Tuesday, July 11, 2017
China - India must understand borderline is bottom line
Since Indian soldiers crossed the China-India border into Chinese territory and obstructed work on a road in the Doklam area in June, China has lodged a series of protests demanding India pull back its troops immediately.
However, New Delhi views both the incident and its actions quite differently.
In order to illegally install its troops on Chinese soil for as long as possible and achieve a fait accompli, India firstly claimed its border had been encroached by China. After realizing its own false allegation was ridiculous, it changed its tone to its actions to being in the name of "protecting" Bhutan.
India, who calls Bhutan an "ally", said it had intervened on behalf of its neighbor, yet the true subtext is the South Asian giant wants to maintain and expand regional hegemony.
The Doklam area has long been recognized as Chinese sovereign territory with a clear history and legal basis, so there is absolutely no reason for India's incursion.
If the Indian side cannot honor the long-standing agreement and correct its mistakes in a timely manner, how is it supposed to win the trust of its other neighbors, including Bhutan?
Finding this regional paternalism still refutable, India even went further by resorting to groundless assumptions and accusations that China's construction of the road near their common border would have serious security implications.
China has every right to build the road within its sovereign territory. Over the past few years it is actually India that has been sneaking around the Sikkim section of the China-India border.
Bluffing about a potential clash that could be similar to that 55 years ago when India's military suffered a bitter defeat, Indian Defense Minister Arun Jaitley said, "India in 2017 is different from India in 1962," implying the country's improved military strength and bloated self-assertiveness.
On the other hand, Jaitley should not ignore China's unwavering and consistent stance which has continued over the last five decades and its firm belief in the international justice that no country can pursue its security at the cost of another country's sovereignty.
The withdrawal of Indian troops from Doklam remains a precondition for bilateral peace, and China will take all necessary measures to ensure its territorial integrity.
India should rectify its mistakes and show sincerity to avoid an even more serious situation creating more significant consequences.
After all, the country should be fully aware of the legal consensus upheld by all members of the international community, that respecting the borderline is the bottom line for
Video Report - More than 130,000 people infected - Who is to blame for the cholera outbreak in Yemen?
More than 130,000 people have been infected with cholera and almost 1,000 people have died since April, UN says.
The United Nations (UN) describes the unprecedented cholera outbreak in Yemen as the world's worst humanitarian disaster. The disease is killing at least one person almost every hour. The UN says the number of suspected cases of cholera continues to rise.
More than 130,000 people have fallen ill since the outbreak began in April. Almost 1,000 people have died, with women and children accounting for half of the numbers.
And that is on top of the devastating effects of the war of nearly three years between the government and Houthi rebels. The Saudi-led coalition has closed the main airport and prevented many human rights workers from entering the country.
So, is the Saudi-imposed blockade complicating aid efforts?
Yemen cholera cases pass 300,000 as outbreak spirals: ICRC
A cholera outbreak in Yemen has now surpassed 300,000 suspected cases, the Red Cross said, outpacing by more than a month the projection made by the World Health Organization (WHO) at the end of June.
As the war-torn country reels from the disease and the threat of famine, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said the cholera epidemic "continues to spiral out of control" since it erupted in April.
"Today, over 300,000 people are suspected to be ill," it said in a Twitter post.
ICRC spokeswoman Iolanda Jaquemet said the death toll now stood at more than 1,700, up by 200 cases from the death toll reported by the WHO on July 1. ICRC regional director Robert Mardini said about 7,000 new cholera cases were being recorded daily in the capital Sanaa and three other areas.
The WHO had said there were 297,438 suspected cases and 1,706 deaths by July 7. It had earlier predicted that 300,000 people could be infected by the end of August.
The collapse of Yemen's infrastructure after more than two years of war between the Saudi-backed government and the Houthi rebels who control Sanaa has made for a "perfect storm for cholera", according to the WHO.
Cholera is a highly contagious bacterial infection spread through contaminated food or water.
Although the disease is easily treatable, doing so in Yemen has proved particularly difficult. The war has left less than half of the country's medical facilities functional.
Jamie McGoldrick, the UN's humanitarian coordinator in Yemen, said much of the $1.1bn in aid pledged by donor governments in April to deal with the hard-pressed population's needs had yet to be disbursed, leaving relief agencies struggling to get their hands on new money.
"Humanitarian organisations have had to re-programme their resources away from malnutrition and reuse them to control the cholera outbreak," he said in Sanaa on Thursday.
"And if we don't get these resources replaced, then using those resources for cholera will mean that food insecurity will suffer."
About 17 million people - two-thirds of Yemen's population - are uncertain of where their next meal will come from, according to the World Food Programme.
Saudi - Iran: ''Who Is the Real Enemy?''
PHILIP GIRALDI
The White House is targeting Iran but should instead focus on Saudi Arabia.
It is one of the great ironies that the United States, a land mass protected by two broad oceans while also benefitting from the world’s largest economy and most powerful military, persists in viewing itself as a potential victim, vulnerable and surrounded by enemies. In reality, there are only two significant potential threats to the U.S. The first consists of the only two non-friendly countries – Russia and China – that have nuclear weapons and delivery systems that could hit the North American continent and the second is the somewhat more amorphous danger represented by international terrorism.
And even given that, I would have to qualify the nature of the threats. Russia and China are best described as adversaries or competitors rather than enemies as they have compelling interests to avoid war, even if Washington is doing its best to turn them hostile. Neither has anything to gain and much to lose by escalating a minor conflict into something that might well start World War 3. Indeed, both have strong incentives to avoid doing so, which makes the actual threat that they represent more speculative than real. And, on the plus side, both can be extremely useful in dealing with international issues where Washington has little or no leverage, to include resolving the North Korea problem and Syria, so they U.S. has considerable benefits to be gained by cultivating their cooperation.
Also, I would characterize international terrorism as a faux threat at a national level, though one that has been exaggerated through the media and fearmongering to such an extent that it appears much more dangerous than it actually is. It has been observed that more Americans are killed by falling furniture than by terrorists in a year but terrorism has a particularly potency due to its unpredictability and the fear that it creates. Due to that fear, American governments and businesses at all levels have been willing to spend a trillion dollars per annum to defeat what might rationally be regarded as a relatively minor problem.
So if the United States were serious about dealing with or deflecting the actual threats against the American people it could first of all reduce its defense expenditures to make them commensurate with the actual threat before concentrating on three things. First, would be to establish a solid modus vivendi with Russia and China to avoid conflicts of interest that could develop into actual tit-for-tat escalation. That would require an acceptance by Washington of the fact that both Moscow and Beijing have regional spheres of influence that are defined by their interests. You don’t have to like the governance of either country, but their national interests have to be appreciated and respected just as the United States has legitimate interests within its own hemisphere that must be respected by Russia and China.
Second, Washington must, unfortunately, continue to spend on the Missile Defense Agency, which supports anti-missile defenses if the search for a modus vivendi for some reason fails. Mutual assured destruction is not a desirable strategic doctrine but being able to intercept incoming missiles while also having some capability to strike back if attacked is a realistic deterrent given the proliferation of nations that have both ballistic missiles and nukes.
Third and finally, there would be a coordinated program aimed at international terrorism based equally on where the terror comes from and on physically preventing the terrorist attacks from taking place. This is the element in national defense that is least clear cut. Dealing with Russia and China involves working with mature regimes that have established diplomatic and military channels. Dealing with terrorist non-state players is completely different as there are generally speaking no such channels.
It should in theory be pretty simple to match threats and interests with actions since there are only a handful that really matter, but apparently it is not so in practice. What is Washington doing? First of all, the White House is deliberately turning its back on restoring a good working relationship with Russia by insisting that Crimea be returned to Kiev, by blaming Moscow for the continued unrest in Donbas, and by attacking Syrian military targets in spite of the fact that Russia is an ally of the legitimate government in Damascus and the United States is an interloper in the conflict. Meanwhile congress and the media are poisoning the waters through their dogged pursuit of Russiagate for political reasons even though nearly a year of investigation has produced no actual evidence of malfeasance on the part of U.S. officials and precious little in terms of Moscow’s alleged interference.
Playing tough to the international audience has unfortunately become part of the American Exceptionalism DNA. Upon his arrival in Warsaw last week, Donald Trump doubled down on the Russia-bashing, calling on Moscow to “cease its destabilizing activities in Ukraine and elsewhere and its support for hostile regimes including Syria and Iran.” He then recommended that Russia should “join the community of responsible nations in our fight against common enemies and in defense of civilization itself.”
The comments in Warsaw were unnecessary, even if the Poles wanted to hear them, and were both highly insulting and ignorant. It was not a good start for Donald’s second overseas trip, even though the speech has otherwise been interpreted as a welcome defense of Western civilization and European values. Trump also followed up with a two hour plus discussion with President Vladimir Putin in which the two apparently agreed to differ on the alleged Russian hacking of the American election. The Trump-Putin meeting indicated that restoring some kind of working relationship with Russia is still possible, as it is in everyone’s interest to do so.
Fighting terrorism is quite another matter and the United States approach is the reverse of what a rational player would be seeking to accomplish. The U.S. is rightly assisting in the bid to eradicate ISIS in Syria and Iraq but it is simultaneously attacking the most effective fighters against that group, namely the Syrian government armed forces and the Shi’ite militias being provided by Iran and Hezbollah. Indeed, it is becoming increasingly clear that at least some in the Trump Administration are seeking to use the Syrian engagement as a stepping stone to war with Iran.
As was the case in the months preceding the ill-fated invasion of Iraq in 2003, all buttons are being pushed to vilify Iran. Recent reports suggest that two individuals in the White House in particular have been pressuring the Trump administration’s generals to escalate U.S. involvement in Syria to bring about a war with Tehran sooner rather than later. They are Ezra Cohen-Watnick and Derek Harvey, reported to be holdovers from the team brought into the White House by the virulently anti-Iranian former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.
Cohen-Watnick is thirty years old and has little relevant experience for the position he holds, senior director for intelligence on the National Security Council. But his inexperience counts for little as he is good friend of son-in-law Jared Kushner. He has told the New York Times that “wants to use American spies to help oust the Iranian government,” a comment that reflects complete ignorance, both regarding Iran and also concerning spy agency capabilities. His partner in crime Harvey, a former military officer who advised General David Petraeus when he was in Iraq, is the NSC advisor on the Middle East.
Both Cohen-Watnick and Harvey share the neoconservative belief that the Iranians and their proxies in Syria and Iraq need to be confronted by force, an opportunitydescribed by Foreign Policy magazine as having developed into “a pivotal moment that will determine whether Iran or the United States exerts influence over Iraq and Syria.” Other neocon promoters of conflict with Iran have described their horror at a possible Shi’ite “bridge” or “land corridor” through the Arab heartland, running from Iran itself through Iraq and Syria and connecting on the Mediterranean with Hezbollah in Lebanon.
What danger to the U.S. or its actual treaty allies an Iranian influenced land corridor would constitute remains a mystery but there is no shortage of Iran haters in the White House. Former senior CIA analyst Paul Pillar sees “unrelenting hostility from the Trump administration” towards Iran and notes “cherry-picking” of the intelligence to make a case for war, similar to what occurred with Iraq in 2002-3. And even though Secretary of Defense James Mattis and National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster have pushed back against the impulsive Cohen-Watnick and Harvey, their objections are tactical as they do not wish to make U.S. forces in the region vulnerable to attacks coming from a new direction. Otherwise they too consider Iran as America’s number one active enemy and believe that war is inevitable. Donald Trump has unfortunately also jumped directly into the argument on the side of Saudi Arabia and Israel, both of which would like to see Washington go to war with Tehran on their behalf.
The problem with the Trump analysis is that he has his friends and enemies confused. He is actually supporting Saudi Arabia, the source of most of the terrorism that has convulsed Western Europe and the United States while also killing hundreds of thousands of fellow Muslims. Random terrorism to kill as many “infidels and heretics” as possible to create fear is a Sunni Muslim phenomenon, supported financially and doctrinally by the Saudis. To be sure, Iran has used terror tactics to eliminate opponents and select targets overseas, to include several multiple-victim bombings, but it has never engaged in anything like the recent series of attacks in France and Britain. So the United States is moving seemingly inexorably towards war with a country that itself constitutes no actual terrorist threat, unless it is attacked, in support of a country that very much is part of the threat and also on behalf of Israel, which for its part would prefer to see Americans die in a war against Iran rather that sacrificing its own sons and daughters.
Realizing who the real enemy actually is and addressing the actual terrorism problem would not only involve coming down very hard on Saudi Arabia rather than Iran, it would also require some serious thinking in the White House about the extent to which America’s armed interventions all over Asia and Africa have made many people hate us enough to strap on a suicide vest and have a go. Saudi financing and Washington’s propensity to go to war and thereby create a deep well of hatred just might be the principal causative elements in the rise of global terrorism. Do I think that Donald Trump’s White House has the courage to take such a step and change direction? Unfortunately, no.
THE MASSIVE PROTEST PUTTING TURKEY’S ERDOGAN ON THE DEFENSIVE
HOWARD EISSENSTAT AND STEVEN A. COOKJULY
The March for Justice is a surprising stroke of genius for Kemal Kilicdaroglu, who, since rising to the leadership of his party in 2010, has been widely perceived as gentlemanly and well-meaning, but incompetent. The heretofore easily ignored CHP leader is, for the first time in his political career, defining events rather than responding to them. The stated reason for Kilicdaroglu to embark on his walk was the sentencing of a legislator from his own party, Enis Berberoglu, to 25 years in prison. Berberoglu, also a journalist, allegedly divulged state secrets about arms shipments to Islamist militants in Syria.
His conviction, however, is more catalyst than cause. It comes against the backdrop of a constitutional referendum on April 16, the fairness of which international observers have called into question, and a purge that has resulted in some 50,000 arrests, more than 100,000 detentions, hundreds of thousands more summarily dismissed from their jobs, and billions of dollars of property confiscated by the government, all in the last year. Kilicdaroglu has belatedly come to recognize that his previous efforts to block the president and his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) through parliamentary maneuvers were a fool’s errand. The victory of the “yes” campaign in the April referendum was a major victory for Erdogan. As a result, Turkey’s new system enhances the power of the president at the expense of parliamentarians whose role overseeing the government is greatly diminished. The referendum also weakened another check on executive power by giving the president far greater control over the already highly politicized judicial system. The constitutional changes facilitate effective one-man rule and could allow Erdogan to remain in office until 2029, or even, according to some readings of the law, until 2034.
Yet the conduct and outcome of the referendum actually underline the softening of support for Erdogan and his party. Supported by the now almost universally pro-government press, the massive “yes” campaign also benefitted from the harassment of opponents , the disenfranchisement of hundreds of thousands of Kurdish voters, and vote rigging, yet only managed to produce a narrow margin of victory for Erdogan. He emerged from April’s referendum with vast institutional powers, but the outcome also evinced a new brittleness in his command of Turkey’s political arena. The March for Justice highlights this weakness. As it approaches the outskirts of Istanbul — Turkey’s largest population center, a traditional AKP stronghold and Erdogan’s hometown where he once served as mayor — the march is demonstrating that resistance to Erdogan remains possible and that the opposition remains broad. Kilicdaroglu’s effort has brought together an unlikely, if uneasy, alliance of his own party, pro-Kurdish rights groups, and hard-line Turkish nationalists. Should the march reach Istanbul, it could conceivably gather hundreds of thousands of supporters and spark “sympathy rallies” elsewhere.
Based on past precedent, it seems unlikely that Erdogan will be willing to tolerate such a train of events. In summer 2013, when protests over the planned redevelopment of a small park in central Istanbul turned into large-scale anti-government demonstrations across the country, Erdogan ordered the riot police to take a hard line. Thousands of protesters were treated to tear gas, water cannons, beatings, and arrests while Erdogan called on the party faithful to turn out in even larger numbers to demonstrate their support for him and the AKP. Since the Gezi Park protests, the government has not allowed large-scale anti-government demonstrations. Even Istanbul’s Pride March, which the AKP once pointed to as a demonstration of its liberalism, is now suppressed with water cannons and rubber bullets. The government has become remarkably adept at limiting the size of protests by pouring thousands of police into the streets, preventing access to protest sites and limiting the protesters’ capacity to unite. Through all of this, Erdogan has yet to suffer politically from unleashing the full force of the police.
The temptation for the government to suppress the March for Justice is thus likely strong, but such a course also carries significant risk. Stopping the marchers by blocking the road would result in an ugly stand-off that would draw international media attention to an underreported story. If Kilicdaroglu is allowed to position himself even more effectively as a principled, peaceful democrat, the story would dominate the news cycle on relatively favorable terms as long as the stand-off lasted – even in a media environment very friendly to the AKP. Removing police protection from the march, another way of short-circuiting the protest, would give Erdogan’s supporters a free hand to bully and physically harass the marchers. This would almost certainly lead to broad civil unrest.
Erdogan wants to stop the march, but he also benefits from the illusion that Turkey is a functioning democracy. Banning the march and detaining Kilicdaroglu and other CHP leaders would further undermine this pretense. This does not seem like it would be much of an issue for a leader who has overseen the deepening of authoritarian politics, but an important element of Erdogan’s success is that he can claim to be democratic and to fairly represent the popular will. The opposition does not believe this, but it is critical to Erdogan’s legitimacy that his own base does. The unfairness of the referendum combined with the ever-expanding purge may have forced some within the AKP to think twice about concentrating so much power in Erdogan’s hands. Almost all were willing to accept the jailing of the pro-Kurdish politicians as part of the country’s fight with the PKK, but an open attack on Kilicdaroglu would represent a significant escalation even for Erdogan’s own party. The AKP may have laid the groundwork for this when members of the party’s leadership, including the prime minister, recently implied that Kilicdaroglu is either a terrorist or enjoys the support of terrorists. Still, while most of his supporters are willing to accept Erdogan as a populist strongman, fewer will likely accept him as an open dictator.
With the March for Justice, Kilicdaroglu has finally found a way to put Erdogan and the AKP on the defensive. The march is supposed to conclude in Istanbul on July 9, although the blistering summer heat has slowed its progress. This timing creates a particular challenge for Erdogan because of its proximity to the first anniversary of the attempted coup of July 15, 2016 — a date that has become central to his own narrative of himself as the democratic embodiment of Turkey’s national will. Instead of the massive outpouring of support that he no doubt expects, Erdogan may find himself confronting throngs of peaceful protesters angered that he has driven the country so far from its, and his, own stated democratic principles. It is precisely this growing gap between what governments tell their people about their lives and the way citizens actually experience reality that has proven politically fatal for leaders like Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak in the recent past. No one expects Erdogan to meet a similar fate, but if he wants to avoid further political polarization and the instability that comes with it, permitting Kilicdaroglu to finish his march is the safer option. It is more consistent with Erdogan’s claims about Turkish democracy — incredulous though they may be to his opponents — and, importantly, will avoid bloodshed.
From the outside, Erdogan may look like the master of his domain, leading a strong and prosperous country. But the March for Justice has laid bare another reality. Along with the events of three of the four previous summers — the Gezi Park protests, renewed war with the PKK, the failed coup — the march reveals a deeply divided, authoritarian, and unstable country. If Erdogan chooses poorly this summer, Turkey may become more unstable and dictatorial yet.
Iraq: Will Tony Blair Finally Stand Trial for His Part in the “Supreme International Crime”?
“I think most people who have dealt with me, think I’m a pretty straight sort of guy, and I am.” (Tony Blair, BBC “On the Record”, 16th November 1997.)
On 30th November last year, Michael Gove, currently UK Environment Minister, pretty well unloved by swathes of the population whatever Ministry he heads, declared, at the post Chilcot Inquiry debate in Parliament regarding Tony Blair’s role in dragging the UK in to a monumental tragedy for which history will not forgive:
“History, I think will judge him less harshly than some in this House do.”
Deciding whether or not to illegally invade Iraq was a “finely balanced act”, fantasized Gove.
It was not. It was a pack of lies, many of which came from the Blair regime, as confirmed by Colin Powell’s delusionary address to the UN on 5th February 2003, in subsequently unearthed correspondence and of course, the Chilcot Inquiry.
On 15th September 2004, the then UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, in an interview with the BBC World Service, asked if the invasion was illegal, stated:
“Yes, if you wish.” He continued without caveat: “I have indicated it was not in conformity with the UN Charter. From our point of view and from the Charter point of view it was illegal.”
Blair, his Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw and his Attorney General Lord Goldsmith did not face a Nuremberg type trial – and surreally, Blair, after his 2007 resignation was appointed Middle East Peace Envoy. Straw and Goldsmith went back to business as usual.
However, after fourteen years, maybe two million deaths, the decimation by ISIS, the US, and the UK of Iraq’s (Mesopotamia’s) history, culture stewardship and witness, over millennia, to one of the world’s great, ancient civilizations, there is a chance that Antony Charles Lynton Blair, Jack Straw and Lord Goldsmith may yet face a Court of Law.
In April this year the UK Attorney General, Jeremy Wright, intervened in an attempt to halt a private prosecution of the three brought by General Abdul-Wahid al-Ribat, former Chief of Staff of the Iraqi Army under Saddam Hussein’s government.
The Attorney General argued that the basis of the case, the crime of aggression “the supreme international crime” as enshrined in the Nuremberg Tribunals, did not apply in British law and that the former Prime Minister, Blair and his Ministers had:
“implied immunity as former Head of State and government Ministers, therefore offence not made out … Allegations involve potential details being disclosed under the Official Secrets Act for which Attorney General and Director of Public Prosecutions consent are required.” (1)
The implication seemingly being that those consents would not be forthcoming.
However, in direct contradiction, relating to the argument regarding the crime of aggression:
“In his 2003 memo on the legality of the Iraq war (Lord) Goldsmith, then Attorney General, appeared to concede the key point of those now seeking his prosecution. ‘Aggression is a crime under customary international law which automatically forms part of domestic law’ “, he wrote in an advice to then Prime Minister Blair prior to the invasion. (2)
Nevertheless the case was dismissed by the Judge at Westminster Magistrates Court. The legal team for General al-Ribat, led by Michael Mansfield QC and lawyer Imran Khan are not easily deterred.
Mansfield has been described thus:
“The radical lawyer has become an icon in a disenchanted age … (Mansfield’s) high profile victories take on a hallowed significance: the good guys against the rotten state … with a flourish of his insolence and a refusal to shut up they flock to him … and he looks after them all. The Establishment loathes him.” (Guardian, 25th October 1997.) Imran Khan: “is one of the most highly regarded human rights layers in the country” and “a rebel with many causes.” (The Lawyer, 17th June 2015.) “My objective is to make sure the State is held accountable”, he is quoted as saying.
This week, on Wednesday, 5th July, General al-Ribat’s case returned to the High Court in an appeal which is being heard by the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Thomas of Cwmgiedd, and Mr. Justice Ouseley.
The General had been motivated, Mansfield told the Court, by the findings of the Chilcot Inquiry that the Iraq invasion was unnecessary and undermined the United Nations.
‘Mansfield summarised the report’s findings as:
“Saddam Hussein did not pose an urgent threat to the UK, intelligence reporting about [Iraqi] weapons of mass destruction was presented with unwarranted certainty, that the war was unnecessary and that the UK undermined the authority of the UN Security Council.”“Nothing could be more emphatic than these findings,” he said. “It was an unlawful war.”
He further argued that in 1945:
“… when the British prosecutor, Sir Hartley Shawcross, opened the cases against Nazi leaders at the Nuremburg war crimes trials at the end of the second world war, he acted as though the crime of aggression had already been assimilated into English law.” (3)
James Eadie, QC. representing the Attorney General, Jeremy Wright stated that:
“The crime of aggression is not know to English law” and does not exist in the statute book.
Sabah al-Mukhtar, of the Arab Lawyers Network, commented of the case:
“This is just looking at whether the first Court was right in refusing to entertain the case.“The Magistrates Court dismissed it on the grounds that Tony Blair had immunity and that the crime of aggression was not part of English law. Many think they were not correct on that.”
The case can be brought in Britain since the British were part of the occupying forces in Iraq, thus General al-Ribat, now living in exile is: “under the European Convention on Human Rights, deemed to have been within the jurisdiction at a relevant time.”
The High Court’s decision has been reserved to allow a further week for the General’s legal team to make “additional specified submissions.” If the Appeal is not dismissed: “the issue of whether the crime of aggression exists in English law will be sent up to the Supreme Court to decide.”
It has not been Blair’s week. In the light of the Court hearing, Sir John Chilcot – who headed the seven year Inquiry in to the decimating attack on Iraq and found that the Blair Cabinet’s decisions on the matter had been “far from satisfactory” – broke a year long silence in an interview with the BBC.
Asked if the former Prime Minister had been as truthful with him and the public as he should have been, Sir John replied:
“Can I slightly reword that to say I think any Prime Minister taking a country into war has got to be straight with the nation and carry it, so far as possible, with him or her. I don’t believe that was the case in the Iraq instance.”
Millions would surely agree, including a swathe of the media, as encapsulated by media correspondent Roy Greenslade (4) exactly a year ago, on the publication of the Chilcot Inquiry. The sub-heading was:
“Without exception, the ‘feral beasts’ of the press tear the former Prime Minister apart over the Iraq invasion, leaving his reputation in tatters.”
A few front page examples were: “Chilcot Report into Iraq war delivers harsh verdict on Blair” (Financial Times); “A monster of delusion” (Daily Mail); “Weapon of mass deception” (Sun); “Blair’s private war” (Times); “Blair is world’s worst terrorist” (Daily Star) and “Spinning on their graves” (Independent). The Mail cited: “the duplicitous, dishonest, secretive, shallow and incompetent conduct of Tony Blair…”
In November 2011:
“In Kuala Lumpur, after two years of investigation by the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission (KLWCC), a Tribunal (the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal, or KLWCT) consisting of five Judges with judicial and academic backgrounds reached a unanimous verdict that found George W Bush and Tony Blair guilty of crimes against peace, crimes against humanity, and genocide as a result of their roles in the Iraq War.” (5)
Of relevance to this week’s case may be that: The Tribunal also added several recommendations to its verdict:
1) Report findings in accord with Part VI (calling for future accountability) of the Nuremberg Judgment of 1945 addressing crimes of surviving political and military leaders of Nazi Germany;
2) File reports of genocide and crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court in The Hague;
3) Approach the UN General Assembly to pass a resolution demanding that the United States end its occupation of Iraq;
4) Communicate the findings of the tribunal to all members of the Rome Statute (which governs the International Criminal Court) and to all states asserting Universal Jurisdiction that allows for the prosecution of international crimes in national courts; and
5) Urge the UN Security Council to take responsibility to ensure that full sovereign rights are vested in the people of Iraq and that the independence of its government be protected by a UN Peacekeeping Force.
It is ten years nearly to the day (27th June 2007) since Blair left Downing Street, left Iraq bathed in blood and tears and walked off to make £millions and a joke of all peace stands for, as a “Peace Envoy.”
Perhaps, at last, justice may have a chance, one which might set a precedent and also deter any politician or leader from embarking on the “supreme international crime”, ever again. Here’s fervently hoping.