Blair starts backtracking on the Iraq WMD argument

[AtW]

He was given to a US-constructed and appointed Iraqi court knowing full well what the outcome would be.

You think any other court in Iraq would have given him less than death penalty? Maybe only if Saddam himself appointed the judges.

If we were so holier-than-thou that we can wade in and replace the Iraqi government, then why were we washing our hands of it at the end?

It's the matter to Iraq to decide how they live there, effectively internal matter. It becomes external if they develop nukes or fund terrorism or attack allies of the west.

You can think what you like, it's illegal.

The invasion was bornerline on illegal - however hanging of Saddam is totally internal matter for Iraq. He deserved it also just like Nazi criminals were hanged in Nurnberg and just like Soviet ones should have been. The same standard howevers hould be applied to all heads of states, top generals etc.

[RichardCranium]

He was hanged by the Iraqies, no amount of UK/US involvement would have saved him.

He was given to a US-constructed and appointed Iraqi court knowing full well what the outcome would be. If we were so holier-than-thou that we can wade in and replace the Iraqi government, then why were we washing our hands of it at the end? It was complicity to execution and I think the UK government should have made a very vocal objection. Just like we should not have silently permitted and colluded in imprisonment without trial for years and torture.

I'd say death penalty should be allowed for heads of states and such who commit very serious crimes or criminal mistakes that has lead to massive negative consequences that involved loss of live.

You can think what you like, it's illegal.

[Troll]

The United Nations Charter

2.3 All members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace, security and justice are not endangered.

2.4 All members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations.

41 The Security Council may decide what measures not involving the use of armed force are to be employed to give effect to its decisions, and it may call upon members of the United Nations to apply such measures. These may include complete or partial interruption of economic relations and of rail, sea, air, postal, telegraphic, radio and other means of communication, and the severance of diplomatic relations.

[AtW]

It was certainly illegal under Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights which prohibits the death penalty and the extradition of suspects to countries where capital punishment may be carried out.

He was hanged by the Iraqies, no amount of UK/US invovelment would have saved him.

I'd say death penalty should be allowed for heads of states and such who commit very serious crimes or criminal mistakes that has lead to massive negative consequences that involved loss of live.

[RichardCranium]

I have been bothered by the hanging of Saddam Hussein ever since it was announced.

Why did our government not formally object?

It seemed to me we were a party to that capture and execution knowing the death penalty was inevitable. And I was under the impression at the time that that was illegal, although I do not know where I got that idea.

We have been banning the death penalty by degrees for 40 years and since 1998 it has even been illegal for the UK to use the death penalty during wartime.

It was certainly illegal under Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights which prohibits the death penalty and the extradition of suspects to countries where capital punishment may be carried out. Given we were one of the parties controlling the country at the time, we are surely partly responsible.

(Protocol No. 13 to the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, concerning the abolition of the death penalty in all circumstances only came in in about 2004.)


I feel Blair has blood on his hands: the blood of Iraqi civilians, Dr Kelly's blood and the blood of participation in execution.

[The_Equalizer]

What I'd like to know whether Bliar used his time away from this country to avoid paying taxes on those millions he paid for "lectures" recently.

And I'm guessing that buying your son a £1million mews house is an IHT dodge:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...umber-six.html

[darmstadt]

Blair can and probably should stand trial at the Hague but sadly his co-conspirator Bush, who really should won't and can't be forced to either as the USA are not signatories to the War Crimes Court:

Shortly after becoming president, one George W. Bush, quickly removed the signature of the United States (President Bill Clinton's signature) from the membership rolls of the International Criminal Court in The Hague.


Soon thereafter, Bush invaded and attacked Iraq, without sanction from the United Nations Security Council, thereby launching a War of Aggression, his Supreme Crime Against Humanity, making his invasion, occupation, and everything that followed, illegal and immoral as well.

He obviously knew that what he was doing was a lie

[AtW]

What I'd like to know whether Bliar used his time away from this country to avoid paying taxes on those millions he paid for "lectures" recently.

[HairyArsedBloke]

Arrested, found guilty, shot. Why bother with a trial? You are right about him being an ally, if he was still there could Iran afford to be quite so belligerent?

hung, drawn, and quartered That's proper British.

[AtW]

If he was still there could Iran afford to be quite so belligerent?

No, they could not have afforded it.

[xoggoth]

Arrested, found guilty, shot. Why bother with a trial? You are right about him being an ally, if he was still there could Iran afford to be quite so belligerent?

[Doggy Styles]

Removal of Saddam Hussein 'right', says Tony Blair

It would have been "right to remove" Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein even without evidence that he had weapons of mass destruction, Tony Blair has said.

The former prime minister said it was the "notion of him as a threat to the region" which had tilted him in favour of the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Without WMD claims it would have been necessary to "use and deploy different arguments," he told the BBC.

Blair lied about WMD, he lied about Saddam supporting al Quaeda, and he was wrong about Saddam's threat too.

Saddam was controlled, by weapons inspectors and no-fly zones, and after being routed in Kuwait was unlikely to try that again elsewhere.

So not only was Blair stupid in getting rid of an ally against millitant Islam in the region, but he has admitted starting a war to effect regime change, which is illegal under international law.

Should he be tried at The Hague or the Old Bailey?