to Israel, the USA has a particular obligation to stop any supply that contributes to gross violations of the laws of war and of human rights," said Malcolm Smart. "The Obama Administration should immediately suspend US military aid to Israel.

"We urge the UN Security Council to impose an immediate and comprehensive arms embargo on Israel, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups until effective mechanisms are found to ensure that munitions and other military equipment are not used to commit serious violations of international law.

"In addition all states should suspend all transfers of military equipment, assistance and munitions to Israel, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups until there is no longer a substantial risk of human rights violations. There must be no return to business as usual, with the predictably devastating consequences for civilians in Gaza and Israel."

"What is needed is a comprehensive international investigation that looks at all alleged violations of international law "

TO BE NOTED:

"UN urged to extend Gaza investigation

© APGraphicsBank">

Aftermath of Israeli airstrike, Gaza Strip, 6 January 2009

© APGraphicsBank

13 February 2009

United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has been urged to broaden an investigation of attacks on UN installations in Gaza so that it becomes a comprehensive inquiry into all alleged violations of international law by all parties to the conflict.

Amnesty International has described the planned investigation, announced on Tuesday, as "welcome yet insufficient".

"The UN's investigation must not be so limited as to look only at recent attacks by Israeli forces on UN schools, staff and property in Gaza. It is not only the victims of attacks on the UN who have a right to know why their rights were violated and who was responsible, and to obtain justice and reparation," said Secretary General Irene Khan.

"What is needed is a comprehensive international investigation that looks at all alleged violations of international law - by Israel, by Hamas and by other Palestinian armed groups involved in the conflict."

Amnesty International researchers, who visited both Gaza and southern Israel during the fighting and in its immediate aftermath, found compelling evidence of war crimes and other serious violations of international humanitarian law.

This included direct attacks by Israeli forces on Palestinian civilians and civilian objects in Gaza, attacks which breached the prohibition on disproportionate attacks. Amnesty International also witnessed the use of weapons, such as white phosphorus, which have indiscriminate effects when used in densely-populated civilian areas.

In the same period, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups fired hundreds of indiscriminate rockets into civilian population centres in southern Israel.

Amnesty International has urged the UN Security Council to support its call for a comprehensive investigation.

"The Security Council must live up to its responsibility to uphold international law and to ensure full accountability," said Irene Khan. "It should support a full and independent investigation that covers all attacks that may have violated the laws of war during the recent fighting in Gaza and southern Israel."

Amnesty International has also called on all UN member states to support the Secretary-General's initiative and to demand a comprehensive UN investigation into all alleged abuses of international humanitarian and human rights law during the conflict in Gaza and southern Israel.

"Long-term peace and security cannot be found in the Middle East unless accountability is established for crimes under international law and the cycle of impunity for serious violations perpetrated by all parties has come to an end," said Irene Khan."

Cambodia At Peace

Some good news today from Reuters:

"Cambodians mark 30 years since fall of Pol Pot

TIMELINE: Cambodia marks thirty years since Khmer Rouge
6:06am EST
By Ek Madra

PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - Thousands of Cambodian survivors of the Khmer Rouge "Killing Fields" marked 30 years Wednesday since the fall of Pol Pot's ultra-Maoist regime, blamed for the deaths of 1.7 million people.

Up to 80,000 people packed into the capital's Olympic stadium for a rally organized by the ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP), descendant of the puppet government installed by Hanoi after its troops ousted Beijing-backed Pol Pot on January 7, 1979.( I HAVE TO ADMIT THAT THIS WORKED. THIS IS WHY I WISH BOTSWANA WOULD INTERVENE IN MOZAMBIQUE. I KNOW THAT THIS WISH IS PROBLEMATIC. I'M SIMPLY BEING HONEST. )

"We have always remembered those who sacrificed their lives to save us from genocide," aging CPP President and former guerrilla Chea Sim told the cheering crowd.

Despite international and domestic repugnance at the Khmer Rouge and their disastrous attempt to create an agrarian utopia, a significant minority of Cambodians mourn January 7 as the start of a 10-year occupation by their hated Vietnamese neighbors.

Political opponents of Prime Minister Hun Sen, a one-eyed former Khmer Rouge commander who has been in charge for the last 23 years( THIS SHOULDN'T STAND ), frequently label him a Vietnamese stooge, a charge he rebutted in typically blunt style this week. ( THERE DO NEED TO BE CHANGES. )

"Whoever is against the day of victory is either Pol Pot or an animal," he told a crowd Tuesday at the inauguration of a bridge south of Phnom Penh, now a bustling city of 2.5 million far removed from the derelict ghost town of 1979.

Skyscrapers springing up on the banks of the Mekong, land prices rivaling Bangkok's and a stock exchange planned for this year all attest to an economy shaking off its past, thanks to growing domestic and Asian investment over the past decade.( GOOD NEWS )

Communist Vietnam also marked the anniversary, with official papers running a series of articles portraying the invasion as a mercy mission and the 10-year occupation as necessary to prevent a resurgence of the Khmer Rouge.

"Wherever our army went, it was welcomed by cheering and helpful Cambodian people," the Tin Tuc daily said.

With the Cold War's "domino theory" occupying the minds of Western policy-makers, many in Washington took a very different view at the time, fearing Vietnam's march on Phnom Penh was a precursor to a wider assault on U.S. ally Thailand.

GUERRILLAS ON TRIAL

After fleeing into the jungle along the Thai border, the remnants of Pol Pot's black-shirted guerrilla army resisted the Vietnamese and Hun Sen until their final surrender in 1998, the same year the movement's 'Brother Number One' died.

Pol Pot's top surviving henchmen, all of them aging and infirm, are only now being brought to justice, although ordinary Cambodians are growing increasingly frustrated at the interminable delays to a joint Cambodian-United Nations tribunal( I UNDERSTAND. ).

"The spirits of my relatives will not be calm without prosecuting those killers," said Thay Srey Khon, who lost eight relatives under the regime.

The court admitted this week that Cambodia's prosecutor was blocking a bid by her international counterpart to go after more than the five top cadres now in custody on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Human rights groups said the admission confirmed long-held suspicions Hun Sen was manipulating the court to ensure it did not dig too deep, for fear it unearthed dark secrets about some of the senior Khmer Rouge figures inside his administration.( PROBABLY TRUE )

The government has denied any such attempt.

Those in custody are 'Brother Number Two' Nuon Chea, former President Khieu Samphan, former Foreign Minister Ieng Sary, his wife, Ieng Thirith, and Duch, head of Phnom Penh's Tuol Sleng, or the "S-21" interrogation and torture center.( ALL MAJOR WAR CRIMINALS. )

They all face life in jail if convicted.( AND JUDGEMENT BY GOD )

(Additional reporting by Ho Binh Minh in HANOI)

(Editing by Ed Cropley and Paul Tait)"CVietnam,

A Call For War Crimes By Hamas

Mahmoud Zahar has betrayed his people
By calling Jewish children 'legitimate targets( JEW HATRED AND CALLING FOR WAR CRIMES ), the Hamas commander has dealt a serious blow to Palestinian justice ( TRUE )

Comments (76)

Maajid Nawaz
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 7 January 2009 12.43 GMT
Article history
Jewish children everywhere are now "legitimate targets"( THIS IS JEW HATRED AND A WAR CRIME }. This was the macabre warning uttered from the mouth of Hamas commander Mahmoud Zahar yesterday. In a shocking revelation the Hamas commander self-righteously declared, "The Zionists have legitimised the killing of their children by killing our children. They have legitimised the killing of their people all over the world by killing our people." The perverse al-Qaida logic used by Zahar in this proclamation is as simple as it is depraved, and the worst part is that it seems to have no end. What if the "enemy" was deemed to have raped or tortured, would we proceed to rape and torture in response as an instrument of war, anywhere in the world and against any Jewish person? ( PURE JEW HATRED )

Is justice in the Palestine question reduced to a body count of how many children have been beheaded? Zahar, you have betrayed your people ( TRUE ), and I hope and pray that others inside Palestine and indeed within your own movement condemn your dehumanisation of innocent babies.( I AGREE )

Last April I wrote about the double standards that plague Islamists in this debate, and what I said then sadly rings true now:

The right to life must also be non-negotiable. Just as British Muslims condemn the deaths of Muslim civilians in Iraq or Palestine, they must also condemn suicide bombings that kill non-Muslim civilians. The silent barbaric logic behind killing 'a child for a child' must cease. Murder is murder.( I AGREE )

Around a week before the Israeli invasion, Hamas had proceeded to institute a medieval penal code inside Gaza, whereby thieves would have their hands chopped off, adultery would be dealt with by stoning to death and alcohol consumption would be punished by lashings( THIS SHOULD BE CONDEMNED ). Many people like me have spoken out in favour of the Palestine issue, and condemned the Israeli aggression in Gaza. How long will it take Hamas and generally those who support them to realise that it is not I, by writing this piece, who betrays Palestine? Rather it is Hamas's Islamist extremism and excess that provides the perfect pretext for the world to turn a blind eye to the suffering of innocent Palestinians caught between two extremes, Zionism and Islamism.

Hamas does bear some responsibility in this current tragedy( THEY COMMIT WAR CRIMES ): the responsibility to resist occupation in a civilised way( THROUGH PEACEFUL PROTESTS AND NEGOTIATIONS). Yes, Israel is not free from blame, as our Quilliam Foundation press release stated Israel's actions are condemnable, it has acted disproportionately and with utter disregard for human life( I AGREE ). There is, however, one crucial difference that slices through this debate like a hot knife through butter. Israel does not have an active policy of deliberately capturing children to murder them, or even deliberately murdering civilians for that matter. Israel acts irresponsibly, with impunity and total disregard for the consequences of its military onslaught, and this leads to the deaths of many Palestinian civilians and some children. But it does not deliberately select children to murder, nor justifies doing so. Hamas just has.( I AGREE )

Contrary to slogans shouted at Saturday's rally, we are not Hamas. If the sane voices that last week spoke up in condemnation of the Israeli offensive in Gaza do not speak now to address Hamas excesses, the cause will remain lost with the loss of a moral high-ground. ( I AGREE. HOWEVER, HAMAS DOES NOT HAVE THE MORAL HIGH GROUND. PALESTINIAN CIVILIANS DO. )

It is these very sane voices that I had hoped to hear yesterday, in an official briefing for leading UK Muslims. What I did not expect to hear were threats of "another 7/7, 8/8, 9/9 and more, with blame falling squarely on government policy, not on anyone else". How dare anyone issue veiled threats to hold the foreign policies of my country hostage to the whims of terrorists( I AGREE. THIS IS DISGRACEFUL. )? If terrorists attack the innocent people of my country, I and countless others will blame them, not David Miliband or the Foreign Office. This is a democratically elected government, accountable to its people upon its policies; if you don't like policy, lobby your point.( GOOD POINT )

What sort of distorted logic would see a link between the blood of the good people of Britain and Israel's atrocities in Gaza? Sadly, I know Islamists too well, and the only link is that both countries happen to be majority non-Muslim. Yet contrary to Islamist claims, the Palestine issue is not exclusively a Muslim cause, there are Palestinian and Arab Christians, for whom it is also a holy land, not to mention humanist campaigners and even Israelis, who all stand side by side with other Muslims seeking a Palestinian state for Palestinians of all faiths.( TRUE )

It is in times of such crisis that people's real moral fibre comes to the fore( TRUE ). I have witnessed torture and imprisonment for my past affiliations to Hizb ut-Tahrir. I know very well the sorts of frustration and anger that can lead to people contemplating revenge. However, no amount of anger can justify extinguishing the light from a child's eyes. As Sunny Hundal recently wrote sometimes, the friends of this cause can be its worst enemies."

There can be no justification for War Crimes by anyone in a civilized world. Ever.

"Barack Obama is unlikely to want to spend precious capital pursuing his predecessor for war crimes"

From the Guardian:

"Jonathan Freedland

• 
  
• The Guardian, Wednesday 24 December 2008
• Article history

'Tis the night before Christmas and the season of goodwill. The mood is forgiving. Our faces warm with mulled wine, our tummies full, we're meant to slump in the armchair, look back on the year just gone and count our blessings - woozily agreeing to put our troubles behind us.

As in families, so in the realm of public and international affairs. And this December that feels especially true. The "war on terror" that dominated much of the decade seems to be heading towards a kind of conclusion. George Bush will leave office in a matter of weeks and British troops will leave Iraq a few months later. The first, defining phase of the conflict that began on 9/11 - the war of Bush, Tony Blair( AND I LIKE BLAIR ) and Osama bin Laden - is about to slip from the present to the past tense. Bush and Blair will be gone, with only Bin Laden still in post. The urge to move on is palpable( IT'S EFFECTING THIS FINANCIAL CRISIS ).

You can sense it in the valedictory interviews Bush and Dick Cheney are conducting on their way out. They're looking to the verdict of history now, Cheney telling the Washington Times last week: "I myself am personally persuaded that this president and this administration will look very good 20 or 30 years down the road.( DELUSIONAL )" The once raging arguments of the current era are about to fade, the lead US protagonists heading off to their respective ranches in the west, the rights and wrongs of their decisions in office to be weighed not in the hot arena of politics, but in the cool seminar rooms of the academy.

Not so fast.

Yes, the new year would get off to a more soothing start if we could all agree to draw a line and move on. But it would be wrong( I AGREE ). First, because we cannot hope to avoid repeating the errors of the last eight years unless they are subject to a full accounting( TRUE ). (It is for that reason Britain needs its own full, unconstrained inquiry into the Iraq war.) Second, because a crucial principle, one that goes to the very heart of the American creed, is at stake. And third, because this is not solely about the judgment of history. It may be about the judgment of the courts - specifically those charged with punishing war crimes( I AGREE ).

Less than a fortnight ago, in the news graveyard of a Friday afternoon, the armed services committee of the US Senate released a bipartisan report - with none other than John McCain as its co-author - into the American use of torture against those held in the war on terror. It dismissed entirely the notion that the horrors of Abu Ghraib could be put down to "a few bad apples". Instead it laid bare, in forensic detail, the trail of memos and instructions that led directly to the then defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld( DISASTER ).

The report was the fruit of 18 months of work, involving some 70 interviews. Most of it is classified, but even the 29-page published summary makes horrifying reading. It shows how the most senior figures in the Bush administration discussed, and sought legal fig leaves for, practices that plainly amounted to torture( THAT ARE TORTURE ). They were techniques devised in a training programme known as Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape or SERE, that aimed to teach elite American soldiers how to endure torture should they fall into the hands of pitiless enemies. The SERE techniques were partly modelled on the brutal methods used by the Chinese against US prisoners during the Korean war. Yet Rumsfeld ruled that these same techniques should be "reverse engineered", so that Americans would learn not how to endure them - but how to inflict them. Which they then did, at Guantánamo, Abu Ghraib and beyond.

The Senate report cites the memorandums requesting permission to use "stress positions, exploitation of detainee fears (such as fear of dogs), removal of clothing, hooding, deprivation of light and sound, and the so-called wet towel treatment or the waterboard". We read of Mohamed al Kahtani - against whom all charges were dropped earlier this year - who was "deprived of adequate sleep for weeks on end, stripped naked, subjected to loud music, and made to wear a leash and perform dog tricks". Approval for this kind of torture, hidden under the euphemism of "enhanced interrogation", was sought from and granted at the highest level( UNREAL. THE US ).

And that doesn't mean Rumsfeld. The report's first conclusion is that, on "7 February 2002, President George W Bush made a written determination that Common Article 3 of the Geneva conventions, which would have afforded minimum standards for humane treatment, did not apply to al-Qaida or Taliban detainees". The result, it says, is that Bush "opened the door" to the use of a raft of techniques that the US had once branded barbaric and beyond the realm of human decency( I AGREE ).

For this Bush should surely be held to account( I AGREE ). And yet there is no sign that he will, and precious little agitation that he should. A still smiling Cheney denies the Bush administration did anything wrong. Note this breathtaking exchange with Fox News at the weekend. He was asked: "If the president during war decides to do something to protect the country, is it legal?" Cheney's answer: "General proposition, I'd say yes."

It takes a few seconds for the full horror of that remark to sink in. And then you remember where you last heard something like it. It was the now immortalised interview between David Frost and Richard Nixon. The disgraced ex-president was asked whether there were certain situations where the president can do something illegal, if he deems it in the national interest. Nixon's reply: "Well, when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal( NIXON WAS LINCOLN COMPARED TO BUSH AND CHENEY )."

It is no coincidence that Cheney began his career in the Nixon White House. He has the same Nixonian disregard for the US constitution, the same belief that executive power is absolute and unlimited - that those who wield it are above the law, domestic and international. It is the logic of dictatorship.

But Nixon was forced from office, his vision of an unrestrained presidency rejected. If Bush and Cheney are allowed to retire quietly, America will have failed to reassert that bedrock principle of the republic: the rule of law( I AGREE ).

This is why there must be a reckoning. Bush will do all he can to avoid it: and it is wholly possible that one of his last acts as president will be to cover himself, his vice-president and all his henchmen with a blanket pardon. Even if that does not happen, Barack Obama is unlikely to want to spend precious capital pursuing his predecessor for war crimes( SAD ).

But other prosecutors elsewhere in the world should weigh their responsibilities( GO FOR IT ). In the end, it was a lone Spanish magistrate, not a Chilean court, who ensured the arrest of Augusto Pinochet. A pleasing, if uncharitable, thought this Christmas, is that Rumsfeld, Cheney and Bush will hesitate before making plans to travel abroad in 2009. Or indeed at any time - ever again."

I agree. They should at least be shunned.