US actions deemed illegal by the world court

Yo Mamma

A well kept secret about the U.S.-U.K. attack on Afghanistan is that it is clearly illegal. It violates international law and the express words of the United Nations charter.

Despite repeated reference to the right of self-defense under Article 51, the Charter simply does not apply here. Article 51 gives a state the right to repel an attack that is ongoing or imminent as a temporary measure until the UN Security Council can take steps necessary for international peace and security.

The Security Council has already passed two resolutions condemning the Sept. 11 attacks and announcing a host of measures aimed at combating terrorism. These include measures for the legal suppression of terrorism and its financing, and for co-operation between states in security, intelligence, criminal investigations and proceedings relating to terrorism. The Security Council has set up a committee to monitor progress on the measures in the resolution and has given all states 90 days to report back to it.

Neither resolution can be remotely said to authorize the use of military force. True, both, in their preambles, abstractly "affirm" the inherent right of self-defense, but they do so "in accordance with the Charter." They do not say military action against Afghanistan would be within the right of self-defense. Nor could they. That's because the right of unilateral self-defense does not include the right to retaliate once the attack has stopped.

The right of self defense in international law is like the right of self-defense in our own law: It allows you to defend yourself when the law is not around, but it does not allow you to take the law into your own hands.

Since the United States and Britain have undertaken this attack without the explicit authorization of the Security Council, those who die from it will be victims of a crime against humanity, just like the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Even the Security Council is only permitted to authorize the use of force where "necessary to maintain and restore international peace and security." Now it must be clear to everyone that the military attack on Afghanistan has nothing to do with preventing terrorism. This attack will be far more likely to provoke terrorism. Even the Bush administration concedes that the real war against terrorism is long term, a combination of improved security, intelligence, and a re-thinking of US foreign alliances.

Critics of the Bush approach have aruged that any effective fight against terrorism would have to involve a re-evaluation of the way Washington conducts its affairs in the world. For example, the way it has promoted violence for short-term gain, as in Afghanistan when it supported the Taliban a decade ago, in Iraq when it supported Saddam Hussein against Iran, and Iran before that when it supported the Shah.

The attack on Afghanistan is about vengeance and about showing how tough Americans are. It is being done on the backs of people who have far less control over their government than even the poor souls who died on Sept. 11. It will inevitably result in many deaths of civilians, both from the bombing and from the disruption of aid in a country where millions are already at risk. The 37,000 rations dropped on Sunday were pure PR, and so are claims of "surgical" strikes and the denials of civilian casualties. We've seen them before, in Kosovo for example, followed by lame excuses for the "accidents" that killed civilians.

For all that has been said about how things should have changed since Sept 11, one thing that has not changed is US disregard for international law. Its decade-long bombing campaign against Iraq and its 1999 bombing campaign of Yugoslavia were both illegal. The US does not even recognize jurisdiction of the World Court. It withdrew from it in 1986 when the court condemned Washington for attacking Nicaragua, mining its harbours and funding the contras. IN that case, the court rejected US claims that it was acting under Article 51 in defense of Nicaragua's neighbors.

The bombing of Afghanistan is the legal and moral equivilant of what was done to the Americans on Sept 11. We may come to remember that day, not for its human tragedy, but for the beginning of a headlong plunge into a violent, lawless World !

Gargoyle

In case you hadn't noticed, we are international law. Everytime UN peacekeepers get in trouble, its either the US or UK that has to go in there and bail them out.

Gargoyle

Originally posted by Yo Mamma
The bombing of Afghanistan is the legal and moral equivilant of what was done to the Americans on Sept 11. We may come to remember that day, not for its human tragedy, but for the beginning of a headlong plunge into a violent, lawless World !

Please stop being so ridiculously melodramatic.

Yurmasyurda

We're all gonna die aaaaaaaaaaaarghhh :eek:

Yeh cos I care :rolleyes:

Dr. Loon

Originally posted by Gargoyle
In case you hadn't noticed, we are international law. Everytime UN peacekeepers get in trouble, its either the US or UK that has to go in there and bail them out.

What do you mean we are international law ?
Who's we? Ireland? Even if the US/Uk are international law.... you still can't break your own law can you?

Sharkey

Originally posted by Yo Mamma
A well kept secret about the U.S.-U.K. attack on Afghanistan is that it is clearly illegal. It violates international law and the express words of the United Nations charter.

Despite repeated reference to the right of self-defense under Article 51, the Charter simply does not apply here. Article 51 gives a state the right to repel an attack that is ongoing or imminent as a temporary measure until the UN Security Council can take steps necessary for international peace and security.

What a crock. the UN has yet to send a single person to protect Americans from terrorists. They aren't in our airports and they aren't sorting the mail.

The UN has yet to do anything and they'd sit on their collective beaurocratic asses and do nothing JUST LIKE THEY DID with the USS Cole and WTC I.

Sure, sure -- eventually, the UN would send out a company of their blue-helmeted surrender monkeys ... that would immediately lie down the first time a group of 16yo Taliban pukes opened fire on them. The only thing UN troops are good for is hostages.

The only thing the UN does is provide cerimonial trials of despots that have already been knocked from power.

Sharkey

Can anyone name those acts the UN has taken "necessary to maintain international peace and security" under Article 51?

bonkey

Originally posted by Dr. Loon


What do you mean we are international law ?
Who's we? Ireland? Even if the US/Uk are international law.... you still can't break your own law can you?

No, its the usual US attitude that the UN is a great idea for keeping others in line, but the US shouldnt itself be subjected to it cause its the self-appointed "good guy" and helps out so much

The US is not international law....it just wants to be.

As the self-appointed policeman of the world, the US should be more careful about keeping with international policy than anyone else. After all, if they can blindly ignore UN resolutions because they want to, then why should anyone else respect UN law, or any other international law for that matter.

jc

Hobbes

Originally posted by Sharkey

What a crock. the UN has yet to send a single person to protect Americans from terrorists. They aren't in our airports and they aren't sorting the mail.

Erm unless requested I thought the UN only went in when there was civil unrest in a country?

Tell me this. If the UN offered to have it's troops deployed in the US to police it's streets, airports and mail rooms what do you think the reply from the US would be?

Shiminay

Originally posted by Hobbes


Erm unless requested I thought the UN only went in when there was civil unrest in a country?

Tell me this. If the UN offered to have it's troops deployed in the US to police it's streets, airports and mail rooms what do you think the reply from the US would be?

Exactly.

The UN hasn't been given much of a chance to react. It's a beaurocracy and it takes time to react.

I wonder (like the Afgans do) where the proof that Afganistan is involved in the September 11th tragedies?

America thinks it runs the globe, but it doesn't just yet (not far from it, mind). Americans need to learn that and then start acting accordingly. If you're going to be a part of the UN, at least stick to the rules like everyone else - that goes for the UK too!

Loomer

Of course the attacks on Afghanistan are completely immorral and illegal, but hey its only a stupid little backwater and no one in the west cares as long as we can get 2 cheeseburgers for $1/£1

Amazing how somewhere along the line Americas focal point shifted from pressuring the Taliban to give up bin Laden to bombarding the country to force the Taliban out of power. Mmm thats sounds like a setup to an internal coup d'etat. Gee! Americas never been involved in anything like that before.

As much as I was against the bombarding of Yugoslavia, putting it in context with this heinous misuse of power and propaganda makes the former act almost justifiable ( at least on legal grounds)

Clintons Cat

in britain the House of Commons never voted on military action.
find an account of Labour MP Paul Marsdens meeting with the Chief Whip when he preposed an early day motion.
"war is not a matter of consience"

Typedef

The simple fact is that violence begets violence. Look at our own country. If the British or Irish had tried for an all out military victory then people on both sides of the divide would more than likely be living in the midst of a war of varying intensity.

So the US has no mandate from the UN, as if that has ever stopped the US from charging in and doing what it likes. Look at Grenada, Guatemela, Nicaragua and now Afghanistan.

The US will only understand a military response, it was only after Osama Bin Laden equated the security of Americans to the security of Palestinians that the US cut off economic (not military) aid to Israel and the adiministration started calling for things like a seperate Palestinian state and withdrawal from the West Bank etc.

Irish people have witnessed 30 years of war, which ostensibly was not in the Republic but the fact that the border is 100km give or take from Dublin brings home the reality of violence to the Irish, similarly the mainland bombing campaign brought home the reality of violence to Britian, but the US has up until now felt totally secure and so militarily superior that it has felt endowed and empowered to do as it wishes.

Don't hate Americans because of this, this is human nature and the Irish at the first given opportunity would show just how little 800 years of British misrule has taught us with respect to others. Look at the posters from the Irish peoples party spouting off about 300 million emigrants coming to Ireland, or the guys who spout off about english bastards and then complain about the blacks or the travellers.

It is as erroneous to hate Afghani people for what media propaganda would have us believe as it is to believe the partisan drivel that tars Americans as some kind of congenital Imperialists.

Of course I disagree with US foreign policy, who wouldn't, but you only have to look at the sharks in our own country (like Denis O'Brien or Ben Dunne, Ray Burke, Michael Lowery) to realise that the US is just a big country doing what big countries do, the same thing as little countries, only bigger.

Look at China in Tibet.
Look at Indonesia in East Timor.
Look at India with it's caste system.
Look at Russia and it's war in Chechnya.
Look at Britian and Irealnd &/it's own foreign interests.
Look at Germany and the holocaust.
Look at Japan and it's own war crimes.
Look at France and it's Nuclear weapons tests, colonialism of Vietnam & others.
Look at Mexico and the people of south Mexico being disposessed for corporate macro interests.


Yes we should pressure the US to subscribe to the international court and we should attempt to dismantle the series of countries that have veto power over various aspects of the UN.

Of course the more organised military complex in human society realises that real stability in the world spells the end of their market segment and so there are whole sections of western & human socitey that thrive from war and disquite. Weapons makers, Battle Ship builders, Security firms etc.

If we can all be so blatantly honest and say that sanctions against Iraq simply seek to influence the flow of petro-chemicals around the world then can we not similarly be honest and say that the military complex of the world needs war in order to survive and that actions such as what is happening in Afghanistan seek to sustain the military industrial infrastructure as it does appease American revanche?

Also surely if we establish a more representative world order where countries no-longer have veto power do we not simply shift our political sharks from nations to pan-global bodies? In such pan-global bodies what is to gaurantee that a neo-political eliteism will not prevade and end up being a globally repressive entity?

We need a structure of governance that abrogates the human will to conquer, a rotational system, a system with an extreme amount of machine driven desisions & little to no human involvement, or some other way of governing ourselves intelligently before somewhere someday probably with even more powerful weapons than exist today, we as a species bring about our own destruction.

Nuclear Winter Sux

Chaos-Engine

Originally posted by Typedef


Look at China in Tibet.
Look at Indonesia in East Timor.
Look at India with it's caste system.
Look at Russia and it's war in Chechnya.
Look at Britian and Irealnd &/it's own foreign interests.
Look at Germany and the holocaust.
Look at Japan and it's own war crimes.
Look at France and it's Nuclear weapons tests, colonialism of Vietnam & others.
Look at Mexico and the people of south Mexico being disposessed for corporate macro interests.

Out of all the above only Mexico, Russia, China and India still exist to the present day. These countries get critised for it also. But the USofA still continues its Imperialistic Foreign Policies. Be them Offical Governmental or Commerical(Ummm yes... the unelectibles)...

Nice post Yo Momma... Fight the Beast... Burn America

Magwitch

There is no point in nit picking the points of international law. The laws were written down to dictate relations and protocol between nations in times of war and peace.

Since then things have changed beyond recognition. If the west is having a hard time adjusting to the new ways of the world then God help the UN if its track record is anything to go by.

The fact is Bin Ladens network and the Taliban belong to a new world force. One that can go to war with, control and topple governments and countries and does not fall under the remit of international law. In the light of these emerging facts the ruling will most likly be overturned due to the circumstances. Out of this I think will come a legal amenment to international law allowing countries to declare war on specific organisations allowing a greater degree of flexability in "policing" actions.

Loomer

I think Bill Hicks (R.I.P) said it best:

"So there, we have figured it out, go back to bed America, your government has figured out how it all transpired. Go back to bed America, your government is in control again. Here, here's American Gladiators. Watch this, shut up. Go back to bed America, here's American Gladiators. Here's 56 channels of it. Watch these pituitary retards bang their ****in skulls together and congratulate you on living in the land of freedom. Here you go America, you are free... to do as we tell you. You are free, to do as we tell you."

Lemming

I hear a lot of people shouting about the "evil Imperialist US of A".

Do any of said anti-war/anti-american people actually realise that the fact they're not arab or muslim is going to mean jacksh*t to an Al Queda operative or some fundamentalist planning to kill them?

These people didn't just declare war on the US. They declared war on the west. Last time I checked .. we were part of that.

While I think that the military actions in Afghanistan could be handled a little better, I still think that the US is right in the direction its going.

Whilst the west (and in particular the USA) has made questionable judgements as regards world policy in teh past, the Arab nations must also shoulder some of the blame. They have allowed the most extreme to rise to power. They have said nothing, they have done nothing. They blame everyone but themselves for everything that happens to them. They scream about the tyranny of the west, etc etc. Yet do they do anything about the extremists in their society? Do they try to marginalise them and say "You do not speak for me".

I had to laugh when I was walking through town (Dublin) some weeks ago, and ran into that Anti-War protest marching down dame st. chanting "1, 2, 3, 4, we don't want your war", or something to that effect. Again, as I said above, to those who carried out the sept.11 attack, we're all the same. They don't caree about our opinions. We're westeners - we're not muslim - and that's all they want to know

PHB

imo the act of terrorism could be defined as follows.

Defines Terrorism as the use of fear or intimidation to civilians to acheive a political goal.
Thats a summarised version.

The US attacks in my opinion are terrorism.
The US attacks are technically againist International Law and are technically going againist the Security Council.

USA basically run the UN.
I think guys should realise that all the p5(countries with a veto) countries have seen the evidence that supports that the taliban are harbouring Bin laden with full support.
Once all the p5 countries agree then the security council if forced to accept that The tailiban are harbouring Bin Laden. The p5 have stated this so the US have the support of the security council in trying to disestablish the Taliban.
As for the attacks on Afghanistain no p5 will risk a conflict with the US over this. Hell the only people backing them up is IRAQ, everyone else is too scared of sanctions, which IRAQ dont need to worry about.

Loomer

Hey Lemming can I borrow your brush after you finished tarring people with it!

Lemming

Originally posted by Loomer
Hey Lemming can I borrow your brush after you finished tarring people with it!

I'm not trying to tar people with it Loomer - what I AM trying to do is point out that the whole sorry state of affairs is a little more complicated then a lot of people are making it sound.

YES the west (that's us included - for those wanting to sit on the sidelines) has a lot of hard questions to answer. But we're NOT the only ones. The arab world itself has to ask itself some very hard questions and then answer - and they may not like some of those answers.