Since the illegitimate coup in Ukraine in 2014, the Kiev regime has committed crimes against civilians in Donbass. It was in response to those atrocities that Russia launched its special military operation on February 24, 2022. According to President Putin, the operation is aimed at protecting the population of Donbass from Kiev’s genocidal actions.
Chairman of the Russian Investigative Committee Alexander Bastrykin assured that Russian investigators will make a criminal-legal assessment of the actions of all those who committed crimes against the residents of Donbass.
“I can say with confidence that the Investigative Committee, for its part, will give a criminal-legal assessment of the criminal actions of all those who participated in the preparation and implementation of criminal plans against the civilians of Donbass and Novorossiya,” Bastrykin said in an interview with Sputnik.
The legal official noted that the task was extremely important not only from the criminal law perspective but also from a historical point of view, as future generations should know what the residents of Donbass went through.
“We will continue to thoroughly investigate the criminal actions of the armed formations of Ukraine, including high-ranking officials. Many of them have already been indicted in absentia,” the head of the agency added.
Bastrykin also said that Russia’s Investigative Committee has opened more than 4,000 criminal cases related to atrocities in Donbass since 2014.
“More than 200 Ukrainian servicemen have been sentenced by the courts to long prison terms, including life imprisonment, for the murder of civilians, cruel treatment of civilians and prisoners,” he said. “Among them are several dozen members of the banned Azov* regiment,” he added.
Since the illegitimate coup in Ukraine in 2014, the Kiev regime has committed crimes against civilians in Donbass. It was in response to those atrocities that Russia launched its special military operation on February 24, 2022. According to President Putin, the operation is aimed at protecting the population of Donbass from Kiev’s genocidal actions.
*The Azov battalion is an extremist organization banned in Russia.
The concept is just a front for bypassing international law, the Russian president has insisted
“Have you ever seen these rules? No, because no one has ever written them, and no one has ever agreed to them with anyone. How can we talk about order based on rules that no one has seen?” Putin stated.
The Western-promoted “rules-based order” is merely a cover for colonialism, as the presumed rules have never been agreed on by anyone and are ever-shifting from one case to another, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said.
The president made the remarks in an exclusive interview with state-run broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV) that was aired on Monday.
“Have you ever seen these rules? No, because no one has ever written them, and no one has ever agreed to them with anyone. How can we talk about order based on rules that no one has seen?” Putin stated.
While such a situation definitely looks “from the point of common sense” as “nonsense,” it’s extremely beneficial for the proponents of the said “rules-based order,” the president explained.
“If no one has ever seen these rules, it means that those who talk about this themselves come up with these rules from case to case in a way that suits their own interests. This is the essence of the colonial approach,” Putin noted.
Colonialism has always been based on supremacist ideas, segregating people into different “classes.”
“Colonial countries have always believed themselves to be first-class people. After all, they always said that they bring enlightenment to their colonies, that they are civilized people and bring the benefits of civilization to other peoples, who are considered to be second-class,” Putin stressed.
The colonial mindset remains strong, he noted, with all the US talk of its “exceptionalism,” for instance, stemming precisely from it. “That is, when they say that they are exceptional in the United States, it means that there are other people, people of some other second class. How else can we perceive this? These are the rudiments of the colonial mindset, nothing else,” he added.
The approach exhibited by Russia and China is entirely different from that shown by the West, with Moscow and Beijing both believing that treating all nations equally is the cornerstone of the emerging multipolar world and the basis of cooperation between the two nations themselves, Putin stressed.
“We proceed from the fact that all people are equal, everyone has the same rights, the rights and freedoms of one country and one people end where the rights and freedoms of another person or of an entire state start. This is how a multipolar world should gradually be born,” the president explained.
“Using the horrific murders of Israeli civilians by Palestinian armed factions as an excuse to justify Israel’s crimes in general and the massacre in Gaza in particular is unacceptable,” said Spain’s minister of social rights.
“Willful killing, and hostage-taking are grave breaches of the Geneva Convention and one has to comply with the law.”
“The United States and the European Union are not looking the other way or acting in a neutral manner, they are encouraging the state of Israel in its policy of apartheid and occupation that seriously violates human rights,”
Spain’s minister of social rights released a statement Monday calling on her country’s coalition government to petition the International Criminal Court to open a war crimes investigation into Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, citing the ongoing aerial bombardment of the Gaza Strip and the devastating blockade that has prevented the free flow of desperately needed humanitarian aid.
“Using the horrific murders of Israeli civilians by Palestinian armed factions as an excuse to justify Israel’s crimes in general and the massacre in Gaza in particular is unacceptable,” Ione Belarra, the leader of Spain’s left-wing Podemos party, said in a video statement posted to social media.
“We ask our partner, the Socialist Party, to work together to present on behalf of the government of Spain a petition to the prosecutor’s office of the International Criminal Court to investigate the war crimes committed in Palestine by Netanyahu, as was done recently in the case of the Spanish aid worker murdered in the Ukrainian war, as well as those perpetrated by Hamas in Israel and occupied territories against the civilian population,” said Belarra, who also called for immediate efforts to protect civilians and negotiate an end to the violence.
Israel is not a member state of the ICC, but the top prosecutor for the Netherlands-based court told Reuters last week that war crimes carried out by Hamas and the Israeli government fall under the body’s jurisdiction.
“It’s horrendous what’s going on, what we’re seeing on our television screens. There has to be a legal process to determine criminal responsibility,” said Karim Khan. “Willful killing, and hostage-taking are grave breaches of the Geneva Convention and one has to comply with the law.”
In the wake of Hamas’ deadly October 7 attack on Israel, the Netanyahu government began what international human rights groups and legal experts have described as a campaign of collective punishment, bombarding the densely populated Gaza Strip, devastating civilian infrastructure, and cutting off the enclave’s supply of food, electricity, fuel, and other critical supplies.
Israeli officials have admitted that the assault on Gaza is primarily geared toward inflicting massive damage, not on precisely targeting Hamas.
More than 2,600 people in Gaza have been killed since Israel’s bombing campaign began and more than a million have been displaced. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) warned Sunday that the Israeli airstrikes and blockade have sparked “an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe” as Gaza’s healthcare system nears total collapse.
On Friday, the Israeli government ordered the entire population of northern Gaza—more than a million people—to evacuate ahead of an expected ground invasion, a demand that prompted global outrage. Rights groups said the directive could amount to the war crime of forcible transfer, given that Gazans have been given no guarantee of safe passage or clear assurance that they will be able to return to their homes.
Israeli bombing on Monday reportedly dashed hopes of a temporary agreement to allow people to flee Gaza and let humanitarian aid enter through a border crossing between Egypt and the occupied territory.
In her remarks on Monday, Belarra decried the complicity of European governments and the United States—Israel’s primary supplier of weaponry—in the devastating attack on Gaza and urged the E.U. to “stop blindly following” the U.S.
“The United States and the European Union are not looking the other way or acting in a neutral manner, they are encouraging the state of Israel in its policy of apartheid and occupation that seriously violates human rights,” said Belarra. “Using Hamas as an excuse to murder thousands of Palestinian civilians, including children, is unspeakable hypocrisy on the part of both Israel and the countries that justify it.”
The US and Japan are the real security threat to the Asia-Pacific, Beijing insists
“They claim to uphold the rules-based international order, but what they do is trampling on international law and the basic norms governing international relations and grossly interfering in other countries’ internal affairs,” Wang told reporters.
“We urge the US and Japan to abandon the Cold-War mentality and ideological bias, stop creating imaginary enemies and stop trying to sow the seeds of a new Cold War in the Asia-Pacific,” Wang told reporters at a regular briefing in Beijing.
Washington and Tokyo need to abandon their Cold War mentality and stop inventing enemies in the Asia-Pacific region, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said on Friday. He described a recent joint statement by American and Japanese foreign and defense ministers as containing “groundless smears and attacks” on China.
“We urge the US and Japan to abandon the Cold-War mentality and ideological bias, stop creating imaginary enemies and stop trying to sow the seeds of a new Cold War in the Asia-Pacific,” Wang told reporters at a regular briefing in Beijing.
Wang’s declaration came in response to the joint statement by the US-Japan Security Consultative Committee issued on Wednesday, which declared the alliance between Washington and Tokyo as “the cornerstone of regional peace, security, and prosperity.”
The document states that China represents “the greatest strategic challenge in the Indo-Pacific region and beyond,” and is signed by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi, and Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada.
According to Wang, however, the US and Japan are instead “finding pretexts for military build-up and wilful use of force,” creating division and confrontation.
“They claim to uphold the rules-based international order, but what they do is trampling on international law and the basic norms governing international relations and grossly interfering in other countries’ internal affairs,” Wang told reporters.
The Asia-Pacific is “an anchor for peace and development, not a wrestling ground for geopolitical competition,” the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman insisted, adding that most of the countries in the world are “for justice and against hegemonism,” preferring cooperation to confrontation.
Asked about Washington’s publicly announced plans to restrict Beijing’s access to semiconductor technology, Wang said China will “resolutely safeguard our own interests.”
He accused the US of abusing export controls and weaponizing trade “in order to perpetuate its hegemony and selfish interests.” This not only “severely violates market rules” but also disrupts international trade, he insisted.
Araud condemned US diplomats for insisting that Washington must always be the “leader” of the world, and stressed that the West should work with other countries in the Global South, “on an equal basis,” in order “to find a compromise with our own interests.”He cautioned against making “maximalist” demands, “of simply trying to keep the Western hegemony.”
Araud argued that if the international community is serious about creating a “rules-based order,” it must entail “integrating all the major stakeholders into the managing of the world, you know really bringing the Chinese, the Indians, and really other countries, and trying to build with them, on an equal basis, the world of tomorrow.”
France’s ex-US Ambassador Gérard Araud criticized Washington for frequently violating international law and said its so-called “rules-based order” is an unfair “Western order” based on “hegemony.” He condemned the new cold war on China, instead calling for mutual compromises.
France’s former ambassador to the United States, Gérard Araud, has publicly criticized Washington, saying it frequently violates international law and that its so-called “rules-based order” is actually an unfair “Western order.”
The top French diplomat warned that the United States is engaged in “economic warfare” against China and that Europe is concerned about Washington’s “containment policy,” because many European countries do not want to be forced to “choose a camp” in a new cold war.
Araud condemned US diplomats for insisting that Washington must always be the “leader” of the world, and stressed that the West should work with other countries in the Global South, “on an equal basis,” in order “to find a compromise with our own interests.”
He cautioned against making “maximalist” demands, “of simply trying to keep the Western hegemony.”
Araud made these remarks in a November 14 panel discussion titled “Is America Ready for a Multipolar World?“, hosted by the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, a think tank in Washington, DC that advocates for a more restrained, less bellicose foreign policy.
Gérard Araud’s credentials could hardly be any more elite. A retired senior French diplomat, he served as the country’s ambassador to the United States from 2014 to 2019. From 2009 to 2014, he was Paris’ representative to the United Nations.
Before that, Araud served as France’s ambassador to Israel, and he previously worked with NATO.
This blue-blooded background makes Araud’s frank comments even more important, as they reflect the feelings of a segment of the French ruling class and European political class, which is uncomfortable with Washington’s unipolar domination and wants power to be more decentralized in the world.
The ‘rules-based order’ is actually just a ‘Western order’
In a shockingly blunt moment in the panel discussion, Gérard Araud explained that the so-called “rules-based order” is actually just a “Western order,” and that the United States and Europe unfairly dominate international organizations like the United Nations, World Bank, and International Monetary Fund (IMF):
To be frank, I’ve always been extremely skeptical about this idea of a ‘rules-based order.’
Personally, for instance, look, I was the permanent representative to the United Nations. We love the United Nations, but the Americans not too much, you know.
And actually when you look at the hierarchy of the United Nations, everybody there is ours. The Secretary General [António Guterres] is Portuguese. He was South Korean [Ban Ki-moon]. But when you look at all the under secretaries general, all of them really are either American, French, British, and so on. When you look at the World Bank, when you look at the IMF, and so on.
So that’s the first element: this order is our order.
And the second element is also that, actually, this order is reflecting the balance of power in 1945. You know, you look at the permanent members of the Security Council.
Really people forget that, if China and Russia are obliged to oppose [with] their veto, it is because frankly the Security Council is most of the time, 95% of the time, has a Western-oriented majority.
So this order frankly – and you can also be sarcastic, because, when the Americans basically want to do whatever they want, including when it’s against international law, as they define it, they do it.
And that’s the vision that the rest of the world has of this order.
You know really, when I was in – the United Nations is a fascinating spot because you have ambassadors of all the countries, and you can have conversations with them, and the vision they project of the world, their vision of the world, is certainly not a ‘rules-based order’; it’s a Western order.
And they accuse us of double standards, hypocrisy, and so on and so on.
So I’m not sure that this question about the ‘rules’ is really the critical question.
I think the first assessment that we should do will be maybe, as we say in French, to put ourselves in the shoes of the other side, to try to understand how they see the world.
Araud argued that if the international community is serious about creating a “rules-based order,” it must entail “integrating all the major stakeholders into the managing of the world, you know really bringing the Chinese, the Indians, and really other countries, and trying to build with them, on an equal basis, the world of tomorrow.”
“That’s the only way,” he added. “We should really ask the Indians, ask the Chinese, the Brazilians, and other countries, really to work with us on an equal basis. And that’s something – it’s not only the Americans, also the Westerners, you know, really trying to get out of our moral high ground, and to understand that they have their own interests, that on some issues we should work together, on other issues we shouldn’t work together.”
“Let’s not try to rebuild the Fortress West,” he implored. “It shouldn’t be the future of our foreign policy.”
French diplomat criticizes US new cold war on China
Gérard Araud revealed that, in Europe, there is “concern” that the United States has a “containment policy” against China.
“I think the international relationship will be largely dominated by the rivalry between China and the United States. And foreign policy I think in the coming years will be to find the modus vivendi … between the two powers,” he said.
He warned that Washington is engaged in “economic warfare” against Beijing, that the US is trying “basically to cut any relationship with China in the field of advanced chips, which is sending a message of, ‘We are going to try to prevent you from becoming an advanced economy.’ It’s really, it’s economic warfare.”
“Really on the American side is the development of economic warfare against China. It’s really cutting, making impossible cooperation in a very important, critical field, for the future of the Chinese economy,” he added.
Araud pointed out that China is not just “emerging”; it is in fact “re-emerging” to a prominent geopolitical position, like it had for hundreds of years, before the rise of European colonialism.
He stressed that many countries in Asia don’t want to be forced to pick a side in this new cold war, and are afraid of becoming a zone of proxy conflicts like Europe was in the first cold war:
Asia doesn’t want to be the Europe of the Cold War. They don’t want to have a bamboo curtain. They don’t want to choose their camp.
Australia has chosen its camp, but it’s a particular case. But Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, they don’t want to choose their camp, and we shouldn’t demand they choose their camp.
So we need to have a flexible policy of talking to the Chinese, because talking is also a way of reassuring them, trying to understand their interests, and also to define our interests not in a maximalist way, of simply trying to keep the Western hegemony.
Araud challenged the idea that the United States must be the unipolar “leader” of the world, stating:
The Americans entered the world, in a sense, being already the big boy on the block. In 1945, it was 40% of the world’s GDP.
Which also may explain what is American diplomacy. The word of American diplomats, the word of American diplomacy is ‘leadership.’
Really, it’s always striking for foreigners, as soon as there is a debate about American foreign policy, immediately people say, ‘We have to restore our leadership.’ Leadership. And other countries may say, ‘Why leadership?’
West must ‘try to see the world from Beijing’
Gérard Araud similarly criticized Western media outlets for their cartoonishly negative coverage of China. The top French diplomat called on officials to “try to see the world from Beijing”:
When you look at the European or Western newspapers, you have the impression that China is a sort of a dark monster which is moving forward, never committing a mistake, never really facing any problem, and going to the domination of the world – you know, the Chinese work 20 hours a day, they don’t want a vacation, they don’t care, they want to dominate the world.
Maybe if we will try to see the world from Beijing, really we will consider certainly that all the borders of China are more or less unstable, or threatened, or facing unfriendly countries, and that’s from the Chinese point of view.
Maybe they want to improve their situation. It doesn’t mean that we have to accept it, but maybe to see, to remember, that any defensive measure of one side is always seen as offensive by the other side.
So let’s understand that China has its own interests. You know, even dictatorships have legitimate interests. And so let’s look at these interests, and let’s try to find a compromise with our own interests.
Araud went on to point out that the US government is constantly militarily threatening China, sending warships across the planet to its coasts, but would never for a second tolerate Beijing doing the same to it:
When I was in Washington, just after the [hawkish anti-China] speech of Vice President Pence to the Hudson [Institute] in October 2018, I met a lot of specialists on China in Washington, DC, but when I was trying to tell them, you know, your [US] ships are patrolling at 200 miles from the Chinese coast, at 5000 miles from the American coast, what would be your reaction if Chinese ships were patrolling at 200 miles from your coast?
And obviously, my interlocutors didn’t understand what I meant. And that’s the question, you know, really trying to figure out what are the reasonable interests of the other side.
Araud stressed that China “is not a military threat” to the West.
French diplomat: Western sanctions on Russia are causing us to ‘inflict pain on ourselves
With this new cold war between the United States and China, Gérard Araud explained, “in this context, Russia is a bit like Austria-Hungary with Germany before the First World War, is a bit doomed to be the ‘brilliant second’ of China.”
While Araud harshly denounced Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, he also criticized the Western sanctions on Moscow, which he cautioned, “on the European side, it is inflicting to ourselves some pain.”
He warned that Europe is in a “dead end” with Russia, “because as long as the war in Ukraine will go on, and my bet, unfortunately, is that it may go on for a long time, it will be impossible for the Europeans, and the Americans in a sense, but also for the Europeans to end the sanctions on Russia, which means that our relationship with Russia may be frozen for an indefinite future.”
“And I think it’s very difficult to have diplomatic activity [with Russia] in this situation,” he added.
You can watch the full panel discussion hosted by the Quincy Institute below:
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Featured image: France’s Ambassador to the US Gérard Araud with President Barack Obama in the White House in 2016 (Source: Multipolarista)
Sabrina De Sousa is one of nearly two-dozen CIA officers who was prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced by Italian courts in absentia in 2009 for the role she allegedly played in the rendition of a radical cleric named Abu Omar. It was the first and only criminal prosecution that has ever taken place related to the CIA’s rendition program, which involved more than 100 suspected terrorists and the assistance of dozens of European countries. But De Sousa, a dual US and Portuguese citizen, said she had nothing to do with the cleric’s abduction and has been wrongly accused. For the past decade, she has been on a global quest to clear her name. VICE News met up with De Sousa in Lisbon, Portugal–and other key figures connected to the case–for an exclusive interview about the steps she’s now taking in an effort to hold the CIA accountable for one of the most notorious counterterrorism operations in the history of the agency.
In the following video translated by RAIR Foundation USA, Russian President Vladimir Putin explains the reasoning behind his recognition of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) and the Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) as sovereign entities.
Neither George W Bush nor Tony Blair are in prison cells at The Hague where international law says they ought to be. Bush is still painting away from the comfort of his home, issuing proclamations comparing Putin to Hitler and platforming arguments for more interventionism in Ukraine. Blair is still merily warmongering his charred little heart out, saying NATO should not rule out directly attacking Russian forces in what amounts to a call for a thermonuclear world war.
Australian whistleblower David McBride just made the following statement on Twitter:
“I’ve been asked if I think the invasion of Ukraine is illegal.
My answer is: If we don’t hold our own leaders to account, we can’t hold other leaders to account.
If the law is not applied consistently, it is not the law.
It is simply an excuse we use to target our enemies.
We will pay a heavy price for our hubris of 2003 in the future.
We didn’t just fail to punish Bush and Blair: we rewarded them. We re-elected them. We knighted them.
If you want to see Putin in his true light imagine him landing a jet and then saying ‘Mission Accomplished’.”
As far as I can tell this point is logically unassailable. International law is a meaningless concept when it only applies to people the US power alliance doesn’t like. This point is driven home by the life of McBride himself, whose own government responded to his publicizing suppressed information about war crimes committed by Australian forces in Afghanistan by charging him as a criminal.
Neither George W Bush nor Tony Blair are in prison cells at The Hague where international law says they ought to be. Bush is still painting away from the comfort of his home, issuing proclamations comparing Putin to Hitler and platforming arguments for more interventionism in Ukraine. Blair is still merily warmongering his charred little heart out, saying NATO should not rule out directly attacking Russian forces in what amounts to a call for a thermonuclear world war.
They are free as birds, singing their same old demonic songs from the rooftops.
When you point out this obvious plot hole in discussions about the legality of Vladimir Putin’s invasion you’ll often get accused of “whataboutism”, which is a noise that empire loyalists like to make when you have just highlighted damning evidence that their government’s behaviors entirely invalidate their position on an issue. This is not a “whataboutism”; it’s a direct accusation that is completely devastating to the argument being made, because there really is no counter-argument.
The Iraq invasion bypassed the laws and protocols for military action laid out in the founding charter of the United Nations. The current US military occupation of Syria violates international law. International law only exists to the extent to which the nations of the world are willing and able to enforce it, and because of the US empire’s military power — and more importantly because of its narrative control power — this means international law is only ever enforced with the approval of that empire.
This is why the people indicted and detained by the International Criminal Court (ICC) are always from weaker nations — overwhelmingly African — while the USA can get away with actually sanctioning ICC personnel if they so much as talk about investigating American war crimes and suffer no consequences for it whatsoever. It is also why in 2002 the Bush administration instituted what became known as the “Hague Invasion Act“, saying military force will be used to liberate any US or US-allied military personnel from any ICC attempt to prosecute them for war crimes. It is also why Noam Chomsky famously said that if the Nuremberg laws had continued to be applied with fairness and consistency, then every post-WWII U.S. president would have been hanged.
This is also why former US National Security Advisor John Bolton once said that the US war machine is “dealing in the anarchic environment internationally where different rules apply,” which “does require actions that in a normal business environment in the United States we would find unprofessional.”
Bolton would certainly know. In his bloodthirsty push to manufacture consent for the Iraq invasion he spearheaded the removal of the director-general of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), a crucial institution for the enforcement of international law, using measures which included threatening the director-general’s children. The OPCW is now subject to the dictates of the US government, as evidenced by the organisation’s coverup of a 2018 false flag incident in Syria which resulted in airstrikes by the US, UK and France during Bolton’s tenure as a senior Trump advisor.
The US continually works to subvert international law enforcement institutions to advance its own interests. When the US was seeking UN authorization for the Gulf War in 1991, Yemen dared to vote against it, after which a member of the US delegation told Yemen’s ambassador, “That’s the most expensive vote you ever cast.” Yemen lost not just 70 million dollars in US foreign aid but also a valuable labor contract with Saudi Arabia, and a million Yemeni immigrants were sent home by America’s Gulf state allies.
Simple observation of who is subject to international law enforcement and who is not makes it clear that the very concept of international law is now functionally nothing more than a narrative construct that’s used to bludgeon and undermine governments who disobey the US-centralized empire. That’s why in the lead-up to this confrontation with Russia we saw a push among empire managers to swap out the term “international law” with “rules-based international order”, which can mean anything and is entirely up to the interpretation of the world’s dominant power structure.
It is entirely possible that we may see Putin ousted and brought before a war crimes tribunal one day, but that won’t make it valid. You can argue with logical consistency that Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is wrong and will have disastrous consequences far beyond the bloodshed it has already inflicted, but what you can’t do with any logical consistency whatsoever is claim that it is illegal. Because there is no authentically enforced framework for such a concept to apply.
As US law professor Dale Carpenter has said, “If citizens cannot trust that laws will be enforced in an evenhanded and honest fashion, they cannot be said to live under the rule of law. Instead, they live under the rule of men corrupted by the law.” This is all the more true of laws which would exist between nations.
You don’t get to make international law meaningless and then claim that an invasion is “illegal”. That’s not a legitimate thing to do. As long as we are living in a Wild West environment created by a murderous globe-spanning empire which benefits from it, claims about the legality of foreign invasions are just empty sounds.
To maintain its global dominance, the US needs the obedience of not only other nations, but international bodies as well. The International Criminal Court, which has again refused to bow, is a painful thorn in Washington’s side.
Following a ruling earlier this month by the ICC’s Appeals Chamber that a formal investigation of US officials for war crimes in Afghanistan could proceed, Washington responded with its usual threats of sanctions. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called out two ICC staff members by name and intimated that they and their family members could be prohibited from traveling to the United States.
But refusing to back down, the ICC insisted that its investigation will go forward, pointing out that it is “an independent and impartial judicial institution” and that its organs “act strictly within the mandate bestowed upon them by the Rome Statute, the ICC’s founding treaty.”
This exchange of hostilities is the latest demonstration of the ICC’s growing sense of independence and confidence. For years the court was derided as biased — not against America, but against Africa — and as failing to uphold principles of equal justice. In 2016, a number of African countries started signaling their intention to leave the ICC, noting that since the court was established in 2002, only Africans had been prosecuted.
Since then, however, the ICC has broadened its scope and opened new investigations, including some that don’t necessarily align with US foreign policy objectives. In 2016, the ICC’s Office of the Prosecutor began investigating alleged crimes related to the 2008 international armed conflict in and around South Ossetia, including alleged crimes committed both by Russia and US ally Georgia.
In late 2019, the ICC’s Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda said that an investigation could proceed into alleged crimes committed by Israel in occupied Palestinian territory. In a statement, the ICC announced that “all the statutory criteria under the Rome Statute for the opening of an investigation have been met.” This led Israel, which is not a state party to the ICC, to enlist friendly states such as Brazil, Hungary, Austria, Germany, the Czech Republic and Australia to lean on the court to drop the investigation — so far, to no avail.
The ICC has also indicated that an investigation into the effects of US sanctions on Venezuela might be in the works. Last month, Bensouda announced that she had received a referral from the Government of Venezuela regarding the situation on its territory. Venezuela alleged that US sanctions amount to crimes against humanity. Rather than dismiss this claim out of hand, Bensouda took preliminary steps to enable an investigation to proceed.
Taken together, the recent developments related to the ICC could spell trouble for the US, whether or not the investigations lead to actual prosecutions of US officials or US allies. This is because US hegemony relies on the subservience not only of nation-states, but of international organizations.
The US has perceived the ICC as a threat ever since it was established 18 years ago, even taking the extraordinary measures in 2002 of repudiating its earlier signature to the Rome Statute and enacting a law authorizing the use of military force to liberate any American citizen being held by the court, which is located in The Hague.
With those threats failing to intimidate the court, the US is now resorting to punitive measures. But so far, judging by the ICC’s response, it is not bowing to pressure. Instead, it appears to be taking its mandate to investigate war crimes seriously, and demonstrating that the US military cannot expect to act with total impunity in its operations abroad.
This reinforces the principle of universal jurisdiction when it comes to grave crimes such as torture. It also serves as a reminder of how countries can avoid ICC investigations and prosecutions. Since the ICC only steps in when national authorities do not properly investigate grave crimes, there is a simple way for countries to avoid this scrutiny: prosecute war criminals themselves.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has threatened the family members of International Criminal Court staff, vowing that Washington will take punitive action against them if the court tries American soldiers for war crimes.
In March 2019, the Pompeo State Department threatened to revoke or deny visas to any International Criminal Court (ICC) personnel investigating crimes committed by American forces.
A year later, on March 5, 2020, the ICC took a defiant step forward, officially approving an investigation into allegations of war crimes and crimes against humanitycommitted by the US military and CIA in Afghanistan.
Pompeo responded by angrily condemning the court and its proceedings. His broadside was an apparent attempt at discrediting the institution, which the US government is not a party to.
In a subsequent State Department press briefing on March 17, Pompeo launched another tirade against the ICC, belittling it as a “so-called court,” a “nakedly political body,” and an “embarrassment.” Pompeo, who previously served as director of the CIA, took the denunciations a step further, threatening the family members of ICC staff.
Secretary Michael R. Pompeo Remarks to the Press – United States Department of State
SECRETARY POMPEO: Good afternoon, everyone. As you all know, the Trump administration continues to put an enormous amount of energy into combating the Wuhan virus and protecting the American…
“We want to identify those responsible for this partisan investigation and their family members who may want to travel to the United States or engage in activity that’s inconsistent with making sure we protect Americans,” Pompeo said, according to the US State Department’s official transcript.
Sarah Leah Whitson, the managing director for research and policy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, drew attention to the “shocking attack” on Twitter. “This isn’t just unlawful collective punishment against family members; it’s not just a disturbing attack on staff of a judiciary — where the US has voted to refer other nations for prosecution; it’s abuse of federal authority to use sanctions against actual wrongdoers,” said Whitson, who previously directed the Middle East and North Africa division at Human Rights Watch.
Whitson called on Democratic presidential candidates Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders to “condemn this US State Department assault on the staff and FAMILIES of ICC – abuse of sanctions authority in flagrant attack on judicial independence, unlawful collective punishment.”
This blatant US threat against the family members of International Criminal Court prosecutors is part of a longer historical pattern of Washington attacking multilateral institutions.
At the beginning of the George W. Bush administration’s so-called war on terror, in 2002, the US Congress passed a bill called the American Service-Members’ Protection Act — more commonly known as the “Hague Invasion Act.”
This unprecedented piece of legislation, which has no precedent anywhere else in the world, declares that the US government unilaterally grants itself the right to militarily invade the Hague if a citizen of the United States or any allied country is tried at the court. Nor are Secretary of State Pompeo’s threats the first time US government officials have targeted the family members of international organizations.
José Bustani, the former director of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), said hardline neoconservative John Bolton, a former under secretary of state for George W. Bush and national security adviser for Donald Trump, threatened him and his family when Bustani negotiated with the Iraqi government to allow in OPCW weapons inspectors.
“You have 24 hours to leave the organization, and if you don’t comply with this decision by Washington, we have ways to retaliate against you,” Bolton reportedly told Bustani, according to his recollection.“We know where your kids live. You have two sons in New York.”
Denigrating the Iranian government as “terrorists” in his State Department press briefing, Mike Pompeo declared new sanctions on the social security investment company of Iran’s military, along with five Iranian nuclear scientists.
Moreover, Pompeo announced State Department sanctions on nine more entities, in South Africa, Hong Kong, and China, for doing business with Iran.
He also unveiled new sanctions on Syria’s minister of defense, citing the Syrian army’s battle to retake Idlib, the last remaining insurgent-held territory in the country, which is occupied by a rebranded al-Qaeda affiliate and other extremist Salafi-jihadists, backed by NATO member Turkey.
US sanctions on Iran have devastated the country’s health infrastructure, greatly exacerbating the coronavirus pandemic. A new study by researchers at the Sharif University of Technology in Tehran warned that millions of people could die due to Covid-19 — which Pompeo repeatedly referred to as the “Wuhan virus” in his press briefing.
An article by German state broadcaster DW concisely explained how US sanctions have set the stage for mass death in Iran: “Iran’s government applied for a $5 billion (€4.6 billion) loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to fight the epidemic — the first time it has asked the IMF for assistance in over 50 years. Yet, even if it gets the loan, the administration won’t be able to shop for much-needed medical supplies: US sanctions make the banking transactions required to secure even medical supplies and humanitarian goods virtually impossible.”
Once upon a time there was a Constitution of the United States. In Article II, Section 2 it stipulated that only the U.S. Congress has the power to declare war, which means the American president has to go to the legislative body and make a case for going to war against an enemy or enemies. If there is a vote in favor of war, the president is empowered as commander-in-chief to direct the available resources against the enemy.
There is also something called international law. Under international law there are situations in which a head of state or head of government can use military force defensively or even preemptively if there is a substantial threat that is imminent. But normally, a country has to go through a procedure similar to that in the U.S. Constitution, which means making a case that the war is justified before declaring war. The Nuremberg Tribunals ruled that starting a war of aggression is the ultimate crime.
The president has already declared that he needs no approval from Congress or from anyone else to initiate further military operations against Iran in the Middle East, even if the action taken is “disproportionate.” Meanwhile he, the State Department and the Pentagon are all stating, without presenting any evidence at all to the public, that Iranian Major General Qassem Soleimani was planning attacks that would kill “hundreds of Americans” as a casus belli justifying his assassination. The White House is also asserting that the killing was done to “stop a war,” which makes no sense even coming from the addled tweet-conditioned brain of Donald J. Trump. And if one still harbors suspicions that Trump might actually be of sound mind, it is possible to listen to him on the day after the assassination while speaking to a gathering of his supporters at an evangelical church in Florida. He told the cheering crowd that “God is on our side” and that Soleimani “…was planning a very major attack, and we got him.” The audience went wild in approval, chanting “four more years.”
Such chest-beating moments of pretend strong leadership coming from president bone spurs as well as similar justifications for an assassination that will be surfacing over the next few days simply do not pass the smell test. Take the window dressing away from the Pentagon and media propaganda and all one has left is that the United States illegally and openly killed a senior official from a country with which it is not at war and did so without the consent of the third country where the assassination took place with which the U.S. is also not at war. The assassination was not in reality based on any imminent threat and is therefore illegal under international law and is undeniably an unconstitutional act of war directed against both Iran and Iraq.
What is particularly bizarre about Trump-think on this issue is that the assassination was carried out right in the open in a country with which the United States has had of late a friendly relationship and which allows American soldiers to be based on its soil. Judging from the crowds of protesters gathered in Baghdad to protest the killing, that somewhat comfortable arrangement is about to end. And it will also end American involvement in neighboring Syria, which will be unsustainable without a presence in Iraq. That is the only good news to come out of the assassination.
To be sure nations at war will try and sometimes succeed to assassinate enemy leaders, and the intelligence services of various countries also have been known to kill foreign politicians who are considered to be threatening. America’s best friend Israel leads the world in that statistic. But spy agencies work their mischief on a basis of plausible denial, which means that the countries that carry out assassinations make every effort to obscure their role and permit deniability.
The difference in what the White House has done now is that another page has been turned in the process of the United States going completely rogue. It all started when George W. Bush warned that “you’re either with us or against us.” Barack Obama subsequently labored over his Tuesday morning kill lists, which included American citizens, and the Trump White House has now expanded that license, asserting that it can act with complete impunity and out in the open to kill anyone at any time anywhere without due process or any actual demonstrated cause or accountability.
Donald Trump should be aware that there is considerable downside to the tiger than he has let out of its cage. What will he do if “enemies” all over the world decide to copy the Trump example and kill American diplomats, soldiers and tourists because they oppose U.S. policies. And what about if they up the ante a little bit and kill senior Ambassadors, Congressmen, and even succeed in killing a presidential cabinet member or two. Trump in his foolishness has invited reciprocity and has even granted those who do the killing a certain immunity if they are claiming that they are doing it to stop something worse, i.e. war.
Finally, if the target of the assassination had been anyone but an Iranian, Israel’s enemy, one can count on there being hell to pay with Congress and the media over Trump’s having gone completely off the rails. Assassinating a foreign leader as a new United States government policy has to be an impeachable offense. Forget about obstruction of justice and collusion with foreigners: assassination is the real deal and if it does not constitute a high crime, it is hard for one to imagine what does. By all means let’s impeach Trump based on what he has actually done, not on speculation over what he might have connived at.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has repeatedly justified the U.S. “extreme pressure” directed against Tehran, demanding that Islamic Republic take steps to become a “normal country.” The real question should be, “When will the United States of America become normal?”
Are we on the brink of a Third World War? There are signs that demand that we ask this question. Three clusters of signs compel us to probe a question that could well determine the future of our civilization.
“They know as others do that war, a creature of hegemony, is a terrible scourge. It is not just a question of millions dying. Much of civilization as we know it will also be eliminated especially since one of the protagonists is convinced that destroying cultural sites in a war is legitimate.”
Are we on the brink of a Third World War? There are signs that demand that we ask this question. Three clusters of signs compel us to probe a question that could well determine the future of our civilization.
One, the nature of the event itself — the reckless assassination of the Iranian general, Qassem Sulaimani, on the orders of the president of the United States of America, Donald Trump, on 3rd January 2020 at Baghdad airport — and the fears it has generated of a full-scale war between the two countries and other actors.
Two, the events that have preceded and followed the 3rd of January murder that portend the danger of a much bigger conflictin the world’s most tumultuous region.
Three, the tussle for power and influence in West Asia between various actors and their protectors and allies which only needs a trigger to set the entire region ablaze.
The Assassination
While the Trump administration has tried to justify the killing of Qassem Sulaimani in terms of his role in combating the American military presence in West Asia, it is indisputably true that he was also instrumental in the defeat of Al-Qaeda and Daesh and their affiliates in both Iraq and Syria — groups which the US leadership formally regarded as “terrorists.” If Qassem had an iconic stature in Iran and certain other countries in the region it was because of his success against terrorists inasmuch as his resistance to the Americans whom he saw as occupiers.
In any case, it is doubtful if it was Qassem’s position against the US presence that was the primary factor in his assassination. Isn’t it possible that Trump was hoping that the assassination of a major figure from Iran — since Iran has been depicted as a demon in the US media — would lessen the adverse impact of his impending impeachment?Besides, if he is perceived as a tough leader willing to eliminate a foreign opponent, wouldn’t it boost his chances of re-election in the presidential polls at the end of this year?
The Context.
Qassem’s killing should be seen in the context of deteriorating US-Iran relations since Trump withdrew from the Iran plus six nation nuclear agreement in 2018. He intensified his pressure upon Iran in a multitude of ways. Sanctions were increased manifold. Drone surveillance over Iranian territory became more pronounced. A US drone which had allegedly violated Iranian air-space was shot down by Iran on 20th January 2019. A tit-for-tat pattern in US-Iran confrontation developed often on Iraqi soil. The US for instance attacked a militia base in Iraq on 29th December 2019 which prompted pro-Iranian Iraqis to retaliate by occupying the US embassy in Baghdad on the 31st of December. Tit-for-tat confrontation arising from the targeting of Iran by the US has heightened the danger of an all-out war.
Tussle for Power
Perhaps a greater danger stems from the tussle for power within West Asia itself. Saudi Arabia, because of its immense oil wealth and its revered status as the land that situates Mekkah and Medina, has for a long while regarded itself as the leader of the Muslim world. The Islamic Revolution in Iran of 1979 was perceived as a challenge to its status partly because it had overthrown a monarchical structure and rejected US hegemony over the region. Besides, the vast majority of Iranians are Shia in contrast to Saudi Arabia’s adherence to Wahabi teachings. The uneasiness between the two states did not create any severe friction until the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq in 2003 which led eventually to the rise of the majority Shia population through the ballot-box. The empowerment of the Shia in Iraq, and their links to Shia Iran were interpreted by the Saudi elite as a threat to their position. Soon, they also witnessed the strengthening of the minority Shia component of Syria largely because of a war imposed upon the land through the machinations of some regional actors backed by the US and its allies. It is because of these reasons — and not the military manoeuvres of Qassem Sulaimani alone —– that the Shias and Iran have become more influential in West Asia.
The increasing influence of Iran has also incensed Israel. Since the 1979 Revolution when the Iranian leadership stated unequivocally its commitment to the liberation of the Palestinian people, Israel has been antagonistic towards Iran. It has worked closely with the US elite to undermine Iran on a variety of fronts. It is their common enmity towards Iran that has now helped to forge a bond between the Israeli and Saudi elites.
It is this struggle for power, Saudi and Israeli elites on one side, and Iran and some of its allies on the other, which has exacerbated the potential for a huge conflict in the region.Needless to say, the US role in this power struggle, as protector and defender of Israel and Saudi Arabia against Iran has heightened the danger of war as never before.
Apart from these three clusters of signs, there are other factors which may also point in the direction of a possible war. They are related to the global economy and global political power. The irreversible shift in global power from the US and the West to China and certain other actors is causing much consternation in Washington DC and London among other capitals. It signals the end of the epoch of Western dominance. Is a world war a way of preventing that change from taking place?
While the danger of a world war is real, we must also recognise that people everywhere do not want a war. A lot of governments have condemned the brazen assassination of Qassem as a gross violation of international law. In fact, some members of the US House of Representatives and the US Senate regard the authorisation of the murder by the US president as a stark transgression of US law.
For critics of US foreign policy outside the US in particular, Trump’s abuse of power is characteristic of a government which more often than not has behaved as if established law and civilised norms do not apply to it. US ‘exceptionalism’ is one of the main reasons why the global movement against hegemony has become so much stronger in the last three decades.
They know as others do that war, a creature of hegemony, is a terrible scourge. It is not just a question of millions dying. Much of civilization as we know it will also be eliminated especially since one of the protagonists is convinced that destroying cultural sites in a war is legitimate.
Iran which had suffered so much from a war imposed upon it in the eighties and has not initiated a war for the last 250 years is opposed to a military confrontation with the US. This is why avenging Qassem’s death for the Iranian leadership does not mean starting a war. It is a rational leadership which will focus upon driving the US military forces out of West Asia through politics and diplomacy.
If it succeeds in achieving this, it would have transformed the region and the world for the well-being of human beings everywhere.
Dr Chandra Muzaffar is the president of the International Movement for a Just World (JUST).
The original source of this article is Global Research
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