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US drone raids could land CIA officers in court: expert
Updated at: 0400 PST, Thursday, March 25, 2010
WASHINGTON: The US government's refusal to offer a legal rationale for using unmanned drones to kill suspected militants in Pakistan could result in CIA officers facing prosecution for war crimes in foreign courts, a legal expert has told lawmakers.
"Prominent voices in the international legal community" were increasingly impatient with Washington's silence on the CIA's bombing raids in Pakistan and elsewhere, Kenneth Anderson, a law professor at American University, told a congressional panel on Tuesday.
Lawyers at the US State Department and other government agencies were concerned the administration has "not settled on what the rationales are" for the drone strikes, he said.
"And I believe that at some point that ill serves an administration which is embracing this," said Anderson.
The law professor said he believes the drone strikes are legal under international law, based on a country's right to self-defense, and urged the US administration to argue its case publicly.
President Barack Obama has spoken about taking the fight to the enemy and denying safe havens to extremists, and US officials privately tout the drone raids against Al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders along the Pakistan border as highly effective.
But the administration declines to discuss the raids openly and has yet to publicly declare the legal justification for hunting down terror suspects in Pakistan and around the world.
"Now, maybe the answer is: This is all really terrible and illegal and anybody that does it should go off to The Hague. But if that's the case, then we should not be having the president saying that this is the greatest thing since whatever. That seems like a bad idea," Anderson said.
The congressional hearing broached a sensitive subject that is usually discussed by lawmakers and officials in closed sessions out of public view.
Human rights activists and some legal experts charge the drone strikes in Pakistan, outside of a traditional battlefield, amount to extrajudicial executions.
US drone raids could land CIA officers in court: expert
Updated at: 0400 PST, Thursday, March 25, 2010
WASHINGTON: The US government's refusal to offer a legal rationale for using unmanned drones to kill suspected militants in Pakistan could result in CIA officers facing prosecution for war crimes in foreign courts, a legal expert has told lawmakers.
"Prominent voices in the international legal community" were increasingly impatient with Washington's silence on the CIA's bombing raids in Pakistan and elsewhere, Kenneth Anderson, a law professor at American University, told a congressional panel on Tuesday.
Lawyers at the US State Department and other government agencies were concerned the administration has "not settled on what the rationales are" for the drone strikes, he said.
"And I believe that at some point that ill serves an administration which is embracing this," said Anderson.
The law professor said he believes the drone strikes are legal under international law, based on a country's right to self-defense, and urged the US administration to argue its case publicly.
President Barack Obama has spoken about taking the fight to the enemy and denying safe havens to extremists, and US officials privately tout the drone raids against Al-Qaeda and Taliban leaders along the Pakistan border as highly effective.
But the administration declines to discuss the raids openly and has yet to publicly declare the legal justification for hunting down terror suspects in Pakistan and around the world.
"Now, maybe the answer is: This is all really terrible and illegal and anybody that does it should go off to The Hague. But if that's the case, then we should not be having the president saying that this is the greatest thing since whatever. That seems like a bad idea," Anderson said.
The congressional hearing broached a sensitive subject that is usually discussed by lawmakers and officials in closed sessions out of public view.
Human rights activists and some legal experts charge the drone strikes in Pakistan, outside of a traditional battlefield, amount to extrajudicial executions.
US drone raids could land CIA officers in court: expert
