UN Panel Wants Iraq to Address Military Contractor Immunity

With the role of security contractors set to increase in Iraq, UN experts want the Iraqi government to settle their legal status once and for all.

Contractor numbers are expected to grow once American troops leave the country at the end of the year. Faiza Patel, head of the UN working group on the use of mercenaries, was at the UN today to present the group’s latest report. 

Patel says the 2007 killing of 17 Iraqi civilians in Nisoor Square allegedly carried out by Blackwater security guards, highlighted the legal challenges in holding private security companies accountable for crimes and rights abuses.

“Due to the coalition’s provisional authority grant of immunity to contractors, the alleged Blackwater perpetrators could not be prosecuted in Iraqi courts. “ she told reporters “Prosecution in the United States, the home country of Blackwater, now known as Xe, has also not yet produced satisfactory results. Four years after the incident, the criminal case against the Blackwater guards is still pending in US courts.”

In 2009,  the Iraq-US Status of Force Agreement (SOFA) ended the legal immunity for certain types of contractors. Patel says that while SOFA was an improvement, it was also unclear about which “category” of military contractors were exempt from prosecution in Iraq. 

But with US troops scheduled to withdraw from the country before the end of the year and SOFA no longer expected to be enforced, Patel says the immunity question needs to be addressed.

 “The status of foreign contractors in Iraq is quite unclear and this is a matter to which the working group believes the Iraqi government should pay urgent attention.”

The Obama administration decided to withdraw all US troops when it could not get an agreement on legal immunity from the Iraq government. But that decision will probably push the State department to rely on private security companies, so immunity will continue to be an issue.

US Diplomat Suspended For Writing Controversial Book, Linking To WikiLeaks

Foreign Services Officer Peter Van Buren claimed Thursday that he was suspended indefinitely from his position at the State Department earlier this week after writing a book that was critical of U.S policy in Iraq and linking to Wikileaks on his blog. 

Van Buren’s book “We Meant Well: How I Helped Lose the Battle for the Hearts and Minds of the Iraqi People” details his experiences in Iraq as a diplomat and the lack of purpose and success in US policy in Iraq. 

“I got off the helicopter at my first operating base and I said the equivalent of ‘so what are we working on?’ and the guy said ‘I thought you were telling us,’” Van Buren told an audience at the National Press Club on Thursday. “It only went downhill from there.” 

“No one was particularly concerned about what we were doing, how much money we were spending, and the results of our endeavors,” Van Buren added.

And this is exactly what he writes about in his book. Whether detailing a chicken factory built in Iraq from $2 million of U.S taxpayer money that laid dormant or how an Ambassador paid between $2 to $5 million to have seeds and sod imported to grow grass on the Embassy Grounds, Van Buren details what he describes as irresponsible use of billions of dollars in Iraq that brought them no closer to a reconstructed society. 

Upon completing the book, Van Buren submitted the manuscript to the State Department for clearance. Because he received no response, he proceeded with the book publishing and blogged to promote it. 

At the end of August, however, Van Buren’s security clearance was revoked for disclosing classified information by linking to the whistleblowing site wikileaks in one of his blog posts. 

While wikileaks did expose classified information illegal for Van Buren to reveal, Van Buren defends sharing the link by saying the information was already out there and he was merely linking to it.

On September 20, the State Department requested he remove a chapter in his book disclosing classified material. The chapter, entitled “A Spooky Dinner,”  depicts intelligence officials dining in Saddam Hussein’s palace.

Van Buren refused to remove it from his book.

On October 21, Van Buren angered the State Department once again when he critically blogged about Secretary of State Hillary Clinton laughing about Gadaffi’s death in an interview with Diane Sawyer. As a result, Van Buren was suspended indefinitely from his position at the State Department and was escorted from the building on Monday, October 24. His ID badge was confiscated and he is prohibited from entering any state department facility.

Yet while Van Buren will not be working, he is still receiving full pay.

When asked by TRNS if all of this was worth writing the book, Van Buren responded that it was. 

“I thought it was a story worth telling but to be honest I never thought I would have to sacrifice my career to tell it, but that’s what happened,” Van Buren remarked. “Was it worth it? I have to say yes. Time will tell.”

Click here to see photos of Van Buren at the National Press Club on Thursday. 

Iraqi-American-Blogger: The War In Is Not Over

By Lisa Kellmna

Despite President Obama’s assurance last week that all American troops will be out of Iraq by the end of the year, Iraqi-American blogger, Raed Jarrar, in an interview today, insisted while this will help Iraq move forward, America will continue to have an obtrusive presence .

Jarrad and those in Iraq believe the war will not end until military and non military American forces erase their footprint in Iraq completely.

By the end of 2011, The U.S. Department of Defense will remove the 40,000 troops still stationed in Iraq, shut all U.S. military bases and hand them over to the Iraqis, leaving only 160 service members in the Iraqi Embassy as part of the Office of Security Cooperation.  

The U.S. Department of State, on the other hand, plans on doubling its personnel from 8,000 to 16,000, half of whom will be armed, in order to train Iraqi soldiers and government members and provide basic aid.

However, training is not the issue argued Jarrar.

“Iraqis and neighboring countries view the Iraqi government and armed forces as puppets of a foreign occupation and legitimacy will not be brought to them by the U.S. presence,” Jarrar said.

Jarrar acknowledged Iraq’s broken military and political system, but emphasized America’s military presence has not nor will ever be part of the solution.

According to Jarrar, to help Iraqis, America needs to cease its military and non military intervention in Iraq.  Those in Iraq who have committed crimes and contributed to Iraq’s downfall need to be held responsible, and the U.S. needs to compensate Iraqis for the destruction it has caused since first arriving.

“The vast majority of solutions will come from within Iraq, by Iraqis, and for Iraqis, things that foreigners cannot and should not attempt to fix,” said Jarrar.  

Seven Anti-War Demonstrators Arrested At House Hearing

Seven anti-war protesters were arrested by Capitol Police Thursday after repeatedly interrupting the testimony of Defense officials at a House Armed Services hearing.

The anti-war demonstrators, who have been identified as part of the Occupy DC movement in Freedom Plaza, teamed up with Code Pink and shuffled their way into the crowded hearing room that was expected to hear testimony from Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Martin Dempsey.

According to a statement released by October2011.org, an advocate website for the Occupy DC movement, one of the demonstrators arrested was 21-year-old veteran Michael Patterson, who was deployed to Iraq as an interrogator at the age of 18.

Patterson interrupted the testimony of Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and was eventually arrested and escorted from the hearing room by two Capitol Police officers.

“You are murdering people,” Patterson shouted. “I saw what you do to people in Iraq.”

Demonstrators who failed to infiltrate the hearing room continued to shout, “We are the 99 percent and we don’t support these wars,” throughout the hallways of Rayburn House Office Building.

The seven demonstrators were arrested and charged with disruption of Congress.

Ron Paul Attributes Polling Rise To Diminished Public Confidence

By Adrianna McGinley

Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul attributed his rising support to the failure of the current economic and political environment, but admitted that he has been guilty of not always transmitting a clear message on the campaign trail.

At a breakfast held Wednesday by the Christian Science Monitor, the Texas Congressman said he needs to refine his message but added that he notices a shift in the public that may boost his chances of surprising the GOP field next year.

“I think people just flat out don’t understand what I’m talking about,” Paul said. “But the people who do get super excited about it because it’s an alternative that explains how we got in to trouble and what we have to do.”

Paul took responsibility for those who do not understand his message saying, “It’s partially my fault, and I think that’s what I work on the most, trying to refine my message, but I don’t think it’s a complicated message…If you have the right ideas and you’re forceful enough, you can have an influence and you win an in, and that’s where we are right now because the whole attitude of the whole country is shifting in our direction.”

Paul attributed his success to the public’s disappointment over the current economic situation.

“The people are noticing the government doesn’t work…I think it’s the failure of the entitlement system, the failure of our foreign policy, the failure that now the people recognize of the Federal Reserve, and I think that’s the reason why now people are looking more carefully, because we’re offering a solution to our problems and an explanation to how it happened. Too often people say when we have a recession what do you do, they don’t ask why did you have a recession?”

Paul noted the public’s lack of confidence in the two-party system as well, saying, “The people are coming to the conclusion there’s not a whole lot of difference between the two parties…I think an alternative party would be very healthy in this country.” Yet he denied any possibility of running as a third party candidate should he not win the GOP nomination.

“I’m not considering that at all.”

Paul did however, express willingness to work with the left should he win the election. He applauded liberal lawmakers Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) and Sen. Bernie Sanders’s (D-Vt.) for their stance on issues concerning the Federal Reserve. “You’ve got to give some credit to the people who think,” Paul said. He added later that he would consider creating a new “Department of Peace” that the anti-war Kucinich could run.

Paul criticized the U.S.’s involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“After 9/11, I voted for the authority and I voted for the funding to go after those individuals responsible, but I didn’t vote for nation building,” he said. “Republicans and Democrats in the last several decades have accepted the idea that we are this exceptional nation that we have something to offer, and we’re not going to offer it by setting a good example and trying to get people to emulate us. We are so good and so wonderful, that we’re going to force it on people. We go to these countries, we don’t know their culture, their religion, their economics or anything, and it leads to perpetual war.

Paul also doubted the likelihood that the U.S. will remove all its troops from Iraq.

“We’re not going to leave Iraq, we’ve just built an embassy over there that cost the American taxpayer a billion dollars.”

Later, Paul turned to financial matters, arguing that the U.S. must not agree to a bailout of Greece, Portugal or any other European nation in fiscal crisis.

“Greece should declare bankruptcy,” Paul said. “[We] should stay out of it, [we] should not put a greater burden on the American people because the only way we can help them is by inflating our currency, further leading to the destruction of the middle class.”