Text of U.S. Army report on Iraqi prisoner abuse.

How Bush has secured immunity for torture of Iraqi prisoners
How Bush has secured immunity for torture of Iraqi prisoners. On May 22, 2003, George Bush signed Executive Order 13303, which provides that Iraqis have no legal recourse for any, ANY activities done to them. ) The EOs are in the government archives. [Archives.gov]

Executive Order 13303
Protecting the Development Fund for Iraq and Certain Other Property in Which Iraq Has an Interest

From page 31931 of the Federal Register
Signed May 22, 2003

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, as amended (50 U.S.C. 1701 et seq.) (IEEPA), the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1601 et seq.), section 5 of the United Nations Participation Act, as amended (22 U.S.C. 287c) (UNPA), and section 301 of title 3, United States Code,

I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, find that the threat of attachment or other judicial process against the Development Fund for Iraq, Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products, and interests therein, and proceeds, obligations, or any financial instruments of any nature whatsoever arising from or related to the sale or marketing thereof, and interests therein, obstructs the orderly reconstruction of Iraq, the restoration and maintenance of peace and security in the country, and the development of political, administrative, and economic institutions in Iraq. This situation constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States and I hereby declare a national emergency to deal with that threat.

I hereby order:

Section 1. Unless licensed or otherwise authorized pursuant to this order, any attachment, judgment, decree, lien, execution, garnishment, or other judicial process is prohibited, and shall be deemed null and void, with respect to the following:

(a) the Development Fund for Iraq, and (b) all Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products, and interests therein, and proceeds, obligations, or any financial instruments of any nature whatsoever arising from or related to the sale or marketing thereof, and interests therein, in which any foreign country or a national thereof has any interest, that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of United States persons.

Sec. 2. (a) As of the effective date of this order, Executive Order 12722 of August 2, 1990, Executive Order 12724 of August 9, 1990, and Executive Order 13290 of March 20, 2003, shall not apply to the property and interests in property described in section 1 of this order.

(b) Nothing in this order is intended to affect the continued effectiveness of any rules, regulations, orders, licenses or other forms of administrative action issued, taken, or continued in effect heretofore or hereafter under Executive Orders 12722, 12724, or 13290, or under the authority of IEEPA or the UNPA, except as hereafter terminated, modified, or suspended by the issuing Federal agency and except as provided in section 2(a) of this order.

Sec. 3. For the purposes of this order:

(a) The term ``person'' means an individual or entity; (b) The term ``entity'' means a partnership, association, trust, joint venture, corporation, group, subgroup, or other organization; (c) The term ``United States person'' means any United States citizen, permanent resident alien, entity organized under the laws of the United

[Page 31932]

States or any jurisdiction within the United States (including foreign branches), or any person in the United States; (d) The term ``Iraqi petroleum and petroleum products'' means any petroleum, petroleum products, or natural gas originating in Iraq, including any Iraqi- origin oil inventories, wherever located; and (e) The term ``Development Fund for Iraq'' means the fund established on or about May 22, 2003, on the books of the Central Bank of Iraq, by the Administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority responsible for the temporary governance of Iraq and all accounts held for the fund or for the Central Bank of Iraq in the name of the fund.

Sec. 4. (a) The Secretary of the Treasury, in consultation with the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense, is hereby authorized to take such actions, including the promulgation of rules and regulations, and to employ all powers granted to the President by IEEPA and the UNPA as may be necessary to carry out the purposes of this order. The Secretary of the Treasury may redelegate any of these functions to other officers and agencies of the United States Government. All agencies of the United States Government are hereby directed to take all appropriate measures within their statutory authority to carry out the provisions of this order.

(b) Nothing contained in this order shall relieve a person from any requirement to obtain a license or other authorization in compliance with applicable laws and regulations.

Sec. 5. This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right, benefit, or privilege, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by a party against the United States, its departments, agencies, entities, officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

Sec. 6. This order shall be transmitted to the Congress and published in the Federal Register.

(George W Bush's Signature)

THE WHITE HOUSE, May 22, 2003.

Civilians ID'd in abuse may face no charges
I guess outsourcing of US military jobs does provide cover for criminal acts. ---BBB

Civilians ID'd in abuse may face no charges
By Farah Stockman, Boston Globe Staff | May 4, 2004

WASHINGTON -- A legal loophole could allow four American civilian contractors allegedly involved in the abuse of Iraqi prisoners to escape punishment, US military officials and specialists said yesterday.

US commanders in Iraq announced that seven military supervisors have received administrative reprimands over the alleged abuse of the detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad. Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, commander of US forces in Iraq, said the investigation into the supervisors -- officers and non-commissioned officers -- was complete and they would not face further proceedings.

Letters of reprimand were issued to the seven on Saturday, a Pentagon spokesman said yesterday, adding that two of the supervisors were relieved of their positions of responsibility. Another six soldiers, members of a military police unit, are already facing criminal charges before a court-martial.

President Bush, on a campaign trip yesterday in Michigan, urged Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to make sure that US soldiers involved in the abuse are punished, said a White House spokesman.

"The president wanted to make sure appropriate action is being taken against those responsible for these shameful and appalling acts," said spokesman Scott McClellan.

But the four civilian workers identified in an internal army report for their involvement in the physical and sexual mistreatment of the prisoners -- including the alleged rape of one detainee -- cannot be punished under military law, and it is unclear whether they will face any charges under either US or Iraqi laws.

The army report -- written in February and obtained by a reporter for the New Yorker magazine -- found evidence that civilian interrogators employed by the Virginia-based firm CACI and civilian interpreters with the San Diego-based Titan Corp were directly involved in the abuses at the prison. Abu Ghraib is a place once notorious for the torture carried out under the rule of Saddam Hussein but now at the center of an international scandal over apparent human rights abuses at the hands of Americans.

The allegations of prisoner abuse, ranging from sodomizing a prisoner with a chemical lightstick, to forcing Iraqi prisoners to simulate sex acts on film, to connecting wires to the genitals of one prisoner, have also raised new questions on the role of civilian interrogators in Iraq and on the heavier military reliance on private contractors who often operate outside the code of military conduct and largely under their own rules.

"This is not something we have seen in previous wars," said Peter W. Singer, a fellow at the Brookings Institution and author of "Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry," referring to the use of civilian interrogators. Singer said the tendency to use private contractors for a wide variety of services -- instead of calling up more troops -- could pose serious legal problems for the US military.

Singer estimated that there were more than 10,000 civilians in Iraq working for private contractors.

US officials say private contractors offer special skills -- like languages and technical know-how -- that are useful in situations such as interrogations. But critics say well-paid contractors, whose deaths are not factored into the official tally of war dead, are also increasingly employed to avoid the politically unpopular move of sending more US soldiers to Iraq.

Attention began to focus on civilian workers last month, when four Blackwater Security employees were ambushed and mutilated in Fallujah in an attack that led to the recent standoff there between insurgents and US Marines.

Military officials said yesterday that the contractors could not be tried under military laws and that they were unsure if Iraqi or US laws would be applied. A US spokeswoman in Baghdad said the military usually refers such cases back to the companies that employ them, and she believed that is what is being done in this case.

"The military has no jurisdiction over the civilian contractors," said the spokeswoman, who has been assigned by military officials to handle inquiries on the prison abuse scandal. She asked not to be identified. "The military can make recommendations, but it is going to be up to the employer to decide what measures to take."

But CACI chief executive Jack London said yesterday that the firm has not received any information from the US government or military about the alleged crimes, despite inquiries and a request for a copy of the internal report.

"I think it is disgusting, and I certainly would believe that our people would not do these things," London said in a telephone interview. "On the other hand, if it turns out that our people did, we won't tolerate it. We won't permit it to continue. We, certainly to the best of my knowledge, we never trained people to do those kinds of things at all."

London said the employees he sent to fill the Iraq contract for interrogators were almost all former soldiers with years of experience. London added that his company would cooperate with any military investigation.

Singer said it is not enough to refer the crimes back to the companies, because they rarely take them seriously enough and cannot impose sufficient punishment for a crime like rape.

"No company can properly punish a felony offense. . . . All you do is you lose a paycheck," said Singer. "This pushes out to way past the envelope. We've already outsourced logistics, we've outsourced training, we've outsourced certain activities in combat. What's left? My concern is we really need to take a step back and look at what should be outsourced."

The internal Army investigation, written by Army Major General Antonio M. Taguba, recommended that CACI employee Steven Stephanowicz be fired and that civilian translator John Israel also be punished for his alleged role in the mistreatment of prisoners, according to The New Yorker. Two other civilians were also identified, according to a former defense official who had seen the report.

The New Yorker said Taguba reserved his harshest criticism for civilian contractors and military intelligence officers.

Calls to Titan were not returned yesterday. Websites from the two companies show they have reaped contracts in military support and intelligence, a private industry that has boomed with government funding since Sept. 11.

CACI, which was once an information technology firm, has been increasingly concentrating on homeland security issues, London has said in recent interviews. Last year, the company won a $154.7 million contract to provide mission support to the US military and national intelligence agency sites worldwide, according to the company Web site.

Titan has a contract for $657 million to provide 4,800 linguists in the US Central Command area, which includes Iraq, according to Deborah Parker, a spokeswoman for the US Army Intelligence and Security Command. Those linguists serve "wherever needed" and are not all in intelligence fields, she said. The growing reliance on private contractors has drawn more concern among lawmakers over the cost effectiveness of using more civilian workers in dangerous zones.

Larry Diamond, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, said it is more difficult to hold civilians accountable than soldiers in places like Iraq.

"If there are military officers doing the interrogating, there are military standards and military instruments to hold them accountable," said Diamond, who was a senior adviser on governance to the Coalition Provisional Authority. "But with civilian contractors, what are the parallel means of accountability?"

US officials insisted the alleged crimes at the Abu Ghraib prison were isolated.

"The vast majority of the contractors that are out on the battlefield are doing excellent work, not only for the military but for the Iraqi people," said Pentagon spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Yoswa.

British officials are also conducting an investigation into alleged abuses of Iraqi prisoners after a London newspaper published photos purporting to show members of a British Army regiment mistreating detainees. But a former commander of the unit said yesterday that the photos had "too many inconsistencies" to be genuine.
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Farah Stockman can be reached by e-mail at [email protected]. Material from the Associated Press was used in this report.

Troops have been abusing Iraqis for a year: Amnesty
Troops have been abusing Iraqis for a year: Amnesty
By Marian Wilkinson, Herald Correspondent in Washington, and agencies
May 5, 2004

At least four Iraqi detainees have died in British custody in the past year, one as a result of torture, says the human rights group Amnesty International, while the CIA admits it is investigating the death of a prisoner under interrogation.

As the scandal over the abuses at Abu Ghraib jail, near Baghdad, widened, President George Bush pointedly called his Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld, to ensure that "those responsible for these shameful, appalling acts" are held "fully accountable".

In Australia, the Federal Opposition condemned the Government for an "immoral disinterest" in the treatment of Iraqi prisoners and warned it had a legal responsibility to them.

A CIA officer told the Herald that "one prisoner . . . who we were talking to did die". And the former US officer responsible for the jail, Brigadier-General Janis Karpinski, reiterated that the cell blocks where the abuses took place were under the control of military intelligence when the prisoners were subjected to beating, rape, sexually humiliation and torture.

Six military police officers photographed abusing prisoners are facing criminal action.

General Karpinski has been accused of failing to prevent the MPs from abusing prisoners, but told the US ABC network they were given separate instructions by US intelligence officers "on what they needed to do".

She said the Military Intelligence Brigade commander, whom she did not name, told her, "The MPs are doing a great job in there. They're getting more information."

Amnesty issued a disturbing report on Iraq last month detailing allegations of torture and ill-treatment by US and British forces in Iraq that are remarkably similar to the evidence that has now surfaced. But its report indicates that the abuses began when US-led coalition forces gained control of Iraq in April last year and took place throughout the country.

The report found at least four detainees have died in British military custody, and in one case the cause of death was torture. The report referred to a hearing in February into the death of an Iraqi at a detention centre in Nasiriyah, where a former US marine testified it was common practice "to kick and punch prisoners who did not co-operate, and even some who did".

That hearing involved the death of a former Baath party official who was beaten and choked by a US marine reservist.

The Amnesty report also noted that thousands of Iraqis had been arrested without charge and many held indefinitely as "suspected terrorists" or "security" detainees.

Amnesty repeated its call for an independent inquiry, saying the abuses were more widespread than acknowledged and included the still unexplained deaths of two prisoners under interrogation in Afghanistan.

"The problem seems to extend beyond one prison and one theatre," said its Washington spokesman, Alistair Hodgett.

However, the Pentagon and the Bush Administration are resisting any calls for an independent investigation into its detention or interrogation practices in Iraq and Afghanistan, saying a high-level military review is already underway.

"I think at this point there's no reason to suspect that the army's not capable of inspecting itself", Brigadier-General Mark Kimmitt said in Baghdad yesterday.

Military lawyers in Washington are sceptical. "All of this is going to have to be run to ground," said Eugene Fidell, of the National Institute of Military Justice.

"The lesson is, make yourself comfortable, because this is going to be a long and interesting process."

A United Nations human rights investigator has called for an independent inquiry into the impact on civilians of the US military's month-long siege of Falluja.

There were credible claims that US-led forces in Iraq "have been guilty of serious breaches of international humanitarian and human rights law in Falluja in recent weeks", the UN special rapporteur Paul Hunt said on Monday.

One thing that really shook me was that there seemed to be no training of the guards in the Geneva Conventions rules for treatment of prisoners. I know, I've been off active duty since 1970. That doesn't change the military regulations that military personnel be given this training. Heck, we even had a quiz to ensure our understanding of it it Basic Training.

The civilian personnel sound as though they are instructors from the old School of the Americas that taught interrogation methods to various brutal governments in Central and South America. I guess they hired themselves out when the schools closed, like some of my old friends in Special warfare did after Vietnam. No loyalties except to oneself and the paycheck. If they get fired, there's always another employer that can use their talents. Getting killed? Just an occupational hazard to avoid.

Regarding the Executive Order, notice how often the terms petroleum and it products are mentioned. It just verifies what I've said all along.

No wonder that the world hates our government. When we go to Canada, we're often asked about US foriegn policy and I often say,"It's foreign to me too." Fortunately people realize that I'm not part of our government.