War critics astonished as US hawk admits invasion was illegal

Oliver Burkeman and Julian Borger in Washington
Thursday November 20, 2003: (The Guardian)

International lawyers and anti-war campaigners reacted with astonishment yesterday after the influential Pentagon hawk Richard Perle conceded that the invasion of Iraq had been illegal.

In a startling break with the official White House and Downing Street lines, Mr Perle told an audience in London: "I think in this case international law stood in the way of doing the right thing."

President George Bush has consistently argued that the war was legal either because of existing UN security council resolutions on Iraq - also the British government's publicly stated view - or as an act of self-defence permitted by international law.

But Mr Perle, a key member of the defence policy board, which advises the US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said that "international law ... would have required us to leave Saddam Hussein alone", and this would have been morally unacceptable.

French intransigence, he added, meant there had been "no practical mechanism consistent with the rules of the UN for dealing with Saddam Hussein".

Mr Perle, who was speaking at an event organised by the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, had argued loudly for the toppling of the Iraqi dictator since the end of the 1991 Gulf war.

"They're just not interested in international law, are they?" said Linda Hugl, a spokeswoman for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, which launched a high court challenge to the war's legality last year. "It's only when the law suits them that they want to use it."

Mr Perle's remarks bear little resemblance to official justifications for war, according to Rabinder Singh QC, who represented CND and also participated in Tuesday's event.

Certainly the British government, he said, "has never advanced the suggestion that it is entitled to act, or right to act, contrary to international law in relation to Iraq".

The Pentagon adviser's views, he added, underlined "a divergence of view between the British govern ment and some senior voices in American public life [who] have expressed the view that, well, if it's the case that international law doesn't permit unilateral pre-emptive action without the authority of the UN, then the defect is in international law".

Mr Perle's view is not the official one put forward by the White House. Its main argument has been that the invasion was justified under the UN charter, which guarantees the right of each state to self-defence, including pre-emptive self-defence. On the night bombing began, in March, Mr Bush reiterated America's "sovereign authority to use force" to defeat the threat from Baghdad.

The UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, has questioned that justification, arguing that the security council would have to rule on whether the US and its allies were under imminent threat.

Coalition officials countered that the security council had already approved the use of force in resolution 1441, passed a year ago, warning of "serious consequences" if Iraq failed to give a complete accounting of its weapons programmes.

Other council members disagreed, but American and British lawyers argued that the threat of force had been implicit since the first Gulf war, which was ended only by a ceasefire.

"I think Perle's statement has the virtue of honesty," said Michael Dorf, a law professor at Columbia University who opposed the war, arguing that it was illegal.

"And, interestingly, I suspect a majority of the American public would have supported the invasion almost exactly to the same degree that they in fact did, had the administration said that all along."

The controversy-prone Mr Perle resigned his chairmanship of the defence policy board earlier this year but remained a member of the advisory board.

Meanwhile, there was a hint that the US was trying to find a way to release the Britons held at Guantanamo Bay.

The US secretary of state, Colin Powell, said Mr Bush was "very sensitive" to British sentiment. "We also expect to be resolving this in the near future," he told the BBC.

Copyright: The Guardian.

Resolution 1441 was predicated on the LIES strewn all over the world by Bush and his warmongers;

that Iraq had WMD and was hiding proof of it from the inspectors.

After the resolution passed, Bush used Res 1441 as "permission" from the UN to attack. Just like he LIED to Congress, got its now infamous authority to pursue war, then used that authority to bolster his reasons for doing so.

Circles within circles of deceit and corruption.

Well, THAT'S a piece of evidence for impeachment if I ever saw one.....from the rooster's mouth.....

But Mr Perle, a key member of the defence policy board, which advises the US defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said that "international law ... would have required us to leave Saddam Hussein alone", and this would have been morally unacceptable.


In addition to impeachment, how about being tried for international war crimes.

I believe the Italian Courts are developing an airtight package on THIS point as we speak....about 13 counts so far.....

How do you tell an outted CIA agent?
His/her one-way ticket to PLANO, Tx......

Back to regular view
http://www.suntimes.com/output/terror/cst-nws-cia25.html

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Italian judge orders 13 CIA agents arrested

June 25, 2005

BY VICTOR L. SIMPSON

ROME -- An Italian judge Friday ordered the arrests of 13 CIA officers for secretly transporting a Muslim preacher from Italy to Egypt as part of U.S. anti-terrorism efforts -- a rare public objection to the practice by a close American ally.

The Egyptian was spirited away in 2003, purportedly as part of the CIA's ''extraordinary rendition'' program in which terror suspects are transferred to third countries without court approval, subjecting them to possible torture.

The arrest warrants were announced Friday by the Milan prosecutor's office, which has called the disappearance a kidnapping and a blow to a terrorism investigation in Italy. The office said the imam was thought to belong to an Islamic terrorist group.

No comment from U.S.

The 13 are accused of seizing Osama Moustafa Hassan Nasr, known as Abu Omar, on a Milan street Feb. 17, 2003, and sending him to Egypt, where he reportedly was tortured, Milan prosecutor Manlio Claudio Minale said in a statement.

The U.S. Embassy in Rome and the CIA in Washington declined to comment. The prosecutor's statement did not name the suspects, give their nationalities or mention the CIA by name. But an Italian official familiar with the investigation confirmed reports Friday that the suspects worked for the CIA.

The official also said there was no evidence Italians were involved or knew about the operation. He asked that his name not be used because official comment was limited to the prosecutor's statement.

Minale said the suspects remain at large, and Italian authorities will ask the United States and Egypt for assistance in the case.

The prosecutor's office said Nasr was released by the Egyptians after his interrogation but was arrested again later.

Italian newspapers have reported that Nasr, 42, said in wiretapped calls that he was tortured with electric shocks. AP

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Check out the L.A. Times for today (Sunday). There is a long article about the indictment, warrants- the Italians are giving no quarter. Even Burlusconi (sp?) is on the hot seat. Funny- every leader who gets on the Bushco bandwagon- Blair and now whaziznamefromItaly- seems to get caught under the wheels...

This is truly amazing coming from Perle. *BIG* cracks starting to appear
within the ranks