UN investigator warns US on use of drones (targeted executions may violate international law)

AP on Yahoo ^ | 10/27/09 | Edith M. Lederer - ap

[NormsRevenge]

UNITED NATIONS – A U.N. human rights investigator warned the United States Tuesday that its use of unmanned warplanes to carry out targeted executions may violate international law.

Philip Alston said that unless the Obama administration explains the legal basis for targeting particular individuals and the measures it is taking to comply with international humanitarian law which prohibits arbitrary executions, "it will increasingly be perceived as carrying out indiscriminate killings in violation of international law."

Alston, the U.N. Human Rights Council's investigator on extrajudicial, summary and arbitrary executions, raised the issue of U.S. Predator drones in a report to the General Assembly's human rights committee and at a news conference afterwards, saying he has become increasingly concerned at the dramatic increase in their use, especially in Afghanistan and Pakistan, since June.

He said the U.S. response — that the Geneva-based council and the General Assembly have no role in relation to killings during an armed conflict — "is simply untenable."

[JayVee]

Hey, put your faith and trust in the UN, after all, 800,000 Rwandans can’t be wrong.

[Proud_USA_Republican]

[Proud_USA_Republican]

[MestaMachine]

UN warns, Mesta scorns. It’s just that simple.
Except that bam will use it as an excuse to stop the ONE thing that appears to work in that godforsaken hellhole.

[444Flyer]

“United Obaminations”...

[VeniVidiVici]

Oh, he does look like a comrade, for sure. :-)

[444Flyer]

“U.S. Drones Have al Qaeda On the Run:
Strikes by CIA Drones to al Qaeda Sanctuaries in Pakistan Are Working”

(CBS) “It’s not often the enemy tells you something you’re doing - strikes by CIA drones against al Qaeda sanctuaries in Pakistan - is working.

But in this document posted on the Web, a top al Qaeda commander writes: “The harm is alarming. The matter is very grave.”

Both senior government officials and outside experts say it is an extraordinary confession, reports CBS News correspondent David Martin.

“It exposes for the first time a level of paranoia and a level of self-consciousness and a lack of confidence in al Qaeda’s leadership in their propaganda that we just haven’t seen up until now,” said Nicholas Schmidle, the author of “To Live or to Perish Forever: Two Tumultuous Years in Pakistan.”

In the past year, the CIA has flown more than 50 drone strikes in Pakistan, killing half of al Qaeda’s top leaders and hundreds of its fighters. One senior official said the central leadership of al Qaeda is under more pressure now than at any time since the bombing of Tora Bora in 2001. The document blames the accuracy of the strikes on “spies … (who) have spread throughout the land like locusts … So many brave commanders have been snatched away … so many hidden homes have been leveled.”

“The accuracy of these drone strikes has been so remarkable that there’s been no - there’s not even been an attempt to al Qaeda or the Taliban to offer a counter narrative to say that no there were actually women and children that were killed. There’s been nothing but silence,” said Schmidle...”

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/07/10/eveningnews/main5151547.shtml

[Let's Roll]

If it’s not bummer hamstringing our wonderful military, it’s UN apparatchiks. They can shove it.

[444Flyer]

July 29, 2008

“Officials: Al Qaeda’s Mad Scientist Killed:
CIA Drone Targeted Chemical Weapons Expert Abu Khabab Al-Masri On Afghanistan-Pakistan Border”

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/07/28/terror/main4301490.shtml

[Blind Eye Jones]

Oh Oh, there goes Obama’s Nobel. Time for war crime tribunals.

[hattend]

“Nuts”

[MestaMachine]

“bummer hamstringing our wonderful military, it’s UN apparatchiks”

One and the same.

[haroldeveryman]

[Al Qaeda’s Egyptian-born weapons expert Midhat Mursi al-Sayid Umar, also known as Abu Khabab al-Masri]

So “Abu Khabab” now is also known as “Shish Khabab”.

[haroldeveryman]

[UN Human rights Lawyer Philip Alston said that unless the Obama administration explains the legal basis for targeting particular individuals.... “it will increasingly be perceived as carrying out indiscriminate killings in violation of international law.”]

Obama can
1. Plead his case to the U.N., and in which case the UN may decide that he is a war criminal.
2. Declare that American law, which gives the President the responsibility for the defense of the United States, overrules “international humanitarian law”, whatever that means.

Which one will it be, Barak? Comeon! This would be an easy one for any other US President (except maybe Clinton).

[DoughtyOne]

I'll be posting this up until the day I die.

[Talisker]

Philip Alston, the U.N. Human Rights Council's investigator on extrajudicial, summary and arbitrary executions... said the U.S. response — that the Geneva-based council and the General Assembly have no role in relation to killings during an armed conflict — "is simply untenable."

Tell that to the million dead Rwandans, the hundreds of thousands in Chinese prison camps, or the millions of shariah-propertied Islamic women, you rancid, garbage-filled murderous hypocrite.

[Son House]

What’s that guys coordinates?

^
Census bureau’s probably got them, they got everyone else’s

[lentulusgracchus]

Concur. Let the blue-helmet squad run up into the mountains and do that finger-wagging thing at the mass-murdering Al-Q'aedists and their knuckle-walking Taliwhacker pals, and then come back down and tell us all how it went.

[saganite]

So a sniper picking off the commanding officer in a battle is against the rules of war? Amazing.

[Vanders9]

I’ve heard everything now - apparently “aiming” is illegal in war...