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Dead Constitution See other Dead Constitution Articles Title: THE GOVERNMENT IS BREAKING THE LAW BY FAILING TO PROSECUTE TORTURE Preface: This is not a partisan issue. As shown below, Democrats are complicit in high crimes as well. President Ronald Reagan signed a treaty legally requiring the U.S. to prosecute everyone who authorizes torture. Specifically, the Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (signed by the U.S. under Ronald Reagan) provides: Article 2 1. Each State Party shall take effective legislative, administrative, judicial or other measures to prevent acts of torture in any territory under its jurisdiction. 2. No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat or war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture. 3. An order from a superior officer or a public authority may not be invoked as a justification of torture. . . . Article 4 1. Each State Party shall ensure that all acts of torture are offences under its criminal law. The same shall apply to an attempt to commit torture and to an act byany person which constitutes complicity or participation in torture. Article 7 1. The State Party in territory under whose jurisdiction a person alleged to have committed any offence referred to in article 4 is found, shall in the cases contemplated in article 5, if it does not extradite him, submit the case to its competent authorities for the purpose of prosecution. Article 15 Each State Party shall ensure that any statement which is established to have been made as a result of torture shall not be invoked as evidence in any proceedings, except against a person accused of torture as evidence that the statement was made. This is not some non-binding, touchy-feeley resolution … it is the law of the land. Specifically, Article 6 of the United States Constitution dictates: This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding. On May 20, 1988 – as he was transmitting the Treaty to the Senate – Reagan said: The United States participated actively and effectively in the negotiation of the Convention. It marks a significant step in the development during this century of international measures against torture and other inhuman treatment or punishment. Ratification of the Convention by the United States will clearly express United States opposition to torture, an abhorrent practice unfortunately still prevalent in the world today. The core provisions of the Convention establish a regime for international cooperation in the criminal prosecution of torturers relying on so-called “universal jurisdiction.” Each State Party is required either to prosecute torturers who are found in its territory or to extradite them to other countries for prosecution. In a 2005 Report to the UN Committee Against Torture 2005 Report to the UN Committee Against Torture, John Bellinger – the Legal Adviser to the George W. Bush State Department – wrote: Article 6 (Detention and preliminary inquiry in cases of extradition) and Article 7 (Extradite or prosecute) 53. As described in the Initial Report, federal law and bilateral extradition treaties provide the legal basis by which the United States can either extradite or prosecute individuals alleged to have committed offenses involving torture, as required by Article 7 of the Convention. Also in 2005, Condoleezza Rice – Bush’s National Security Advisor and then Secretary of State - said: Torture, and conspiracy to commit torture, are crimes under U.S. law, wherever they may occur in the world. In addition, the United States War Crimes Act of 1996, a federal statute set forth at 18 U.S.C. § 2441, makes it a federal crime for any U.S. national, whether military or civilian, to violate the Geneva Convention by engaging in murder, torture, or inhuman treatment. (Torture is – of course – a violation of the Geneva Conventions, which make it illegal to inflict mental or physical torture or inhuman treatment. ) The statute applies not only to those who carry out the acts, but also to those who ORDER IT, know about it, or fail to take steps to stop it. The statute applies to everyone, no matter how high and mighty. 18 U.S.C. § 2441 has no statute of limitations, which means that a war crimes complaint can be filed at any time. The penalty may be life imprisonment or — if a single prisoner dies due to torture — death. Given that there are numerous, documented cases of prisoners being tortured to death by U.S. soldiers in both Iraq and Afghanistan, that means that the death penalty would be appropriate for anyone found guilty of carrying out, ordering, or sanctioning such conduct. The Military Commissions Act of 2006 limited the applicability of the War Crimes Act, but still made the following unlawful: torture, cruel or inhumane treatment, murder, mutilation or maiming, intentionally causing serious bodily harm, rape, sexual assault or abuse. In 2006, 9/11 Commission Executive Director Philip Zelikow – a key member of Bush’s transition team in 2000, and a top assistant to Ms. Rice – noted that the Bush administration’s use of “cruel, inhuman or degrading” interrogation techniques like waterboarding were “a felony war crime” … “even if there is a compelling state interest asserted to justify them.” Zelikow added: We are unaware of any precedent in World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, or any subsequent conflict for authorized, systematic interrogation practices similar to those in question here … even where the prisoners were presumed to be unlawful combatants.” Dean of the Massachusetts School of Law and a professor of law Lawrence Velvel and many other legal experts say that the torture which was carried out after 9/11 is a war crime. Former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clarke notes: The U.S. is treaty bound to prosecute all persons, high and low, who haveauthorized, condoned or committed torture if our word in the international community is to mean anything. Darrel Vandeveld – former prosecutor in the Guantanamo military commissions, and current Lieutenant Colonel in the Army Reserve – wrote: Torture is a crime and the United States engaged in it. Those are two indisputable facts… The process of self-examination and accountability has been, and remains, the only way to move forward and regain our moral and legal grounding… We have a Department of Justice for a reason, and now it’s up to Attorney General Holder, the nation’s top law enforcement officer, to do his job and appoint an independent prosecutor to follow the evidence where it may lead… It is critical that we hold accountable those who authorized, those who legally sanctioned and those who implemented the torture policies of one of the darkest periods in our nation’s history. What is at stake is nothing less than our democracy. Moreover: General Ricardo Sanchez, the former top coalition commander in Iraq, called for a Truth Commission so we might fully understand the failure of the military and civilian command to honor the pledge of our constitution. Sanchez . . .stressed that the outcome must embrace a variety of solutions, including prosecution. Sanchez stated, “When the president made the declaration that the Geneva Conventions no longer apply, we unleashed the hounds of hell and eliminated all the foundations for the training, ethics and structure we had built into our soldiers and our leaders for how to conduct these kinds of operations.” Sanchez stated many problems could be traced to loyalties to individuals and political parties. Former President Jimmy Carter is also calling for a truth commission with the possibility of prosecution: “[I] like to see is a complete examination of what did happen, the identification of any perpetrators of crimes against our own laws or against international law,” said Carter. “And then after all that’s done, decide whether or not there should be any prosecutions.” Colin Powell’s former chief of staff stated that Dick Cheney is guilty of war crimes for overseeing torture policies. Matthew Alexander – a former top Air Force interrogator who led the team that tracked down Abu Musab al-Zarqawi – notes that government officials knew they are vulnerable for war crime prosecution: They have, from the beginning, been trying to prevent an investigation into war crimes. A Malaysian war crimes commission also found Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and five administration attorneys guilty of war crimes (although but the commission has no power to enforce its judgment). There Is NO DEFENSE Former National Security Adviser and Secretary of State argued that : as late as 2009, Rice echoed Richard Nixon (and Nazis during the Nuremberg war crimes trials) by claiming – “if it was authorized by the president, it did not violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture”: Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread
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