Tulsa Peace Fellowship

There never was a good war or a bad peace. ~Ben Franklin

In an op-ed piece for The Observer newspaper (UK) Tutu writes that the Iraq war "has destabilized and polarized the world to a greater extent than any other conflict in history," wrote Tutu, who was awarded the Nobel prize in 1984.  He says the ex-leaders of Britain and the United States should be made to "answer for their actions."

http://news.yahoo.com/tutu-bush-blair-face-trial-hague-094855285.html

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In an op-ed piece for antiwar.com, the libertarian website for which he is chief editor, Justin Raimondo writes;

"To this day, not a single US government official has been held accountable, and the pro-war pundits – who spent over a decade relentlessly agitating for the war – are in their same perches, war-birds screeching for more destruction."

Ten Years Later: When is the Reckoning?

Iraq war criminals still at large

March 18, 2013

http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2013/03/17/ten-years-later-when-...


Citizens' campaign to arrest Blair continues
Citizens band together to arrest former British prime minister over involvement in Iraq's invasion a decade ago.
Last Modified: 21 Mar 2013
excerpt:

Ten years since British forces joined the US-led assault, many in the UK are more critical than ever of the country's involvement in a conflict documented by the Iraq Body Count database to have killed more than 112,000 civilians.

More than a fifth - 22 percent - of Britons polled by YouGov this month said they believed Blair should be tried as a war criminal for his role in the conflict, which was preceded by massive anti-war demonstrations in London and other cities.

Fifty-three percent said the invasion was wrong, while half said Blair, a key international ally of US President George W Bush, had deliberately misled the British people over the threat posed by weapons of mass destruction.

Blair's schedule these days is a closely guarded secret to avoid ambushes by the protesters who stalk his public appearances armed with eggs, shoes and banners reading: "BLIAR". Even his testimony at last year's phone-hacking inquiry was interrupted by an intruder shouting, "This man is a war criminal!"

In an article published in last weekend's Sunday Herald newspaper, Alex Salmond, the leader of the ruling Scottish National Party, wrote: "The illegal invasion and war in Iraq is a disgrace without parallel in modern times, the shame of which will echo down the ages for Blair and all of those who were complicit in sending young men and women to risk their lives on the basis of a gigantic fraud."

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2013/03/20133209727608817...

Richard Falk, the Milbank Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University, writes:

The Iraq War was a war of aggression from its inception, being an unprovoked use of armed force against a sovereign state in a situation other than self-defence. The Nuremberg and Tokyo War Crimes Tribunals convened after World War II had declared such aggressive warfare to be a "crime against peace" and prosecuted and punished surviving political and military leaders of Germany and Japan as war criminals. 

We can ask why have George W Bush and Tony Blair not been investigated, indicted and prosecuted for their roles in planning and prosecuting the Iraq War.

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/03/2013361029140182.html

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., (Aug. 20, 2013) — Plaintiff Sundus Shaker Saleh, an Iraqi single mother and refugee now living in Jordan, filed a complaint in March 2013 in San Francisco federal court alleging that the planning and waging of the war constituted a “crime of aggression” against Iraq, a legal theory that was used by the Nuremberg Tribunal to convict Nazi war criminals after World War II.

In court papers filed today (PDF), the United States Department of Justice requested that George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and Paul Wolfowitz be granted procedural immunity in a case alleging that they planned and waged the Iraq War in violation of international law.

In her lawsuit, Saleh alleges that:

-- Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz began planning the Iraq War in 1998 through their involvement with the “Project for the New American Century,” a Washington DC non-profit that advocated for the military overthrow of Saddam Hussein.

-- Once they came to power, Saleh alleges that Cheney, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz convinced other Bush officials to invade Iraq by using 9/11 as an excuse to mislead and scare the American public into supporting a war.

-- Finally, she claims that the United States failed to obtain United Nations approval prior to the invasion, rendering the invasion illegal and an act of impermissible aggression.

The case is Saleh v. Bush (N.D. Cal. Mar. 13, 2013, No. C 13 1124 JST).

http://warisacrime.org/content/obama-doj-asks-court-grant-immunity-...

Former Prime Minister Tony Blair subjected to citizen's arrest attempt at top London restaurant over 'war in Iraq'

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/uk/former-pri...

op/ed in the online pages of The Guardian:

"Currently a prosecution depends on one of two factors: its status before the International Criminal Court (ICC) or its status in domestic law. The ICC calls itself "an independent, permanent court that tries persons accused of the most serious crimes of international concern, namely genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes". In all honesty I have no faith in the ICC bringing a conviction against Blair. The ICC has been accused of bias, and as being a tool of western imperialism, only punishing leaders from small states while ignoring crimes committed by richer and more powerful states. ...

"[O]ur only hope of getting criminal charges brought against Blair lies at home. ... That will send a clear message to any future politicians, both in the UK and abroad, helping to avoid another illegal misguided foray and the loss of innocent lives. Between 500,000 and 1 million people have lost their lives in Iraq (depending on which reports you believe), and with sectarian violence showing no signs of slowing down, the death toll is still on the rise.

"The sword of Damocles is hanging over Tony Blair's head in the form of Sir John Chilcot's Iraq inquiry report, which unsurprisingly has faced long delays. It is going to tell the story of, what is in my mind, the most catastrophic foreign policy decision since 1956, when former British prime minister Anthony Eden misled parliament and the British public and lied to the world during the Suez crisis. Eden and Blair share several similarities: both willing to sacrifice our troops and the innocent lives of civilians in the Middle East for oil, regime change and imperialist gain. ...

source:

"Tony Blair should be prosecuted for war crimes – not just judged by history"

Blair is 'eel-like' – but if the Chilcot inquiry is published soon, he might not wriggle off the hook

7 May 2014

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/may/07/tony-blair-war...

In the Telegraph (UK), Lord Hurd is quoted as saying: “This has dragged on beyond the questions of mere negligence and forgiveable delay – it is becoming a scandal. This is not something which is of trivial importance, it is something which a large number of people in this country look anxiously for truth.”

Tony Blair 'could face war crimes charges' over Iraq War

06 Jan 2015
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/tony-blair/11328177/Tony-B...

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