IRAQ: Race Against Time for Case in Britain

By Sanjay Suri Reprint | | Print |

Sanjay Suri

LONDON, May 6 2004 (IPS) - A group of lawyers is in a race against time to bring legal action against British authorities over the killing of Iraqi civilians.

Public Interest Lawyers, a group based in Birmingham about 100 miles north of London, will go to court next week alleging that British troops acted unlawfully in killing civilians in Iraq.

The petition is based on evidence gathered by Maznin Younis from the lawyers group during a visit to Iraq. The group has at present 12 cases of people said to have been killed by British troops, but is expected to gather information on many more.

The timing of the legal action has become critical for several reasons.

"We will go to court for a directions hearing next week," Felicity Williams from Public Interest Lawyers told IPS. "That court will decide when the main hearings will take place. We expect that to happen some time in June or July."

The case may, however, get overtaken by the proposed handover of Iraq to some limited form of self-rule June 30. Any moves thereafter to set up independent courts in Iraq would strengthen the British government case that the petition cannot be admitted in Britain.

The question of jurisdiction is central to the case. If the High Court in London decides that killing by British soldiers in a foreign land is actionable in Britain, the decision can have long-term consequences for British soldiers who may kill during postings abroad.

"We are going to the High Court under the case law directions for European courts," Williams said. "It is clear from that law that if an area is under effective control of a signatory state, then the European convention applies to that area. And there can be no doubt that the British military has effective control over southern Iraq."

The lawyers are concerned over the delays before the matter could be admitted to court also for other reasons. "We have information that evidence is being tampered with and removed in these cases," Williams said. "That includes things like bullet marks and other evidence on the ground."

The lawyers are petitioning for the case to be taken up urgently. A delay of several weeks could affect questions both of actual evidence and jurisdiction.

Witness statements in the 12 cases have already been filed in court. "The UK government must make those responsible accountable for their actions," Phil Shiner from the lawyers group told media representatives earlier.

"We pride ourselves in our respect for human rights, for democracy and for the rule of law, but in these cases and others we show contempt for those principles and therefore give succour to our enemies," he said.

The witness statements filed in the 12 cases include "a man beaten to death in custody, another beaten in custody and made to swim a river and drowned because of his injuries, a woman shot in her head while eating her supper in her home with her family, another man shot dead while he prepared for morning prayers," Shiner said.

The group is seeking full compensation for the families of the 12. Some of the families have been paid sums between 800 dollars and 1,600 dollars.

Officials from the Ministry of Defence say these payments do not amount to admission of liability. They say the Human Rights Act does not apply to British troops in Iraq because it holds for Europe and not Iraq. They argue also that British control of administration in Basra and around in southern Iraq does not amount to jurisdiction for its courts.

Officials say admission of jurisdiction could also open up the possibility of legal action by torture victims and the families of those killed in Afghanistan.

The near simultaneous publication of photographs showing the brutality of coalition forces in their treatment of Iraqi prisoners has given vivid support to the statements of several of the witnesses.

The photographs include several showing British soldiers torturing Iraqi prisoners published in the tabloid Daily Mirror. The authenticity of these pictures, however, has been doubted.

Interviews with several former prisoners who had earlier been among ‘the men in hoods’ have also made the timing of the legal action particularly poignant.

The 12 cases do not relate to prisoners, but to civilians in non- combat circumstances, according to the witness statements. The list is being held up by the lawyers as indicative of killing on a far wider scale.