US is wrong, wrong, wrong
While most of the world hears the rhetoric of the US government and its few paid-off allies claiming that their occupation of Iraq is good, reality indicates otherwise. And nowhere is this reality reflected more clearly then in the legally binding rules of international law.
First, the US invasion of Iraq was and is illegal. It is clear that the US violated Article 2, paragraph 4 of the UN Charter and customary international law. This violation is unambiguous and clearly exists even though the US media and cowards like UN Secretary General Kofi Annan refuse to talk about it.
Kofi's predecessor Boutros Boutros-Ghali has been more courageous by speaking out as a prominent international lawyer. Boutros-Ghali has said unequivocally that the US attack on the Iraqi people is illegal. He is undoubtedly correct, the words of the UN Charter are clear.
US arguments based on Security Council resolutions are wrong and are so viewed by the overwhelming majority of the international lawyers around the world, only American lawyers remains deluded. None of these resolutions satisfy the provisions of the Charter that allow the Security Council to authorize the use of force for the clear reason that none of the resolution authorize the use of force.
Second, and something also recognized by Boutros-Ghali, is that the US' continued occupation of Iraq is illegal. It is in the worse tradition of colonialism and a continued attack against the Iraqi people. No matter what the US' propaganda says, no matter what the American puppets in the Iraq Council claim, the US occupation of Iraqi is illegal, a form of foreign occupation that is prohibited by international law. The illegal occupation also violates a whole host of international human rights and humanitarian law.
Third, the consequence of the US' illegal occupation is that Iraqis have a legal right to fight the occupation. According to this right the attacks on Americans that you hear about every day in Iraq -- including many you do not hear about because the US military prohibits report-ing them -- are generally legal.
Yes indeed, because of US President George W. Bush's aggression against the Iraqi people, brave Iraqis can "legally" kill Americans and their allies. It is not something Iraqis have claimed, but it is the law and it is this way because of the US' actions, not Iraqis'.
The Iraqis who attack Americans and their allies who are illegally occupying their country are lawful heroes defending their country's independence from perhaps the most deadly attempt at occupation and subjugation that the modern world has seen. The US regime in Iraqi is even more brutal than the Nazi occupation of many European countries during World War II and Iraqis are legally entitled to fight against it according to the rules of customary international law agreed to by the overwhelming number of states and their citizens in the international community.
And finally, the Iraqis who are attacking Americans in Iraq are, under international law, entitled to support from any other country that seeks to assist them in striving for their independence. Any country can legally give support to the Iraqis who are struggling for independence and to remove the US occupation of their country. This support can be moral and material, including arms and even soldiers. It can be public or secret. This support has even been encouraged by several UN resolution that call on all countries to help end illegal foreign occupations.
This is what international law says. This is what the US media refuses to report. Instead they claim Americans and others are too stupid to understand international law. Maybe it is the US administration and the US media that are too cowardly to obey the law.
Curtis Doebbler
Washington
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