HA HA!
Posted on 07/29/2003 6:52:07 PM PDT by sjersey
The lower house of parliament in Belgium has approved a bill amending a controversial war crimes law which has led to cases being filed against several world leaders including President George W Bush and the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon. Under the existing law, Belgian courts are empowered to try anyone for war crimes regardless of their nationality and regardless of where the alleged crimes are committed.
The new bill will limit the jurisdiction of the courts to cases only involving Belgian citizens and residents.
Correspondents say that, with several international organisations having their headquarters in Brussels, the government was under pressure to change the law.
HA HA!
So now they're going to have a law that empowers Belgium to try Belgians? I wonder what they did before - ship them to Holland for trial maybe?
No words are suitable to express my contempt for these halfbreed eurotrash weasels.
Belgium law change condemnedHuman rights groups have attacked the Belgian Government's decision to withdraw a controversial war crimes law.
The US-based organisation, Human Rights Watch has accused Belgium of giving in to pressure from the United States.
A Belgian human rights group described the decision as hypocritical and irresponsible.
The law gave Belgian courts the power to try any war crimes cases, wherever they were committed.
It had been used in attempts to indict the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, US President George W Bush and the UK Prime Minister, Tony Blair.
But after being re-elected last week, Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt said the law would be scrapped and under a new bill, only cases involving Belgian citizens or residents would be considered.
A representative of Human Rights Watch expressed sadness and shock at the announcement.
"What saddens me is that, with all the political pressure from the United States and Israel, we have completely forgotten the original point of the law, which was to render justice to the victims of horrible crimes," said Geraldine Mattioli from the group's Brussels office.
"These crimes are so horrible that they are beyond understanding and, as such, concern the whole of humanity so that we do not need to be directly involved to be affected by these crimes."
"It's clearly a disappointment," said Dan Van Raemdonck, of Belgium's Human Rights League. "Belgium was in the lead, now it's fallen behind other countries."
An Israeli Government spokesman said Israel would remain cautious until the law had been repealed, while the US state department in Washington said it was too soon to comment.
Dropped cases
The law prompted Washington to warn that it would block further funding for Nato's new headquarters in Belgium until the legal threat was withdrawn.
Mr Verhofstadt said on Saturday the amendments would mean most of the dozens of pending cases could be dropped, although he said complaints relating to events in Rwanda, Chad and Guatemala where Belgians were directly involved could continue.
The complaints against Mr Bush, Mr Blair and US Iraq war commander General Tommy Franks had already been rejected by the Belgian authorities last month, using earlier amendments to the law.
The bill is expected to be approved by parliament in the coming weeks in a move which was initiated last month, and will bring the law in line with that from other Western states.
The Eurosocialists have also been told in a Congressional resolution that any attempt to take Americans into custody by these sham courts will be met with force. Perhaps the Belgians should pass a law against biased, bogus reporting. The BBC would be very interested in that.
All it took was a little pressure from the U.S. and threats to move NATO headquarters elsewhere to get Belgium to overturn this noble law.
The United States sends it's boys (and it's girls!) to the worst hell holes in the world and spends hundreds of billions of dollars to rid the world of monsters like Saddam Hussein and Mullah Omar and meanwhile socialist lawyers are taking George W. Bush and Tony Blair to court for "war crimes" in Belgium. There's Europe's idea of justice.
With all due respect, who the he!! does Belgium think it is?
Hi
I was in Belgium for a while too long and their home made aloof hysteria, which happens to be interpreted by them as their culture, results in an uncommunicative society typical of a communist regime.
Essentially the culture swung the wrong way and now they are stuck in this loop that can only get worse unless political interventions like the one of the War Crimes Tribunal keep coming to humble the Belgians.
Impersonality can be appreciated provided it meets the needs of freedom, but the "mainstream" Belgian culture has developed a twisted concept of absence for the masses avoiding altogether the strength there is behind a generalised feel good, optimistic society.
They are potentially in a position where they can develop a society where progress is at the core of their culture but out of resentment of not having a comfortably designed national culture they push the issue most than many other nations and ANY comment or observation on the feel one has on anything within the Belgian boundaries, not matter its nature, it gets met with Gestapo like resentment and scorn. It appears as if they are going around with a phrase book containing a list of stereotypes on most nations on the planet to meet any interpretation on their being resulting in appearing to dislike every country.
I wonder if it the 50% taxes they pay (and they proudly admit avoiding as well as another of their national traits) that causes this collective delusion.
Their loss, what do you reckon?
So, in other words Belgium has no idea who she is. Pity.
But, Belgium's "resentment" over her own shortcomings does not impart a right to alter in any way America's sovereignity.
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