IHRC Event: D.C. Bar Association's General Counsels Series (Department of Defense)

The D.C. Bar Association, in cooperation with the International Human Rights Committee, will present an off-the-record brownbag program with Jeh C. Johnson, General Counsel for the Department of Defense, on Wednesday, November 4, from 12:15 to 1:30 p.m. EST, at WilmerHale (1875 Pennsylvania Avenue; DC). The cost is $15 for members of the ABA's Section of International Law.

ICTY Trial Aganist Karadzic Commences

October, 26, 2009.  The Hague. 

Today, I stood in the visitor's line to get a place in the public viewing room of Courtroom I at the ICTY to watch the start of the prosecution against Karadzic for his role in a joint criminal enterprise to commit genocide through the massacre at Srebrenica in 1995 that resulted in over 8,000 deaths. 

There were many people holding banners.  One of them listed the names of people who died in the massacre and their dates of birth.  They ranged from teenagers to people in the 60s, upon a quick glance.  There were about ten vans with satellite dishes on top parked across from the ICTY.  A group of people (mostly women) from Srebrenica came to the trial and was allowed in.  Many of them wore head scarves.  The other visitors and I standing in line were allowed through the first security checkpoint after the group had been admitted.

On the way in, I heard the guards tell a person (presumably an ICTY staff member) that she could not sit in the public viewing area because it was not for "staff."  Apparently, many of the media could not sit there, either, and they were mostly based in the World Forum across the street with video screens to show the court proceedings. A few handfuls of people with laptops (possibly journalists) were inside the ICTY but they seemed to be based outside the courtroom in the lobby in front of the lobby TV screens broadcasting the court proceedings.

I went through the second security checkpoint and upstairs to Courtroom I and got a handheld translator (which seemed to cut off when I put it inside my blazer pocket so maybe it had a weak wireless signal).  I took a seat in the back because it was, at least, near the center of the room with a view of the entire courtroom ahead. There was a large glass wall separating us, in the public gallery, from the courtroom but the judges were directly ahead of us and the prosecution to our right.  Neither Karadzic nor any defense lawyers seemed to be in the courtroom (on our left hand side), just the prosecution (on our right).

The prosecutor was speaking, a caucasian woman with short grey hair.  The judges huddled together and then one of them (of Asian ethnicity) announced that the proceedings would be adjourned until tomorrow at 2:15 pm when they will begin with the prosecutor's opening statements.  The people in the public viewing gallery were upset at the delay and some shouted out, especially the older woman with a head scarf next to me.  The viewers stood up even though the judges were all seated and we were supposed to observe courtroom decorum and sit ourselves. The guards seemed a bit concerned and asked us to sit but then the judges, themselves, got up.

I said to the older woman standing next to me and to a younger woman (in her 30s or 40s) standing in front of me, the simple word - "tomorrow."  I gestured forward with my hands since I did not know if they spoke English.  I thought they were upset that it was adjourned and, maybe, did not realize it was a temporary postponement.  They understood but were not comforted. 

The woman standing in front of me said, "we came all the way from Srebrenica." I thought to myself that these people may have lost family or friends in the massacre.  I could see their anger and hurt. I realized there was not much I could say. To them, justice delayed (even one day) was justice denied. I reached forward and gave the woman a hug.  She stood still and did not seem to react.  I pulled back and then noticed that, within a couple seconds, she had started to cry, perhaps as a release triggered by my short and tentative embrace.  Her eyes were red.  She was upset.  They had waited 14 years for this day and now they would have to wait another 24 hours.

I got a tea from the automatic machine in the ICTY lobby and watched everyone gather in the lobby and then outside in front of the main door of the ICTY but inside the tall iron gate.  Reporters and cameramen spoke with the older woman that had been sitting next to me.  I imagine she will be on Bosnian TV tonight.  She sounded just as angy or even angrier as when we were in Courtroom I. 

I finished my hot tea and went to the tram station and sat, waiting for the tram but thinking about the events of the morning.  A woman with a dog passed by and asked me when the next tram would come.  I thought she needed assistance.  We saw that the last tram had come one hour earlier and that no further trams would arrive.  She did not really need to know for herself but she was trying to help me snap out of it.  She said she had noticed that a lot of people don't realize when the tram stops running.  I think she was just out walking her dog and offered a little assistance. 

A hug here.  Some advice from a stranger there.  These are the human elements that bind us and, maybe, give us a bit of faith in each other when broader events seem unfair or meaningless.  The ICTY proceedings can be viewed live over the internet (if you are awake at that time in Europe) via http://www.icty.org/.  The court's schedule is available here: http://www.icty.org/sections/TheCases/CourtSchedule

Best regards,
Rob Gaudet

Relevant Materials for International Human Rights Committee's Teleconference on the CIA and the Use of Torture to Combat Terrorism

Please note the following materials of relevance to the upcoming teleconference on the CIA and the use of torture to combat terrorism:

• Stuart Taylor Jr., "Torture:  Stop Harassing the Lawyers," NationalJournal.com (Sept. 12, 2009) 
• Testimony of David Luban, Senate Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on Administrative Oversight and the Courts, "What Went Wrong:  Torture and the Office of Legal Counsel in the Bush Administration" (May 13, 2009)
• Senate Armed Services Committee Inquiry into the Treatment of Detainees in U.S. Custody (Dec. 11, 2008)
• ICRC Report on the Treatment of Fourteen "High-Value Detainees" in CIA Custody (Feb. 2007)
• CIA Inspector General's Report on Counterterrorism Detention and Interrogation Activities (May 7, 2004; released Aug. 24, 2009)

Torture is Illegal, Immoral and Counterproductive

by Mike Pheneger, Colonel, US Army (Ret.), a participant in the International Human Rights Committee's teleconference on the CIA and the use of torture to combat terrorism

*Please click on the title of this post to read the post in its entirety.

I was stunned to learn that the United States government had authorized the torture of suspects captured during the War on Terror. I am not naïve. As a professional soldier, I know individuals captured by the US military have been abused in the past, but abuse usually occurs at the point of capture during or immediately after a fire-fight when tempers are hot and units have sustained casualties. Some prisoners were tortured, but this was an aberration not national policy. It is important that we ensure that the record of our involvement with torture is laid bare. That is the only way to ensure that we never again stride purposely and confidently down that dark path.

Our greatest presidents rejected torture and abuse. Washington refused to follow the British practice of torturing prisoners; he believed our new nation should be noted for its humanity. Lincoln believed that “military necessity shall not permit of cruelty.”

The Bush Administration abandoned our traditions and made a calculated decision to authorize torture as a matter of national policy. Immediately after 9/11, Vice President Cheney noted that we would have to go the “dark side” to counter the al-Qaeda threat. After 9/11, the administration “took the gloves off” and approved “harsh” interrogation techniques that individually and in combination amount to torture. Alberto Gonzales advised that Geneva Convention prohibitions against torturing and abusing prisoners did not apply to al-Qaeda and Taliban prisoners.

The torture policy and its “legal” justification were developed in secret by a small group of attorneys closely associated with the Vice President. They simply assumed that “harsh” interrogations would be necessary to obtain actionable intelligence. There is nothing in the public record to indicate that anyone with actual knowledge of or experience in interrogation participated in making the decision. Service Judge Advocates were frozen out of the process because they were considered “unreliable.” When Alberto Mora, then General Counsel of the US Navy, learned the Department of Defense was about to approve harsh interrogation methods, he brought his concerns to DoD General Counsel William Haynes. After unsuccessfully trying to bring Mora on board, Haynes froze him out of the process. The torture policies were not subject to the normal interagency coordination process that is designed to weed out really bad ideas.

IHRC to Host Free Teleconference: the CIA and the Use of Torture to Combat Terrorism

On Monday, October 26, from 12:30 to 2:00 p.m. EST, the International Human Rights Committee will host a free teleconference on the CIA and the use of torture to combat terrorism. The teleconference will discuss CIA interrogation tactics and whether they constitute torture, as well as the relationship between torture and the rule of law in the context of CIA liability.

Panel members for this teleconference include:

• Mike Pheneger: Mike Pheneger, Colonel, U.S. Army (Ret.), represents Florida on the ACLU's National Board and serves on the ACLU's National Executive Committee. Colonel Pheneger spent 30 years on active duty as a U.S. Army Intelligence Officer and served multiple Vietnam tours, retiring in 1993. He also served as an intelligence staff officer at the U.S. European Command and on the Army staff. He currently teaches courses on the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, terrorism, and geopolitical issues for the University of South Florida's Learning in Retirement Program. He holds a B.A. in History from Bowling Green State University (Ohio) and an M.P.A. from Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania. He is a graduate of the U.S. Army War College, the Command & Staff Course, U.S. Naval War College, and the Military Intelligence Officer's Advanced Course.

• Hina Shamsi: Hina Shamsi is Senior Advisor to the Project on Extrajudicial Executions at NYU School of Law. Previously, Ms. Shamsi was a Staff Attorney with the National Security Project of the American Civil Liberties Union. She is a graduate of Northwestern University School of Law and Mount Holyoke College.

• Stephen I. Vladeck: Stephen I. Vladeck is a Professor of Law at American University Washington College of Law, where his teaching and research focus on federal jurisdiction, national security law, constitutional law (especially the separation of powers), and international criminal law. Professor Vladeck was part of the legal team that successfully challenged the Bush Administration’s use of military tribunals at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, 548 U.S. 557 (2006), and has co-authored amicus briefs in a host of other lawsuits challenging the U.S. government’s surveillance and detention of terrorism suspects. Professor Vladeck earned a B.A. summa cum laude in History and Mathematics from Amherst College in 2001 and graduated from Yale Law School in 2004. He clerked for the Honorable Marsha S. Berzon on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and the Honorable Rosemary Barkett on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.

• Ben Wizner: Ben Wizner has been a staff attorney at the ACLU since 2001, specializing in national security, human rights, and first amendment issues. He has been involved in numerous post-9/11 civil liberties cases, including challenges to the CIA's extraordinary rendition program; lawsuits aimed at exposing FBI and Pentagon surveillance of non-violent protestors; and suits challenging unlawful airport security policies. He has traveled to Guantanamo Bay to observe and report on Military Commission trials. Wizner was a law clerk to the Honorable Stephen Reinhardt of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. He is a graduate of Harvard College and New York University School of Law.

To participate in the free teleconference, please use the following call-in information:

Dial-in Number: 1-219-509-8111

Participant Access Code: 153417

Participants who join the call are muted but may unmute themselves during the question and answer portion of the teleconference. It is important to remain on mute while not speaking to avoid complications with feedback. The teleconference is limited to 150 participants, so please join us early to ensure your participation.