BRIGHTENING GLANCE
WAR CRIMES CHARGES AGAINST TURKEY AND AMERICA
LAWS AND PROTOCOLS BEING VIOLATED
UNDER OCCUPATION: A MANIFESTO
The government of Turkey, in primary collaboration with the government of the United States of America, has dared to attempt to destroy the duly constituted government of Syria. In that process it has funded, encouraged and armed a motley gang of terrorist killers that include numerous members of Al-Qaeda and other recognized terrorist groups. The Hatay region of Turkey is being used as a staging area for attacks on a neighboring country, a country that until relatively recently had enjoyed great favor with Turkey. Hatay, perhaps the most enlightened, peaceful region in Turkey, now is under occupation by gangs of terrorist killers. The people are regularly accosted on the streets by these ruffians, and asked if they are Alevites. You will be next, they are told. This anti-Alevite dialogue is fostered by divisive statements made by the Turkish government.
In 2012, a rash of hate crimes broke out in Turkey against members of the Alevite religious sect (20 million in Turkey), an enlightened, modern-thinking branch of Islam. (It is important to note that there is a long, violent history of hate crimes committed against the Alevites in Turkey.) Last year, verbal insults, beatings, and the painting of threats on houses spread throughout the country. Inexplicably, there were no statements of warning, concern or reproach issued by the government. Making matters worse and fanning the flames of violence, the prime minister called the houses of worship of the Alevites “ucube,” a “freak.” Clearly this should have been deemed as “hate speech” and punished as such under the provisions of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Article 20 (as ratified by The Republic of Turkey on 23 September 2003). Interestingly, Turkey, a majority Sunni Islamic country, has no specific hate crimes laws.
And there are many Alevites in Syria. Many innocent Syrian people have been murdered by this assembled-in-Turkey terrorist machine. Moreover, the citizens of Hatay are daily threatened by these terrorist gangs that the government of Turkey has organized, of course, with the help of the CIA, proven by history to be experts in unspeakably violent subversions. These crimes are well known and now well-documented. This lawless behavior, indeed a crime against the Syrian people, and a war crime in terms of the Geneva Conventions, is the supreme insult to all truth, all justice, all morality and all religion.
As these government and foreign operatives have dared to drag the Turkish people through their filth of deceit, lies and murder, so shall I dare. Dare to tell the truth, since the normal channels of the media and the Turkish justice system have failed so miserably to do so. If people fail to speak out they become accomplices to this murderous travesty of justice. But there is more to this, much more.
At the root of it all is one man, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. A man of great ambition and great scowls. A perpetrator of epic police violence against the peaceful Gezi Parl protesters, he and his henchmen were also revealed to be epic story tellers. The entire world has witnessed their performance so there is little to add. Since he came to power he has relentlessly embarked on a policy to divide and weaken the republic. Who is this man, Erdoğan? Or as Cassius asked the reluctant assassins of Julius Caesar, “Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed, that he is grown so great?”
In the Turkish case I suspect American hamburgers and hotdogs. For he and his ilk are of them. And now, during these days of tragedy, there are no longer any secrets. The truth is as bare as an eyeball hanging from its socket. Blood and death in the Turkish streets, poisonous pepper gas supplied by valiant allies like America and Brazil. Government street thugs wielding machetes. Beatings, clubbings, mass arrests. Roundups of lawyers, physicians, anyone who provided humanitarian aid to the protesters. Savage reprisals are now in full sway. And threats, threats, threats.
And of late, the finish of the destruction of the Turkish military, for how else to divide and reparcel the once integral Republic of Turkey in order to conform to the dictates of its American master’s pipe dream of regional
stability? The ludicrous show trials called Ergenekon and its related fantasies that polluted all concepts of legal jurisprudence. Hundreds falsely imprisoned: military officers, journalists, writers, academicians. Secret witnesses, false testimony admitted without cross-examination. Lawyers jailed for making procedural objections in court. It all boils down to two words, justice raped.
Turkey is a nation held captive by the not-so-secret Obama-Erdoğan cabal. This is aided and abetted by its foreign policy, intelligence and espionage operations, and includes nongovernmental freelance organizations, both financial and mercenary. It is a stunning and deceitful array of destructive operators. The target? To destroy Turkish secularity, replacing it with a post-modern blend of religious fascism and uneducated compliance, a lethal long-term cocktail indeed. But they are adamant to once and for all create a compliant Turkish puppet state. And that’s where Erdoğan comes in. And Mustafa Kemal Atatürk departs. And that’s where Turkey is today, under occupation by a cabal of domestic ruling (AKP) and foreign (USA) powers. The army secular leadership is in jail. The police are feral and rabidly loyal to the ruling power. The situation is dire.
But we in Turkey do live in a wider world though this is rarely obvious in the discourses of the two occupying powers. And, believe it or not, there are indeed laws that are upheld and enforced in this wider world. Below are a few that are being violated by the prime minister of Turkey and the President of the United States and the members of their cabal. The dimensions are of Hitlerian proportions which was the motive force for establishing many of these laws and protocols. We, the real people of the real world, should demand their enforcement. The nightmare is here. It is time.
James (Cem) Ryan, Ph.D.
Istanbul
11 August 2013
LAWS AND PROTOCOLS BEING VIOLATED
UNITED NATIONS GENERAL ASSEMBLY RESOLUTION 3314: Definition of Aggression
Aggression is the use of armed force by a State against the sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence of another State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Charter of the United Nations.
INTERNATIONAL COVENANT ON CIVIL AND POLITICAL RIGHTS
Article 20.
1. Any propaganda for war shall be prohibited by law.
2. Any advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence shall be prohibited by law.
NUREMBERG TRIBUNAL CHARTER
The Tribunal established by the Agreement referred to Article 1 hereof for the trial and punishment of the major war criminals of the European Axis countries shall have the power to try and punish persons who, acting in the interests of the European Axis
countries, whether as individuals or as members of organizations, committed any of the following crimes. The following acts, or any of them, are crimes coming within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal for which there shall be individual responsibility:
(a) Crimes Against Peace: namely, planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression, or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances, or participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of any of the foregoing;
(b) War Crimes: namely, violations of the laws or customs of war. Such violations shall include, but not be limited to, murder, ill-treatment or deportation to slave labor or for any other purpose of civilian population of or in occupied territory, murder or ill-treatment of prisoners of war or persons on the seas, killing of hostages, plunder of public or private property, wanton destruction of cities, towns or villages, or devastation not justified by military necessity;
(c) Crimes Against Humanity: namely, murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against any civilian population, before or during the war; or persecutions on political, racial or religious grounds in execution of or in connection with any crime within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal, whether or not in violation of the domestic law of the country where perpetrated. leaders, organizers, instigators and accomplices participating in the formulation or execution of a common Plan or conspiracy to commit any of the foregoing crimes are responsible for all acts performed by any persons in execution of such plan.
Note: the above provisions were codified as legal principles by the International Law Commission of the United Nations.
PROTOCOL ADDITIONAL TO THE GENEVA CONVENTIONS OF 12 AUGUST 1949, AND RELATING TO
THE PROTECTION OF VICTIMS OF INTERNATIONAL ARMED CONFLICTS (PROTOCOL 1) (2ND PART)
Article 50. Definition of civilians and civilian population
1. A civilian is any person who does not belong to one of the categories of persons referred to in Article 4 A (1), (2), (3) and (6)
of the Third Convention and in Article 43 of this Protocol. In case of doubt whether a person is a civilian, that person shall be considered to be a civilian.
2. The civilian population comprises all persons who are civilians.
3. The presence within the civilian population of individuals who do not come within the definition of civilians does not deprive the population of its civilian character.
Article 51. Protection of the civilian population
1. The civilian population and individual civilians shall enjoy general protection against dangers arising from military operations. To give effect to this protection, the following rules, which are additional to other applicable rules of international law, shall be observed in all circumstances.
2. The civilian population as such, as well as individual civilians, shall not be the object of attack. Acts or threats of violence the primary purpose of which is to spread terror among the civilian population are prohibited.
3. Civilians shall enjoy the protection afforded by this Section, unless and for such time as they take a direct part in hostilities.
4. Indiscriminate attacks are prohibited. Indiscriminate attacks are:
(a) Those which are not directed at a specific military objective;
(b) Those which employ a method or means of combat which cannot be directed at a specific military objective;
(c) Those which employ a method or means of combat the effects of which cannot be limited as required by this Protocol; and
consequently, in each such case, are of a nature to strike military objectives and civilians or civilian objects without distinction.
5. Among others, the following types of attacks are to be considered as indiscriminate:
(a) An attack by bombardment by any methods or means which treats as a single military objective a number of clearly separated
and distinct military objectives located in a city, town, village or other area containing a similar concentration of civilians or civilian objects; and
(b) An attack which may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated.
6. Attacks against the civilian population or civilians by way of reprisals are prohibited.
7. The presence or movements of the civilian population or individual civilians shall not be used to render certain points or areas immune from military operations, in particular in attempts to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield, favour or impede military operations. The Parties to the conflict shall not direct the movement of the civilian population or individual civilians in order to attempt to shield military objectives from attacks or to shield military operations.
8. Any violation of these prohibitions shall not release the Parties to the conflict from their legal obligations with respect to the civilian population and civilians, including the obligation to take the precautionary measures provided
for in Article 57.
Article 52. General protection of civilian objects
1. Civilian objects shall not be the object of attack or of reprisals. Civilian objects are all objects which are not military objectives as defined in paragraph 2.
2. Attacks shall be limited strictly to military objectives. In so far as objects are concerned, military objectives are limited to those objects which by their nature, location, purpose or use make an effective contribution to military action and whose total or partial destruction, capture or neutralization, in the circumstances ruling at the time, offers a definite military of advantage.
3. In case of doubt whether an object which is normally dedicated to civilian purposes, such as a place of worship, a house or other dwelling or a school, is being used to make an effective contribution to military action, it shall be presumed not to be so used.
Article 57. Precautions in attack
1. In the conduct of military operations, constant care shall be taken to spare the civilian population, civilians and civilian objects.
2. With respect to attacks, the following precautions shall be taken:
(a) Those who plan or decide upon an attack shall:
(i) Do everything feasible to verify that the objectives to be attacked are neither civilians nor civilian objects and are not subject to special protection but are military objectives within the meaning of paragraph 2 of Article 52 and that it is not prohibited by the provisions of this Protocol to attack them;
(ii) Take all feasible precautions in the choice of means and methods of attack with a view to avoiding, and in any event to minimizing, incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects;
THE NUREMBERG PRINCIPLES
These principles define a crime against peace as the “planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression, or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements, or assurances, or participation in a common plan or conspiracy for accomplishment of any of the forgoing.”
INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT
Rules of Procedure and Evidence
U.N. Doc. PCNICC/2000/1/Add.1 (2000).
http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/instree/iccrulesofprocedure.html
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