I’m always wary of politicians, and political speeches, and yet Obama’s inauguration speech left me feeling hopeful … I guess only time will tell though.

I can’t say that I entirely oppose the death penalty, but I firmly believe there can be no justification for the execution of children. I understand that some of these children have committed crimes that are abhorrent but I’m forced to question whether it’s right to impose the death penalty upon youngsters who are by definition immature and not necessarily able to fully comprehend the consequences of their actions.

I arrived at the airport just before 8am. On entering the airport I went through the first security check which was a single police officer standing at the main entrance checking your passport and ticket. No problems there. Once I got through there I had to proceed to a security check performed by the Pakistan Anti Narcotics Force. I was told to place my suitcase on a table.

The ANF Officer asked me where I had travelled from, but didn’t wait for the answer he proceeded to take a knife and start stabbing my suitcase. Which at this point was still locked. I’ve been to many airports around the world and this was the first time I’d ever had anyone stabbing my suitcase, I’m not entirely sure what this was meant to prove or check for. Before I had a chance to protest though his knifed broke in half as the idiot tried to stab the front plate of my suitcase which is metal. He then told me to open the suitcase up and proceeded to rifle through all my belongings throwing things onto the floor as he did so.

My suitcase contained a load of clothes, several cricket balls which I had purchased in Kashmir as gifts for some of the kids at Local Leagues, several books and a couple of small souvenirs which were packed in a small plastic bag which also contained one of my watches. When he discovered the cricket balls he proceeded to start sniffing each of them. I wasn’t aware human beings were actually able to smell narcotics in this manner, security forces normally use sniffer dogs. Anyway he kept tossing my belongings on the floor and the table until he was satisfied at which point I had to hurriedly pack everything back into my suitcase, I took care to make sure that all the items that were on the floor/table ended up back in my suitcase. It was only when I returned to the UK and opened up my suitcase that I realised the bastard had taken the small bag containing the watch and the souvenirs I’m positive he stole it because I packed away all the items that I could see he had tossed onto the floor/table.

Anyway after he had finished with me I proceeded to the next security check. This simply involved me placing my luggage through the x-ray machine and walking through a metal detector and being frisked by a police office. No problem there. After this I proceeded to get my luggage checked in and get my boarding pass. No real problems there.

I then had to proceed to Immigration. Where there were a load of Police Officers with the letters FIA ( Federal Investigation Agency ) emblazoned on their Uniforms. When I reached the immigration desk the officer asked me for my passport and boarding pass which I duly handed over. He then asked me where I had been staying during my visit. He then stared at me and asked me if I was the individual in the picture in my passport, and I said yes! He asked me for my date of birth. Which I provided. He then told me he thought my passport was fake because it wasn’t scanning. However he hadn’t yet tried to scan it! So I just looked at him. He then asked me a question “kuch aur deso?” which in my mind I translated as “do you have any other identification you want to show me?” to which I said no that’s my passport, and it should be fine since I’ve travelled all over the world on it. He kept repeating the question, and I kept replying as I had done.

Eventually after keeping me standing there for almost 40 minutes some of the other passengers in the queue behind me got rather rowdy. Someone shouted out “just give the bastard some money, that’s what he’s asking you for!” others in the queue started hurling abuse at the officer as well as the police in general. The ruckus caused a number of other FIA officers to walk over to see what was going on. They asked their colleague what the problem was and he told them my passport was fake and wasn’t scanning. To which I responded he hasn’t tried to scan it yet. Another officer, wondered over and took the passport from his colleague and scanned it through the machine first time, handed it to me, and told me to proceed. As I walked past the officer who had held me there the best part of an hour I told him in no uncertain terms what I thought of him, which I wont repeat here.

Once I got through immigration I had to go through another frisking, and then another metal detector and being frisked once more. Once I got through all that I was able to proceed to the waiting lounge. At this point I felt really drained and quite angry. But I figured I’m through the worst of it, and looked back at the queue of people having to go through all the same security checks and actually felt sorry for them.

My visit to Kashmir left me with a very low opinion of Pakistani Police Officers – they’re all corrupt. It seems it’s impossible to travel anywhere without having to go through impromptu checkpoints set up by small groups of Pakistani police officers who aren’t checking anything just asking drivers to hand over money. They seem to target vehicles that have Kashmiri license plates (which being with letters AJK), in fact I can’t recall making a trip where our driver didn’t have to pay some police officer a bribe to let us travel around our own country which is quite depressing.

There have been wars fought by India and Pakistan over possession of Kashmir and as it stands the country is divided in two. The Indian controlled half of Kashmir is often referred to as “Indian Occupied” Kashmir, whereas the Pakistani side of Kashmir is referred to as “Azaad Kashmir” which means “Free Kashmir”, but the sad truth is that Kashmir is not a free state – not in any true sense of the word. It’s occupied by two nations, Indian and Pakistan, and both nations have committed atrocities against our people, and continue to do so. Growing up I used to fill in application forms that asked for ethnicity as “Pakistani” since it was always one of the check boxes and we were always taught that Kashmiri’s were Pakistani’s. If I learnt anything about myself on this trip its that I am of Kashmiri decent, and I’m definitely not Pakistani – its taken 29 years for me to learn the difference and that hurts.
Anyway I’m digressing, back to the airport.

I was sitting in the departure lounge waiting for the air plane to arrive. As usual it was delayed which meant sitting there for 4 hours! Whilst I was sitting there a gentleman in suit came and sat down next to me. I didn’t think anything of it until several armed police officers walked over to where I was sitting. My first reaction was “shit am I in trouble for calling that FIA guy a C…”, but it wasn’t me they were interested in. The officers walked straight up to the gentleman sitting next to me and proceeded to apologise to him for not meeting him at the entrance of the airport.

I listened to the conversation rather intently, I figured this guy must be someone really important. What I overheard, and then confirmed by talking to the gentleman at great length (i had four hours to kill) actually terrified me to the point where I wasn’t actually sure I wanted to get onto the plane. Here’s why…

The police officers had been sent by their senior officer to escort his friend “the gentleman” through airport security to the waiting lounge, and to ensure he wasn’t harassed by anyone. During the course of our conversation this gentleman went to great detail to explain what “not being harassed” meant.

When he normally travelled from Islamabad it meant he’s met out front by several officers. They take his passport and his ticket. One of the officers escorts the gentleman pass all the security checks to the waiting lounge. The others take all his luggage directly through the luggage check-in without it ever being opened or x-rayed. It’s checked in. They then take his passport and ticket and have it stamped at immigration and then take his documents up to him in the waiting lounge – he doesn’t normally go through immigration himself.

He went to great length boasting at how he doesn’t have a weight limit regardless of who he fly’s with, how on his last trip he was able to take close to 100 KG of luggage with him. I told him that must have been expensive, and he laughed and said “they don’t charge me anything … the police just load it onto the plane”. He was holding his boarding pass in his hand and I clearly see it was marked “Economy” just like mine. This meant was only entitled to 30 KG.

Why did this frighten me so much? Since 9/11 Airports around the world have been implementing more and more rigorous and some feel more draconian security measures to ensure that bombs and weapons cant be smuggled onto aircraft. As passengers we sometimes feel harassed by this or frustrated but we all like to think that hey everyone has to go through the same process and in the end it’s for our own safety – so we accept it.

At Islamabad airport though if your friends with a senior police officer none of the security checks or rules need apply to you. Your luggage isn’t even put through an x-ray machine. That scares me. It scares me a lot.

Many airlines British Airways, Emirates, US, Singapore etc. fly to and from airports in Pakistan. The pilots and cabin crew don’t work on check-in desks they rely on the local authorities to have conducted all the necessary security and safety checks to ensure no one gets a weapon or a bomb onto a plane, either in hand luggage or in the cargo hold. But if those security checks are routinely circumvented by certain people, either because its so easy to bribe officials, or because officials are happy to do favours for friends – then that puts us all in danger.

I believe that any airline that has assets travelling to and from airports in Pakistan needs to demand that something is done about this. I can tell you this – if a plane ever blows up or is hijacked after leaving an airport in Pakistan you don’t need to waste millions on exhaustive investigations to figure out how the “terrorists” got weapons or a bomb onto the plane; corruption amongst security personal at airports in Pakistan is culturally ingrained, I fear it isn’t a question of “if” it will happen. It’s a question of “when”. Unless the international community and airlines around the world do something about it. Ironically the FIA was created to combat this type of corruption and that’s the authority that handles such complaints or issues – yet I’ve seen with my own eyes how corrupt FIA officials are.

As for the important gentleman in the blue suit? I told him I thought he must be someone really important to get that kind of treatment. Turns out he’s unemployed living off benefits – he’s not a dignatory, not an official – just a nobody who happens to be the relative of a good friend of the head of police at the airport.

A team of world-leading neuroscientists has developed a powerful technique that allows them to look deep inside a person’s brain and read their intentions before they act

When I read the headline the first thought that sprung to mind was 1984 closely followed by Minority Report. It reveals how far neuroscience is progressing but an urgent debate is needed on the ethical issues surrounding such technologies.

The idea of being able to control a computer with your mind, or a wheelchair on the face of it sounds quite appealing and advocates of this technology argue that it could have many such benefits.

Detractors maintain that such technology could be used to create an Orwellian style society. This kind of technology has the potential to change society, and we need to understand and encourage debate around its ethical use:

“Do we want to become a ‘Minority Report’ society where we’re preventing crimes that might not happen? For some of these techniques, it’s just a matter of time. It is just another new technology that society has to come to terms with and use for the good, but we should discuss and debate it now because what we don’t want is for it to leak into use in court willy nilly without people having thought about the consequences” Barbara Sahakian,Professor Neuro-Psychology at Cambridge

“These techniques are emerging and we need an ethical debate about the implications, so that one day we’re not surprised and overwhelmed and caught on the wrong foot by what they can do. These things are going to come to us in the next few years and we should really be prepared,” Professor John Dylan-Haynes

According to a home office spokesman this idea would mean that sex offenders would have to register their online identity with the police, the notion that “online identities would be treated in exactly the same was their real name” is ridiculous given that it takes about five seconds to register a new email address, and even ip addresses can be faked – i cant see how this could be enforced and it seems to me to be a monumental waste of money.

After reading Bruce Schneier’s piece on the Psychology of Security I can’t help but feel this is a move to make people feel more secure when the reality is that they are far from it.

The wider issue of everyone having a single Internet Identity that uniquely identifies them (like a National Insurance number), is interesting. I need to give it a bit more thought before I comment on it.

The Bush administration did not seek legislation to authorize its new pre-emptive approach, instead relying on existing, if previously little used, laws. Key among these were two statutes—passed in 1994 and 1996 respectively—barring “material support” of terrorism, which can mean anything from personnel to funds. The laws, which were expanded under post-9/11 legislation, allow the government to bring terrorism- related charges even when no terrorism has occurred.

The article does raise some excellent points around the whole issue of the rhetoric found in Islamic Extremism:

The rhetoric of Islamic extremism may present the toughest challenge for that standard since its establishment. The question lapping at the trials’ edges—and sometimes at their core—is how the law should deal with language that does not incite but, through a long slow process, indoctrinates. On the continuum between word and deed, belief and action, where do we draw the legal lines?

I’ll concede that this is an incredibly divisive topic and I can understand why its so difficult for the judiciary to deal with this. Equally though it alarms me that a Muslim who, perhaps professes sympathy to the plight of the Palestinians in Gaza, might under this interpretation of the law find him/herself branded a terrorist.

The interpretation of Islamic texts is fraught with difficulties and extremists have been very good at using this to their advantage but that isn’t something that is at all unique to Islam. At the moment though it’s only Islam that seems to be linked so inextricably with terrorism. As Amy points out:

The question of how to interpret a text may be as old as writing, and it applies equally to determining where the power of religious speech inheres. In authorial intent? A reader’s interpretation? Historical or modern context? Over the centuries, and even today, the Bible and Christian theology have helped justify the Crusades, slavery, violence against gays, and the murder of doctors who perform abortions. The words themselves are latent, inert, harmless—until they aren’t.

What worries me the most though are the comments made one of the Jurors at a trial that Amy describes in her article:

We’re not being asked, “Did the defendant commit the crime?”—whether it’s larceny, murder, whatever. Now you’re being asked, “Is the defendant capable of doing a crime?” And I don’t think that that is in the … level of understanding of the juror.

It’s no secret that the Met completely got it wrong with reference to the tragic shooting of Jean Charles de Menezes^[2]. They killed the wrong man and then attempted to cover it up with series of lies. However as badly as the situation was handled and as disturbing as the subsequent cover up was, I’m not at all convinced that turning to a military unit is the right answer. Military units are trained for combat not law enforcement, so I find myself questioning whether, in the case of the Menezes shooting, they would have been more or less restrained.

Interestingly, as far as I know here in the UK we do not have the equivalent of the Posse Comitatus Act^[3], which in the United States is a law that forbids the military from acting in a law enforcement capacity within the US (unless expressly authorised by Congress). It’s debatable as to whether we need it, however in the US it serves as a deterrent to prevent the deployment of military troops at the local level to deal with what should be purely a law enforcement matter – it should be noted that since 9/11 this law has been somewhat eroded^[4].

1. The Times – SAS Unit moves to London in terror fight, http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2559186,00.html [back]
2. Jean Charles de Menezes, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Charles_De_Menezes [back]
3. Posse Comitatus Act, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posse_Comitatus_Act [back]
4. The Myth of Posse Comitatus, Major Craig Trebilcock – http://www.homelandsecurity.org/journal/articles/Trebilcock.htm [back]

I think, quite honestly, when corporate CEOs see that those firms are representing the very terrorists who hit their bottom line back in 2001, those CEOs are going to make those law firms choose between representing terrorists or representing reputable firms

Stimson’s remarks deserve condemnation. Neal Sonnett the President of the American Judicature Society, a non-partisan group of judges and lawyers described Stimsons words as “shameful and irresponsible” he actually went on to say that what Stimson words were a “blatant attempt to intimidate lawyers and their firms who are rendering important public service in upholding the rule of law and our democratic ideals”.

Stimson is no stranger to controversy, he infamously stated last October that more than 300 prisoners currently detained at Guantanamo Bay could remain there under US Military detention for the rest of their lives. These are men who have never been tried or legally charged with a crime. Stimson discounted international outrage over the detentions as “small little protests around the world” that were inflated by liberal news agencies. It’s a fact that FBI Agents have documented more than two dozen incidents of mistreatment at Guantanamo – in fact in a December court ruling a federal judge in Washington decried the plight of “some of the unfortunate petitioners who have been detained for many years in terrible conditions at Guantanamo Bay”. Whenever I think of Guantanamo Bay I always recall the following words written by Dostoevsky :

“The degree of civilisation in a society can be judged by entering its prisons”

The US government tells us that these men are guilty but won’t tell us why, and seemingly isnt willing to let these men be tried in civil courts in front of the world, legally. It’s shocking, though not surprising, that the man they have chosen to oversee detainee policy in Guantanamo would want to encourage legal firms’ corporate clients to pressure them not to defend these men. I would hazard a guess that most of us living in the US or the UK understand that legal representation of the accused is one of the core principles of any democracy – that your innocent until proven guilty. Professor Charles Fried of Harvard Law School recently rebuked Stimson:

It is the pride of a nation built on the rule of law that it affords to every man a zealous advocate to defend his rights in court, and of a liberal profession in such a nation that not only is the representation of the dishonorable honorable (and any lawyer is free to represent any person he chooses), but that it is the duty of the profession to make sure that every man has that representation.

The Pentagon has disavowed Stimson’s remarks, and the controversy surrounding his words resulted in him issuing an apology through the Washington Post. Yet the fact that he hasn’t been sacked speaks volumes about this administration and its conduct.

I remember how different the world around me felt immediately after 9/11. I’m sure It affected everyone. As uncertain a time as it was and as frightening nothing frightened me more than the first time I heard the phrase “The Patriot Act“. It was a piece of legislation signed into law by George Bush that expanded the authority of American law enforcement for the stated purpose of fighting terrorism even though it meant erroding a few civil liberties.

At the time it troubled me greatly that commentators and critics of this bill were branded unpatriotic, or branded as helping the terrorists. Six years on it would appear that the administration is still playing the same card, only now its turning its attention to the lawyers and others in the legal profession trying to provide these individuals with a defence they are entitled to under democratic law.

As I write this I find myself recalling and agreeing with the words of another famous writer, Oscar Wilde, when he said that:

patriotism is the virtue of the vicious

Now I’m no military commander, but if your enemy can rely on two year old photos to plan attacks against you then shouldn’t alarm bells be ringing in your head about your own complacency? Am I the only one that thinks that it shouldn’t really be possible for insurgents to pinpoint attacks based on two year old pictures?

By their own admission the Military Intelligence (Oxymoron anyone?) state that:

We have never had proof that they have deliberately targeted any area of the camp using these images but presumably they are of great use to them.

I’m guessing a pair of binoculars and a current roadmap might actually be more useful to them. Unless the images were very recent they aren’t going to show the correct positions of tents, or ordinance or even buildings. I admit they might be useful in the wider context of planning to provide information about surrounding terrain but its not as though that information isn’t already available elsewhere.

McNamara’s opening salvo is hardly objective:

Sooner or later Google is going to have to start doing a better job of coming to grips with the collateral damage created by the ever-expanding array of wiz-bang applications that have made it a worldwide phenomenon.

There are always social implications for any new technology most people love Google Earth in fact there’s an entire sub-culture thats developed around people trying to identify buildings, boats, interesting bits of terrain etc. and posting what they have discovered up just visit here to see what I mean. Stating that by not censoring their service Google is somehow colluding with terrorists to kill soldiers is to my mind offensive, I’d agree with him if the images were real time or current but they aren’t. All this is, is scaremongering of the worst kind and I dont like it … in fact I find it quite distasteful.

C’mon the last time I tried to use Google Earth to look at my home there was a huge camper van parked outside it owned by one of the neighbours … but she sold it three years ago!

Anyway found this article over at The Register whilst its a tad irreverent it makes a great read, one of the individuals quoted (Brigadier Daya Ratnayake – Sri Lanka) makes an excellent point:

“In this era of technology, you have to live with the fact that almost everything is on the internet – from bomb-making instructions to assembling aircraft. So it’s something the military has to learn to live with and adapt.”

However what worries me the most is that doing a quick google for the search “google earth insurgents terrorists” leads me to a list of articles that regurgitate the kinds flawed views echoed by McNamara and fail to point out how woefully out of date the images are. Take this quote from Fox News’s coverage of the story:

The officer said he believes insurgents use Google Earth to identify the most vulnerable areas of bases, such as tents. The tool can get as detailed as showing specific vehicles in a desired region and has no limits to who can sign up and use it

What happened to journalistic integrity? or actually using common sense? I guess scaring the shit out of people sells newspapers a damn sight quicker than telling them the truth.

For those in any doubt here’s John Pike’s view on the issue over at GlobalSecurity.org:

“If I was going to be going through all the trouble to conduct a well-planned assault on a nuclear power plant, I’m not going to trust some Web site to do my intelligence collection, If evildoers were wanting to get imagery of say, a nuclear power plant, there’s simply so many different ways that they can do it, the fact that it’s available on an Internet Web site really doesn’t alter their attack planning requirements.”

You can also read this article written by Barry Levine which offers a more balanced view, in fact Paul I recommend that you do read it you might actually learn something useful to report back to your readers.

btw: heres Bruce Schneier’s take on it.

If journalists do not see it as their job to give such background and it is still so hard to find elsewhere, then politicians can go on deceiving themselves and their people.

I remember rather anecdotaly mentioning during the conversation that whilst at aQtive Justin, Alan and myself briefly worked with a company called topsoft, who almost a decade ago had developed a full disk encryption system, which they were selling to other companies and the UK DoD. FDE systems have often been considered overkill, but encrypting every bit of information on a machine does mean that you dont need to rely on the user consciously choosing what to encrypt and what not to.

It is interesting that the US Government has decided to open up this selection of a product in the form of a competition … I find myself agreeing with Schneier’s assessment that:

It’s certainly a high-stakes competition among the vendors, but one that is likely to improve the security of all products. I’ve long said that one of the best things the government can do to improve computer security is to use its vast purchasing power to pressure vendors to improve their security.

But I’ve always been really wary of the whole idea of Key Escrow, the system just seems far too easy to abuse, and some of the worse violations of privacy, encroachment of civil liberties and indeed human rights have been perpetrated by so called patriots under the banner of “national security“.

I’ve been visiting their site from time to time my interest in it really began after 9/11 where scientists were discussing the plethora of security measures being proposed by governments as well the threats posed by different forms of terrorism. Their analysis was often more rationalised than the often hysterical or sensationalist reports that were fed through politicians and main stream media. However the topics they cover range from scientific integrity and ethics all the way through to specific scientific issues such as global warming or the debate on GM foods. If you have views on these issues, and others, then its definitely worth visting their site.

Anyway, this particular article relates to how ExxonMobil has not only adopted the same disinformation tactics used by the tobacco industry but also some of the same individuals and organisations, in an attempt to cloud the scientific understanding of global warming, delaying any action on the issue. They document how ExxonMobil has funneled almost $16 million to a network of 43 advocacy organisations to confuse the public on the issue of climate change.

The idealist in me hopes that the revelations in the report as well as the money trail it documents shows all the idiots who have blindly fallen for Exxon’s so called scientific arguments about how global warming isn’t happening, why and how they’ve all been played for chumps.

The cynic in me doubts that these revelations will change anything the reality is that its greed that drives politicians and big businesses to resort to these underhanded tricks because ultimately its their pockets that are being lined and for some reason they are either unable or unwilling to look beyond their quarterly profits and dividends.

I remember back when I was working at aQtive with Alan, on a hot summers day it started raining heavily, and the area around Edgbaston was flooded really badly. I commented on how freakish it was to have weather like that in the middle of summer, and I recall we had a short chat about global warming in which he stated the paradox around governments unwillingness to act on the issue was akin to watching some bloke saw through the tree limb he’s sitting on. I might be putting words in his mouth, but im pretty sure thats how he put it. It’s incomprehensible that governments are not doing more about the problem, or indeed as in the case of the US, wanting to completely ignore the issue. I often wonder if these politicians, particularly in the US, would be so closed minded on the issue if they weren’t so reliant on political contributions from the large oil companies.

Forgive my ignorance but can someone please explain to me what the difference is between a political contribution and a bribe?

What’s been bothering me over the last few days is The Execution of Saddam of Hussein on Eid. It’s safe to say the event divided opinion amongst the group of people I was with – and it was a pretty diverse group of folks from all around Europe. Not enough to completely ruin our excursion but enough to give us all pause, and a need to debate the issue. What did suprise me was that everyone agreed the trial was a farce, but the penalty he received was probably what he deserved.

Before I go on, I guess I need to qualify anything further with some caveats: I’m in no way a supporter of Saddam, or sympathiser or trying to defend any of his actions. I couldn’t possibly describe myself as a pacifist and I’m certainly not against the death penalty … which was a truth I discovered whilst working with Amnesty International when I was younger … I started off with spirited idealism which was fine up until the point I came to believe that for some crimes death was an appropriate sentence, which unfortunately wasn’t in line with Amnesty’s views and I moved on … although I do have great respect for the work that organisation does.

So if I think he did deserve to die for his crimes, why am I bothered about it, or writing this?

My concern is with the farce that was his trial and the politically motivated execution that took place on the holiest day in the Islamic calendar. I’m hardly the most devout of Muslims … like many people I’m trying to find my faith, yet as despondent as I am even I was stunned by the insensitivity of executing him on the day that they chose to. For anyone who cant understand why that bothers me, imagine the distaste you might feel, for example, as a Christian, if Mr Bush or Blair was executed on Christmas Day for Crimes against Humanity? Put it this way I know this single event overshadowed the Eid celebrations for every Muslim I know.

Before I go on I have to thank Wikipedia, it truly is an invaluable resource when researching anything these days and I’ve certainly been using it a lot particularly in finding some of the materials I reference in this discussion.

I want to start by talking about the trial.

When Saddam was captured and it was evident that he would face trial, like many people I assumed that this monster would be tried in the International Criminal Court, he would undoubtedly be charged with Crimes against Humanity and given the unstable state of Iraq, and the fact that it is currently occupied, surely it would be in the interest of justice and truth for the trial to be neutral and held under the auspices of being fair and independent – I just couldn’t see how the national judicial system would be able to provide that. As with the Nazi’s at Nuremberg the facts of Saddam’s atrocities would thus be documented for the world to see.

As a student of history I like to believe that we can learn from the mistakes of the past. The Nuremberg Trials, whilst flawed in some ways, where formed by the Allies under Truman and Churchill’s genuine hope at the time that they were keen for justice to be done, and to be seen to be done. On September the 30th 1946 the War Crimes Tribunal at Nuremberg gave its judgement on 22 Nazi War Criminals. I believe its greatest achievement was in providing a fair trial under the most difficult of circumstances to a group of men who most people felt deserved it the least. Nuremberg uncovered the horrors of those atrocities, detailed them for the world to see, the ramifications of which still haunt us today.

I was studying the aftermath of the second world war at college, and how Nazi war criminals were brought to justice, when I first I read this, and the warning it carries:

“We must never forget that the record on which we judge these defendants is the record on which history will judge us tomorrow. To pass these defendants a poisoned chalice is to put it to our own lips as well.”

- Justice Robert Jackson at Nuremberg

Interestingly I’m not the only one … I came across this article written by Curtis Doebbler, one of the defence lawyers assigned to Saddam. Doebbler describes in no uncertain terms how the Iraqi Special Tribunal (IST) handled the case. He points out what I believe the fundamental flaw behind this trial:

The trial was undertaken by a court set up and controlled by the United States, an occupying power. This violates the express provisions of international humanitarian law in the Fourth Geneva Convention.

Which is compounded by the revelation he makes that …

In addition the US has allegedly written the final decision as they wrote the closing statement for the defense after the judge forced the defense lawyers chosen by the defendants out of the courtroom.

It’s seems incomprehensible to me that a foreign power that clearly wanted him dead could write the closing statement for the defense in his trial, it also makes a mockery of President Bush’s assertion that “Saddam was executed after receiving a fair trial”. Now I don’t know if its possible that Saddam could ever have received a fair trial anywhere, but at least call it what it was, a scripted show put on for the benefit of making some impotent gesture to create the appearance of propriety. The entire proceeding was a denigration of law and should rightly outrage our sense of justice … and perhaps the reason it doesn’t is because he was a monster. But even if he was should that diminish our responsibility to the ideals we supposedly believe in? It’s hard to extol the virtues of democracy if were willing to shelve them in order to get rid of a thorn in our side.

Of everything I’ve read around these proceedings nothing captivated me as much as a short interview I saw, whilst away, on BBC News 24 with Ramsey Clark who said the following in answer to the question: “The execution itself is it any justice?”

Its a tragic assault upon truth and justice, and the consequences for the future can be dire not only to the people of Iraq and the passions it will inflame and perhaps ripple beyond, but to the idea and hope for international law. The court reeked of prejudice … before the trial started the judge said we don’t need a trial we just need a hanging.

You can view the interview here on the BBC site.

Alarmingly of all the atrocities that Saddam is known to have committed his trial was based around a single atrocity, the killing of 143 Shiites from Dujail, in retaliation for the failed assassination attempt of 8 July 1982. Why is this alarming? Well why not put him on trial for the Halabja Poison Gas Attack? It also falls under the description of a Crime against Humanity, it was an even more barbaric act than the one for which he was ostensibly executed. In answering this question you come to what I think was the truth behind his trial and the reason the US and other nations were so eager for him to be tried for the single atrocity, that would appease the overwhelmingly Shiite government, and for the court not to venture into anything else. The answer lies in how Saddam came to power and the assistance he received.

In 1958, a year after Saddam had joined the Ba’ath party, army officers led by General Abdul Karim Qassim overthrew Faisal II of Iraq. The Ba’athists opposed the new government, and in 1959, Saddam was involved in the attempted United States-backed plot to assassinate Qassim. Concerned about Qassim’s growing ties to Communists, the CIA gave assistance to the Ba’ath Party and other regime opponents. This paved the way for Saddam to eventually become the leader of Iraq and an ally of the US. For a more detailed account read this.

In 1979 Iran’s Shah was overthrown in the Islamic Revolution led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. This alarmed the west and they needed a buffer between themselves and Khomeini and his expansionist Islamic state. That’s why they armed the Iraqi dictator with amongst other things the materials with which to build … chemical weapons, I’d insert a quip here about what happened to the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction but it isn’t as though anyone gives a flying f*** if its the Americans dishing out WMD’s to their buddies … Ok im being unfair …. its important to point out that it wasn’t just the US but a number of other nations who must share the responsibility … these nations are listed here. In fact I wonder if any of the companies listed here ever faced legal proceedings or even censure for their part in equipping the regime, or ever revealed how much money they made from these transactions ( as well as who they made political contributions too at the time )

Here’s an extract from Wikipedia:

During the war, Iraq used Western supplied chemical weapons against Iranian forces fighting on the southern front and Kurdish separatists who were attempting to open up a northern front in Iraq with the help of Iran.^[16]

On March 16, 1988, the Kurdish town of Halabja was attacked with a mix of mustard gas and nerve agents, killing 5,000 civilians, and maiming, disfiguring, or seriously debilitating 10,000 more. (see Halabja poison gas attack) [10]. The attack occurred in conjunction with the 1988 al-Anfal campaign designed to reassert central control of the mostly Kurdish population of areas of northern Iraq and defeat the Kurdish peshmerga rebel forces. The United States now maintains that Saddam ordered the attack to terrorize the Kurdish population in northern Iraq,^[17] but Saddam’s regime claimed at the time that Iran was responsible for the attack^[18] and the US supported the claim until the early 1990s.

So perhaps the real reason Saddam’s trial was so short was that a proceeding as thorough and competent as the Nuremberg trial would have revealed in detail not only the historic truth of what happened at Halabaja, but of all the other atrocities that the US, and other regional powers, colluded with him in. That might have been a bit much for our western sensibilities to palette. Not to mention demands from survivors and their relatives for reparations, compensation etc. etc. and thats exactly what would happen since one of the results of the Nuremberg Trials was drafting of The Convention on the Abolition of the Statute of Limitations on War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity in 1968, which basically meant there was no period of limitation for crimes against humanity … to further expound on this:

Article 2. If any of the crimes mentioned in article I is committed, the provisions of this Convention shall apply to representatives of the State authority and private individuals who, as principals or accomplices, participate in or who directly incite others to the commission of any of those crimes, or who conspire to commit them, irrespective of the degree of completion, and to representatives of the State authority who tolerate their commission

It’s certainly widely believed that the proliferation of weapons in this manner was aided by the CIA as well as the knowledge to build them. At some level this would have had to have been authorised directly or tacitly by individuals in government … mmm I’m beginning to understand why the United States never signed up to the International Criminal Court (from Wikipedia):

To date, 104 countries have ratified or acceded to the court, including nearly all of Europe and South America, and nearly half of all African countries.[5] A further 35 states have signed but not yet ratified the treaty,[6] which under the law of treaties obliges states to refrain from “acts which would defeat the object and purpose” of the treaty.[7] The USA and Israel have “unsigned” the Rome treaty in order to avoid these obligations.

I guess in their own way Truman and Churchill had a better understanding or belief in the ideals of law and justice than their current successors do; Nuremberg was their testament to those ideals. Whilst the Iraqi Special Tribunal will stand as a Testament to their contemporaries.

Oh well I guess it’s ok to demonise some foreign monster … just don’t do anything to remind us how we created that monster … colluded with him in committing his atrocities … oh and please don’t tell us that some of those other monsters that helped him … well they’re still out there … getting rich off it …. some of them are even running the countries we live in probably planning their next regime change.

Sarcasm aside, has his death accomplished anything. Has it given justice to his victims? Perhaps in some sense it has, although I wonder if those victims can ever truly have justice whilst the representatives of powers that colluded with him and the companies that profited from their deaths will probably never face trial for their part in these atrocities. If it had been a relative of mine killed in Halabja I wouldn’t just want Saddam swinging from the gallows but everyone else that colluded with him, how could I possible rest knowing that some of those just as responsible were still out there.

His death certainly isn’t going to end the violence in Iraq, if anything, as Ramsey Clark stated it will probably “inflame passions” further. To execute him on the day that most Sunni’s celebrated Eid in Iraq (and much of the world) will be seen by many as a deliberate affront given that Shiites celebrated Eid the following day. The subtext in this decision alone is hard to ignore, to consider that it was an innocent coincidence is beyond my ability to stomach.

A video released on the internet that was recorded by someone actually present at the execution shows how Saddam was heckled and taunted by his Shiite captors right up to the moment he was hanged, I haven’t linked to the movie itself, you can find it on Google Video if you want to see it. Far from appearing frightened or defeated he was defiant right to the end admonishing the hecklers for their lack of bravery in taunting a shackled man. He managed to retain his dignity in the moment of his death not succumbing to fear or begging for mercy … defiant to the end. He actually managed to appear more dignified than those tormenting him at his execution … and that doesn’t bode well for this supposedly democratic new government in Iraq – their neolithic incompetence in this entire affair has turned a monster into a martyr and that’s a gross travesty of justice – but I guess it’s disingenuous to lay the blame entirely at their feet … its not as though they actually govern the country or make any decisions.

I think I’ll end this discussion firstly with this statement by Louis Arbour, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

“All sections of Iraqi society, as well as the wider international community, have an interest in ensuring that a death sentence provided for in Iraqi law is only imposed following a trial and appeal process that is, and is legitimately seen as, fair, credible and impartial.

“That is especially so in a case as exceptional as this one.”

and this reflection by Richard Dicker, of the Human Rights Watch.

“The test of a government’s commitment to human rights is measured by the way it treats its worst offenders…

“It defies imagination that the Appeals Chamber could have thoroughly reviewed the 300-page judgment and the defence’s written arguments in less than three weeks’ time… The appeals process appears even more flawed than the trial…

“History will judge the deeply flawed Dujail trial and this execution harshly.”

As for Iraq’s future … I have to admit that at the moment it appears bleak. The country is in the midst of a civil war, and whilst that’s not a fact politicians in the west are willing to acknowledge one only has to look at the daily body count to appreciate the tragic reality of the situation. I cant help but feel that things are going to get a lot worse, before they get better. The flawed trial, the subsequent execution and its timing have only served to deepen the sectarian divides, not only within Iraq but across the whole of the middle east.

I cant help but wonder whether that was someone’s intention all along?