Friday, May 07, 2004

Administration incompetence

Where were the legal and foreign affairs experts when the US Military contracted with commercial security firms for work in Iraq? If the contracts were indeed written with no language that provided for a proper legal jurisdiction over the potential for abusive behavior by the contractors in a zone without its own legal apparatus, the people granting to contracts were clearly incompetent. Many people assume that because the military is involved on foreign territory that the Geneva Conventions somehow apply. But the Conventions only apply in war and only apply to the military. The abusive contractors were operating in an area with a vacuum of law and it is unlikely that there is any legal recourse against them. And this administration clearly allowed that to happen.

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