{"id":148052,"date":"2019-11-25T12:00:20","date_gmt":"2019-11-25T12:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=148052"},"modified":"2019-12-25T10:51:27","modified_gmt":"2019-12-25T10:51:27","slug":"us-pardons-for-accused-war-criminals-contrary-to-international-law-un-rights-office","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2019\/11\/us-pardons-for-accused-war-criminals-contrary-to-international-law-un-rights-office\/","title":{"rendered":"US Pardons for Accused War Criminals, Contrary to International Law: UN Rights Office"},"content":{"rendered":"

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19 Nov 2019 – A presidential pardon for two United States soldiers accused of war crimes,\u00a0and a sentence reduction for a third, \u201crun against the letter and the spirit of international law which requires accountability for such violations\u201d, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights<\/em> said today.<\/em><\/p>\n

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\u201cWhile\u00a0pardons exist in\u00a0international law, and can\u00a0properly address issues of injustice or unfairness\u201d,<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Rupert Colville, Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR<\/a>), told<\/a> reporters at a regular press briefing in Geneva that these cases showed no circumstances to suggest anything\u00a0other than<\/p>\n

\u201csimply voiding the otherwise proper process of law in the cases. <\/em>These pardons send a disturbing signal to\u00a0military\u00a0forces all around\u00a0the\u00a0world\u201d,<\/em> he added.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The accused<\/strong><\/p>\n

According to news reports, Lieutenant Clint Lorance was tried and convicted for\u00a0ordering the shooting of Afghanistan civilians in 2013 and handed down a 20-year prison sentence. Last Friday, he was given a full pardon.<\/p>\n

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US War Criminal Army Lieutenant Clint Lorance – Credit: The Old School Patriot<\/p><\/div>\n

Major Mathew Golsteyn was charged with executing an unarmed Afghan\u00a0man who was a suspected Taliban bombmaker in 2010. He was scheduled to be tried in February.<\/p>\n

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War Criminal Maj. Mathew Golsteyn had been scheduled to go on trial for premeditated murder charges before President Trump pardoned him on 15 Nov 2019.
Credit…Andrew Craft\/The Fayetteville Observer, via Associated Press<\/p><\/div>\n

And Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher was charged with murdering a captive in Iraq. He was acquitted\u00a0but received a demotion for posing with the corpse for a photograph. President Trump on Friday vowed to restore his rank.<\/p>\n

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War Criminal US Navy SEAL Edward Gallagher on July 2 in San Diego.
Sandy Huffaker\/Getty Images<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cThese three cases involve serious violations of international humanitarian law, both proven and alleged,\u00a0including the shooting of a group of civilians and execution of a captured member of an armed group\u201d,<\/em> said Mr. Colville.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Some US news outlets applauded President Donald Trump\u2019s reprieves, while others saw them as a sign of disregard for the decisions of military juries as well as for the judicial process itself.<\/p>\n

\u201cInternational Humanitarian Law establishes the obligation to investigate violations and prosecute war crimes\u201d<\/em>, reminded Mr. Colville.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He pointed out that by investigating the\u00a0allegations,\u00a0and initiating and\u00a0completing\u00a0criminal proceedings, the US military justice system had been in compliance with international law.<\/p>\n

Underscoring that \u201cvictims of gross human rights violations and serious violations of international humanitarian law have the right to a remedy<\/em>\u201d, Mr. Colville maintained that the pardon\u00a0terminating further criminal\u00a0proceedings in the case of Major Mathew Golsteyn, was\u00a0\u201cparticularly troubling\u201d<\/em>.<\/p>\n

He elaborated that remedies include equal and effective access to justice, the right to the truth, and to see\u00a0perpetrators\u00a0serve\u00a0punishments proportionate to the seriousness of their conduct, \u201crather than see them absolved of responsibility\u201d.<\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 news.un.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

19 Nov 2019 – A presidential pardon for two United States soldiers accused of war crimes, and a sentence reduction for a third, \u201crun against the letter and the spirit of international law which requires accountability for such violations\u201d, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":109474,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65,57,139],"tags":[651,91,112,249,95,70,126,965],"class_list":["post-148052","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-anglo-america","category-militarism","category-justice","tag-justice","tag-nato","tag-pentagon","tag-trump","tag-us-military","tag-usa","tag-violence","tag-war-crimes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148052","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148052"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148052\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109474"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148052"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148052"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148052"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}