Felonies under US law, crimes against humanity under international law
In the wake of the atrocities committed by the Nazis during World War II, the United States and other Allied nations advanced the notion that some acts weren’t mere crimes against their victims but were so odious, so evil, so fundamentally deranged that they constituted a crime against all of humanity. These acts, genocide and systematic torture among them, would be punished by any court that discovered them and no statute of limitation would apply to them.
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the United Nations Convention Against Torture, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the Geneva Conventions (III and IV) all elaborate on the basic idea that torture is illegal and that its systematic use rises to the level of a crime against humanity.
United States law is very clear regarding torture.
18 U.S.C. § 2340A, enacted in 1994, provides for the prosecution of a U.S. national or anyone present in the United States who, while outside the U.S., commits or attempts to commit torture.
What recent news has told us is that in the White House there were regular meetings of important Bush administration officials, including but not limited to the Vice President, the National Security Advisor (then Ms. Rice), and the Attorney General which were fundamentally an ongoing conspiracy to violate US and international law. They not only conspired to instruct the US officials and authorities to use water-boarding and other torture techniques, but they specifically outlined in individual cases how such techniques should be applied. They were directly involved in the planning and execution of illegal acts. Felony crimes. Crimes against humanity.
It has sometimes seemed as if the Bush administration is one large criminal enterprise conducted for personal gain at the expense of the American people. But this is a shockingly clear case.
Whoever the next President is, s/he must appoint an Attorney General with the moral fortitude and will to ensure that these criminal elements are brought to justice in a court of law, which, ironically, is more than they permitted their victims.
