A panel of experts set up by the International Commission of Jurists has concluded that counterterrorism measures adopted after 9/11 “threaten the very core of the international human rights framework.” The panel’s report, called “Assessing Damage, Urging Action,” was released last week following a three-year study of how tactics used in the so-called “war on terror” have eroded rights and liberties the world over and created a climate of “lingering cynicism.”
The panel includes sixty senior jurists from around the world. The report studies counterterrorism practices in forty countries but concentrates on the United States, asking President Obama to “immediately and publicly renounce” the characterization of counterterrorism as a war and to investigate human rights abuses against terrorism suspects.
The report was headed up by Mary Robinson, the president of the International Commission of Jurists.
There’s been a lot written on the war on terror and counterterrorism, but this was the first time that there were hearings in sixteen countries that involved more than forty, because some of them were regional hearings.
We did look very closely both at the United States and United Kingdom law. We had hearings in both London and Belfast, because we found that in countries that didn’t have good protections, they felt the laws had changed, so they expanded their bad laws and clamped down on freedom of the press, on political activism. And when we challenged that, they would say, “Oh, but look at the United States. They no longer say no torture. Look at what they’re doing with Guantanamo. Look at Abu Ghraib, etc.” So we had to hold those who, you know, speak about democracy and freedom to the standard that they need to be held to. And we were shocked at how the standards had dipped. And, of course, it wasn’t making us more secure.
It is a report that’s intended to be helpful and constructive, but we really do want to bring home the damage that has been done, some of it through a great expansion of intelligence gathering in secret with no accountability and no oversight, and some of that intelligence has been obtained by torture. President Obama was so unequivocal, as he has been from the beginning, about no torture and got a standing ovation. That’s a step in the right direction.
When we were in London launching the report, the newspapers were full of this case of the Ethiopian British resident who has just been returned from Guantanamo. He claims to have been tortured in Morocco with UK intelligence officers handing in the questions to him. We don’t know, because we haven’t had an inquiry yet, how much validity, but the United States will not hand over intelligence that was gathered from him. And that is a matter that has been before the British courts. So we have this secret world of unaccountability, and we say this is one of the problems when you talk about a war and you use that paradigm and when you don’t uphold the standards of international human rights law and international humanitarian law.
The United States has an administration now which has recognized the damage. And I think we should be looking forward and saying there are steps that need to be taken, and we need to understand that acts of terrorism are very serious criminal acts. And in our report, we repeat frequently that we know that these are real threats, and governments have a duty to protect, as the first responsibility of government. And we’re not soft at all on terrorism. We want more effective measures to bring terrorists to justice and put them away for a long time. But if you bend the rules, other countries will not respect you, and they will bend them further.
When George Mitchell was making progress in Northern Ireland, I asked a former loyalist Protestant paramilitary, who had become a community leader and was helping with reconciliation, I said, “What do you attribute his success in Northern Ireland?” And he used a phrase that I then honored George with later. He said, “He listened us out.” In other words, he was so patient in listening to the different sides that they ran out of complaints. And then he said, “Well, now, where do we go from here?”
And there is a need, in the context of the Middle East, to have an understanding of the narrative, which is completely different on both sides. On the Palestinian side, they are the victims, etc. On the Israeli side, they feel they are the victims, in some measure. And there needs to be an ability to transcend that and set the course for addressing the deep issues that divide.
I was in Gaza as High Commissioner for Human Rights eight years before. Going back—first of all, the way in which the West Bank itself has been divided up, by the new settlements, which are, you know, very provocative and in many cases illegal; by roads that Palestinians can’t go on, but they have to find ways around; and by the wall—but when I went to Gaza, to be with people who were under siege for eighteen months, where there was a truce, which at that stage was due for possible renewal, but there had been no dividend. When we were in Northern Ireland and the IRA started to come into some kind of process, we encouraged them by having some kind of a dividend, some kind of a change in circumstances. There was none in Gaza.
I met poor farming women whose land had been bulldozed so they couldn’t farm. And they said, “We learned embroidery, but we’ve no thread. We learned to make candles, but we’ve no wax.” There was no activity. There was not enough food for families, not enough healthcare. We heard terrible stories about pregnant women dying at the border. And I saw—because I spent two hours going in and going out, I saw very sick people being treated like dirt. You know, you don’t treat people like that. It’s very dehumanizing. These young conscripts on the Israeli side do not treat the people going in and out as human beings. They treat them as potential terrible terrorists. And that’s the image. So we need to break all of that. And I think George Mitchell has the capacity to reach beyond and to start to make us aware that this is a human situation that has to be addressed.
I was very critical of the situation under Hamas rule, because they had eroded many human rights, and I brought that up. Freedom of speech, freedom of movement. Women were being pulled back from playing a full role. They were being replaced by male teachers in some circumstances. But I felt that it was important to engage, because they have a responsibility. And I do believe that, you know, there cannot be a sustainable solution. But the main thing at the moment is to try to bring about unity in the Palestinians, between the Hamas and Fatah and others. And at the moment, that divide is damaging the prospects for all of the Palestinian people.
Senator Patrick Leahy has talked about the need for an independent inquiry. And he’s right. You cannot just brush this aside because there’s an economic crisis. There is a need for a people to say, “How did we get it so wrong? What were the ways in which we lost our way with our values?” And then the decision can be taken as to whether anybody will be held accountable.
Acts of terrorism are crimes against humanity. They are terrible crimes, and we need to reinforce the criminal justice system, work with countries that have weak systems to strengthen their systems, and make sure that there is sharing of intelligence, but that there isn’t a secret world of no accountability for passing across intelligence that’s obtained through torture, while nodding and winking, “Oh, we don’t torture, but we will use intelligence obtained under torture.” These are the things that have to be addressed.
Mary Robinson talking.
Mary Robinson, world-renowned human rights lawyer and advocate. She is the former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and the former president of Ireland, the first woman to hold the office. She is currently the president of the International Commission of Jurists and the president of Realizing Rights: The Ethical Globalization Initiative.
– from democracynow