U.S. military arrests war's 'bargaining chips' (US taking hostages)

[oldhat]

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/ny-woabus0526,0,2008882.story?coll=ny-top-span-headlines

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- U.S. troops wanted Jeanan Moayad's father. When they couldn't find him, they took her husband in his place.

Dhafir Ibrahim has been in U.S. custody for nearly four months. Moayad insists that he is being held as a bargaining chip, and military officials have told her that he will be released when her father surrenders. Her father is a scientist and former Baath party member who fled to Jordan soon after the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime.

"My husband is a hostage," said Moayad, 35, an architect who carries a small portrait of Ibrahim in her purse. "He didn't commit any crime."

In a little-noticed development amid Iraq's prison abuse scandal, the U.S. military is holding dozens of Iraqis as bargaining chips to put pressure on their wanted relatives to surrender, according to human rights groups. These detainees are not accused of any crimes, and experts say their detention violates the Geneva Conventions and other international laws. The practice also risks associating the United States with the tactics of countries that it has long criticized for arbitrary arrests.

[scubadude]

1. I do believe this goes against the Geneva Conventions.... nt

[oldhat]

7. Key paragraph

Read carefully:

"Taking hostages is a grave breach of the Geneva Conventions -- in other words, a war crime," Human Rights Watch wrote in a January letter to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

[nadinbrzezinski]

2. Add this to the War Crimes and now Crimes against

Humanity list.

Taking hostages falls on the latter category

[lfairban]

3. This has happened before.

Last year sometime a US General, I think his name was Hoog or something, took the wife and daughter of a suspect into custody and said they would not be released until he turned himself in. He did a few days later.

[NNN0LHI]

4. Izzat Ibrahim al-Duri

http://www.command-post.org/2_archives/008938.html

Family of Iraqi Fugitive Captured

U.S. forces detained one of the wives and a daughter of Izzat Ibrahim al-Duri, number six on the coalition's list of 55 most-wanted Iraqis and believed to be key in the planning and financing of the anti-coalition insurgency, a U.S. military spokesman told CNN Wednesday.

The two women were taken into coalition custody, along with the son of al-Duri's physician, after a raid Tuesday morning near Samarra, about 75 miles (120 km) north of Baghdad, according to Lt. Col. Bill McDonald, spokesman for the 4th Infantry Division in Tikrit.

[Disturbed]

6. Geneva Conventions?

Bushco doesn't care about those, except for Americans captured.

It's called hypocrisy.

Bushco needs to be tried for War Crimes!!!!

[othermeans]

5. Come on it's just good clean Amerikan hazing n/t

[DulceDecorum]

8. And that is why

the Saudis left the US IMMEDIATELY after September 11, 2001.

You got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em,
Know when to walk away and know when to run.
You never count your money when you’re sittin’ at the table.
There’ll be time enough for countin’ when the dealin’s done.
-- The Gambler

The neo-cons are nowhere near as smart.

Chalabi had immense appeal to the Bush administration, which viewed the longtime Iraqi exile as its greatest hope to lead a democratic Iraq. But Chalabi was no leader. He was a con man who whispered into the eager ears of neo-cons such as Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and Dick Cheney exactly what he knew they yearned to hear - that Saddam Hussein had huge stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction and that Iraqis would eagerly welcome a U.S. invasion and occupation.
http://www.registerguard.com/news/2004/05/24/ed.edit.chalabi.phn.0524.html

So until proof emerges that Mr. Rumsfeld was directly connected to the torture, it would be unfair to single him out. That's why only 20 percent of Americans say in an ABC poll that Mr. Rumsfeld should lose his job. Even Democrats oppose firing Mr. Rumsfeld by a ratio of two to one.
NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
Published: May 22, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/22/opinion/22KRIS.htm

[Massacure]

9. If we all wrote to the French and Germans

If we asked them to put Bush under war crimes trials, do you think they would?

[NashVegas]

10. Another Example of the New Medievalism

I believe we're taking a page out of Jordan's book.

[Spazito]

11. The US pulled the proposed resolution to extend their immunity from..

international prosecution for war crimes.

Here is the thread on the article, well worth reading! A very strong message is being sent to bush and his cabal!

It is entitled: U.S. Delays World Court Exemption Plan

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x582496

[bluestateguy]

12. These guys have been watching a little too much "24"

Because only a scenario like what transpired during this season's "24" show would justify these kinds of tactics, and indeed that is exactly what happened. Vague, long-term threats to security are absolutely no justification for such tactics. And I don't trust this Administration to decide what constitutes an immediate threat to security.

[UpInArms]

13. this definitely puts in league with the terrorists

and remember what the mantra has been?

"we do not negotiate with terrorists", so I guess what we should expect is the same - there will be fewer diplomatic solutions because we have become a rogue nation.

:cry: