[37], Henry Waxman, the chair of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, which held hearings on the use of Private Security Contractors in February 2007, said his committee would hold hearings "to understand what has happened and the extent of the damage to U.S. security interests". [14], On October 13, 2007, the FBI reported that it had concluded that at least 14 of the 17 Iraqis who died in the square had been killed without cause. Witnesses described how the American men ambushed the civilians unprovoked, firing on Baghdad's Nisour Square with heavy gunfire and grenade launchers. [73], The trial was set for early 2010,[74] but the charges were dismissed by United States District Court for the District of Columbia Judge Ricardo Urbina on December 31, 2009, who ruled that the Justice Department had mishandled evidence and violated the guards' constitutional rights. - Asser Institute (Decision Date: 31 December 2009)", "Ex-Blackwater Guards Face Renewed Charges", "Blackwater guards face new U.S. charges for Iraq shooting deaths", "Legal questions loom in Blackwater convictions", "Blackwater guards found guilty in Iraq shootings", "Emails Reveal Discord Over Blackwater Charges", "Ex-Blackwater Guards Sentenced to Long Prison Terms in 2007 Killings of Iraqi Civilians", "U.S. Appeals Court Tosses Ex-Blackwater Guard's Conviction in 2007 Baghdad Massacre", "Murder conviction in Blackwater case thrown out, other sentences overturned", "In Blackwater Case, Court Rejects a Murder Conviction and Voids 3 Sentences", Recent Case: D.C. Dickinson says that the victims' families are likely to feel let down and abandoned by the U.S. government. On Tuesday, President Trump pardoned 15 people, including Dustin Heard (from left), Evan Liberty, Nicholas Slatten and Paul Slough, the four former government contractors convicted for a 2007 massacre in Baghdad that left more than a dozen Iraqi civilians dead. security contractors who had previously been sentenced over the death of 17 Iraqi civilians in the 2007 Nisur Square massacre . A State Department employee who was walking into the department's Baghdad operations center on the day of the incident heard a radio call from the convoy: "Contact, contact, contact! That day destroyed me completely, Kinani said. My law firm received a call from an immigration attorney the next year seeking representation for the Blackwaters victims, and I was eventually retained to represent the Kinani family in a civil lawsuit against Blackwater, Prince, and various other Blackwater companies and, of course, the men who were charged and eventually convicted of murder, manslaughter, and weapons charges for their conduct. Before VT Nuclear Education: The Beirut Nuclear Coverup, The Hidden History of the Incredibly Evil Khazarian Mafia. Although Mohammed was going to return quickly with his sister and Alis cousins for a visit, Mohammed told his son that he could go with him. An Iraqi policeman went over to the car, possibly to help the passenger, but the vehicle kept moving and it looked to the guards as if the policeman was pushing the car towards the Blackwater TST. It was as if someone had targeted the area in his SUV where a persons head would have been. However, after "Raven 23" entered Nisour Square, Watson was ordered to "lock down the traffic circle to expedite the travel of [the other Blackwater team]". AP Our civil case resulted in a resolution that was acceptable to the parties. [80], On April 22, 2011, after closed-door testimony, a federal appeals-court panel revived the Justice Department's prosecution of the former Blackwater Worldwide guards by reinstating the manslaughter charges against the five men. Four Blackwater security guards convicted in 2014 of carrying out a massacre of Iraqi civilians, sparking an international outcry over the use of mercenaries in war . The men, all military veterans working in Iraq for the private security contractor Blackwater, were convicted of massacring 14 civilians in an unprovoked and unjustified rampage of gunfire and. Liberty is one of four former Blackwater mercenaries pardoned by President Donald Trump in one of . Their cover: "return of Ukrainians from the French Foreign Legion.". The Blackwater guards were firing indiscriminately. In the sheer desperation to inflict maximum material damage to Russias security forces, however, NATO appears to have breached its own long-standing convention of curbing the proliferation of anti-aircraft munitions. Slough, Liberty and Heard were convicted on multiple charges of voluntary and attempted manslaughter in 2014, while Slatten, who was the first to start shooting, was convicted of first-degree murder. "[46] Hasan Jaber Salman, a lawyer who was one of the wounded, said that "no one did anything to provoke Blackwater" and that "as we turned back they opened fire at all cars from behind"[61] An Iraqi police officer who was directing traffic at the scene said Blackwater guards "became the terrorists" when they opened fire on civilians unprovoked, while a businessman said he wasn't seeking compensation but only "the truth" from the guards. The kind of reporting we do is essential to democracy, but it is not easy, cheap, or profitable. In 2014, four former government contractors who worked for Blackwater Worldwide, a security firm founded by Erik Prince an ally of Trump and the brother of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos were convicted in federal court in Washington in connection with the killings. For those of you who are not aware, Erik Prince (Blackwater/Academi) personally sold to the CIA the concept of a mercenary army to conduct hybrid war ops and/or crypto-guerrilla war against Russia. [71], In December 2008, the United States Department of Justice announced it was filing criminal charges against five of the Blackwater employees, and ordered them to surrender to the FBI. I was thinking the same thing about the Chechens a few days ago. But he knew he was surviving as he kept yelling for the children in the back of his SUV to stay down. Nassar Hamza was 67 years old when he was shot and wounded in the arm. [26][27], On September 27, 2007, The New York Times reported that during the chaotic incident at Nisour Square, one member of the Blackwater security team continued to fire on civilians despite urgent cease-fire calls from colleagues. None of the bullets the lab had available could be matched to the rifles used by the guards. Despite having immense firepower at its disposal that could readily turn the tide in conflicts as protracted as Syrias proxy war, the Russian advance in Ukraine has been slower than expected according to most estimates because Russia is only targeting military infrastructure and doing all it can to minimize collateral damage, particularly needless civilian losses in the former Soviet republic whose majority population is sympathetic to Russia. The White House further stated that the Court of Appeals "ruled that additional evidence should have been presented at Mr Slatten's trial", and recently that prosecutors said "that the lead Iraqi investigator, who prosecutors relied heavily on to verify that there were no insurgent victims and to collect evidence, may have had ties to insurgent groups himself". I commented when the convictions were first brought that I was certain my clients who were still residents of Iraq were pleased to know that justice had been served. "I think what that does is it sends the wrong message to the people of Iraq, who we told we were going to come in and protect, and to the rest of the world, that the pillars of justice upon which the United States is based on has a crack in it," he says. [100] UN Human Rights Office spokeswoman Marta Hurtado said that forgiveness "contributes to impunity and has the effect of encouraging others to commit such crimes in the future". Blackwater Mercenaries Filmed on a Rampage in Iraq & Shooting Civilians from WarPosting After being leaked by a former employee of the notorious PMC, the footage dated April 2006 was featured in a piece called "The Warrior Class" by Charles Glass. But Trump reached a peace agreement with the Taliban and then lost the re-election bid before he could consider the bizarre proposal. The committee was co-chaired by Abd al Qadir, the Iraqi Minister of Defense, and Patricia A. Butenis, the Charg d'affaires of the U.S. Embassy in Iraq. [88], On August 4, 2017, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit overturned Slatten's murder conviction and ordered the other defendants to be re-sentenced to time already served. The other three guards faced decades in prison; the weapons charges carried a minimum 30-year sentence under a law enacted during the 1990s cocaine epidemic. [41], Richard J. Griffin, the Assistant Secretary of State for Diplomatic Security, who made key decisions regarding the department's oversight of private security contractor Blackwater USA, resigned in November 2007, after a critical review by the House Oversight Committee found that his office had failed to adequately supervise private contractors during the Blackwater Baghdad shootings. The black-op of setting a building in the sprawling nuclear complex alight and then posting doctored video clips of Russian tanks shelling straight at the nuclear plant on social media, promptly verified as authentic by corporate media, was clearly the dirty work of covert saboteurs whove been advising and assisting Ukraines inept security forces and also taking an active part in combat operations in some of the hardest fought battles against Russias security forces north of Kyiv and at Kharkiv and Donbas. Five were charged with 14 counts of manslaughter, 20 counts of attempted manslaughter and a weapons violation: Donald Ball, a former Marine from West Valley City, Utah; Dustin Heard, a former Marine from Knoxville, Tennessee; Evan Liberty, a former Marine from Rochester, New Hampshire; Nicholas Slatten, a former army sergeant from Sparta, Tennessee, and Paul Slough, an army veteran from Keller, Texas. He thought they had been given a miracle after he saw so many others killed. The report found that the use of contractors such as Blackwater was a "new form of mercenary activity" and illegal under international law; however, the United States is not a signatory of the 1989 UN Mercenary Convention banning the use of mercenaries. In the middle of the attack, Mohammed could not understand why this man lying dead was a target. The order did not say when the suspension would expire. An initial prosecution was thrown out by a federal judge sparking outrage in Iraq but the then vice-president, Joe Biden, promised to pursue a fresh prosecution, which succeeded in 2015. [15] The incident sparked at least five investigations, including one from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Russian Forces strike Ukrainian Armys Electronic Intelligence Center in Kiev Region. While the #RussianOligarchs are vile post-Soviet capitalists, the hypocrisy of the US media is revealing. "Trump pardons Blackwater contractors jailed for massacre of Iraq civilians", 23 December 2020. ", Human Rights Watch says the pardons "show contempt for the rule of law.". Everything was eerily quiet. Erik Prince, chair of the Prince Group LLC and Blackwater USA, holds up a picture showing the effect of a car bomb while testifying during a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing on Capitol Hill Oct. 2, 2007 in Washington, D.C. Mohammed was going to visit his sister and her children. Again be warned it is ugly. I know that each of them placed great faith in the U.S. legal system. When he arrived at the hospital, it was a war zone. [68][69], On September 24, 2007, the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior announced it would file criminal charges against the Blackwater staff involved in the shooting, although it is unclear how some of them will be brought to trial. "This was Baghdad's Bloody Sunday," Dickinson told NPR's Mary Louise Kelly on Wednesday. American troops invaded Iraq in 2003 and toppled Saddam Hussein's regime. Their route home was through Nisour Square. It looks at the rise of private security contractors such as Blackwater in the era of modern warfare. . Trump issued pardons for all four men on Tuesday. Mohammed was thrilled when the U.S. entered Baghdad years earlier in 2003. This includes the right to see perpetrators serve punishments proportionate to the seriousness of their conduct. Slatten, whom prosecutors said started the shooting, was sentenced to life in prison. He died in the hospital hallway surrounded by family as he was asking for water. [6][86] Bringing the weapons charges was disputed within the Justice Department, which initially opposed including them in the indictment. When Mohammed looked to his right, the driver of the car next to him shouted that the soldiers had just shot into another car in front of them. Adela Sulimanis a London-based reporter for NBC News Digital. Mohammed had not been shot. "The ministry believes that this decision did not take into account the seriousness of the crime committed and was inconsistent with the U.S. administration's declared commitment to the values of human rights, justice, and the rule of law, and regrettably ignores the dignity of the victims," it said. Being so close to the Green Zone, he thought someone important might be entering or leaving the area. [58] Nor is the US a signatory of the 1977 additional protocol to the 1949 Geneva Conventions in which Article 47 specifies that mercenaries are civilians who "take a direct part in the hostilities" and are "motivated to take part in the hostilities essentially by the desire for private gain". Mohammed turned his bullet-riddled SUV around and drove back to the closest hospital only a few blocks behind him. Since the harrowing Nisour Square massacre in Baghdad in 2007, the Blackwater private military contractor, renamed as Academi in 2011 and becoming a subsidiary of Constellis Group following a merger with Triple Canopy in 2014, has built quite a business empire for itself. The Nisour Square massacreoccurred on September 16, 2007, when employees of Blackwater Security Consulting (now Constellis), a private military companycontracted by the US government to provide security services in Iraq, shot at Iraqi civilians, killing 17 and injuring 20 in Nisour Square, Baghdad, while escorting a U.S. embassy convoy. Blackwater mercenaries in helicopters also fired into traffic from overhead. What takes place doesnt mention Russian soldiers but others preventing citizens from escaping. [1][2][3] The killings outraged Iraqis and strained relations between Iraq and the United States. It was an honor to represent these victims and their families. Five independent UN experts condemned United States President Donald Trump's pardoning of private security contractors, convicted in 2015 for war crimes in Iraq, on Wednesday. Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) - On Tuesday, Trump the Mad pardoned 4 Blackwater mercenaries who killed 14 Iraqi civilians, including a nine-year-old boy, with indiscriminate fire at Nisour Square in downtown Baghdad on September 14, 2007. They beat citizens and scorn them. I felt I had done that, and I knew the prosecutors were doing that. Paul Dickinson[emailprotected]farrin.com. [78] The opinion elaborated "the government failed to establish that the Iraqi witnesses it presented to the second grand jury were not in any way influenced by their previous exposure to the defendants' compelled statements. [4] Germany to ship anti-aircraft missiles to Ukraine: https://www.dw.com/en/germany-to-ship-anti-aircraft-missiles-to-ukraine-reports/a-60995325. A former security guard working for US mercenary firm Blackwater has been found guilty of murder for his role in a notorious massacre of unarmed civilians in downtown Baghdad in 2007. He never received treatment. He was shot through the back with a massive exit wound in his chest. Who would be responsible for the myopic and vindictive policy of providing anti-aircraft munitions to Ukraines irregular militias once Kyiv falls and those MANPADS are found in black markets posing a grave risk to civilian airlines across the globe? Three Ex-Blackwater Guards Are Resentenced in Iraq War Massacre The men will serve about half of their original 30-year sentences for their roles in a 2007 shooting of unarmed civilians in Iraq . [14], On October 2, 2007, the Democratic staff of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee released a report stating that Blackwater USA guards had used deadly force weekly in Iraq and had inflicted "significant casualties and property damage". The U.N. Human Rights Office says it's "deeply concerned" by the pardons. Joining is simple and doesnt need to cost a lot: You can become a sustaining member for as little as $3 or $5 a month. Almost everyone who was killed or injured was shot in cars, taxis, or buses. In 2002, Blackwater received its first contract from the United States government. Nasser's younger brother, Mahdi Saheb Nasser, was 22 and working as a taxi driver when he was killed in September 2007 alongside other unarmed civilians in Baghdad's Nisur Square. He was driving on flat tires and with a shattered windshield. These men will now be free, despite their crimes, and they will not serve the time in prison they deserved. Again, I knew my clients would be pleased to know that justice had been served and their rights had been protected. The report found that the guards fired their weapons 195 times from the beginning of 2005 through the second week of September 2005. Justice Blackwater mercenary sentenced to life in prison On Wednesday, Slatten was sentenced to life in federal prison for initiating a massacre that left 14 Iraqi civilians dead. After it was added, defense attorneys contended a 30-year sentence would be too severe, since the law was intended to deter gang members from carrying automatic weapons. [24] The driver of the Kia was shot once in the head by a Blackwater contractor and was killed. "I am overwhelmed with emotion at this fantastic news.". Trump pardons ex-campaign aide and disgraced Republican lawmakers, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. Each step of the way, the U.S. legal system ensured that these men were given fair and just prosecutions. "They prefer animals over humans, and then they talk about human rights, justice and humanity," said an Iraqi man whose brother was among those killed in 2007. "The victims' families finally saw some measure of justice when these men were convicted in 2014 and sentenced to prison. [25][31], The account by the Blackwater firm differed from the Iraqi government's account; Blackwater's account stated the driver of the Kia sedan had kept driving toward the convoy, ignoring verbal orders, hand signals, and water bottles thrown at the car, and continued to approach even when fired upon. The shooting ended as suddenly as it started. Erik Prince, chairman of the Prince Group, LLC and Blackwater USA, tesifies during a House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in 2007. pardon four Blackwater private security contractors, US announces troop withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan. . LONDON and BAGHDAD -- When news broke that Mohammed Kinani's son's killers, Blackwater private military contractors hired by the U.S. government in Baghdad, were pardoned Wednesday by President Trump, Kinani said it was like losing his 9-year-old boy all over again. Rogers. At the sentencing, the US attorneys office said in a statement: The sheer amount of unnecessary human loss and suffering attributable to the defendants criminal conduct on 16 September 2007 is staggering., After news of the pardon emerged on Tuesday night, Brian Heberlig, a lawyer for one of the four pardoned Blackwater defendants, said: Paul Slough and his colleagues didnt deserve to spend one minute in prison. By signing up, I agree to receive emails from The Intercept and to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Use. [47], The U.S. State Department said it planned to investigate what it called a "terrible incident". He suffered from his wounds for over a year until he died from a brain injury. [3] Erik Prince provided weapons and aircraft to eastern Libyas warlord Khalifa Haftar: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/25/world/middleeast/libya-mercenaries-arms-embargo.html. U.S. military reports appear to corroborate the Iraqi government's contention that Blackwater was at fault in the incident. The pardons have reduced American talk of human rights to mere "slogans," he said, adding, "They prefer animals over humans, and then they talk about human rights, justice and humanity. . Ukrainian POW Unveils, Russian forces eliminating Ukrainian saboteurs that violated border, Greetings from Oujda, Morocco, the City of Mosques, VT RADIO: Exposing East Palestine Train Derailment Disaster with VTs, VT RADIO: Foreign Policy Gone Mad with VTs Senior Editor, VT RADIO: UFOs, Aliens, & Chinese Balloons with VTs Jack, Many Predicted NATO Expansion Would Lead to War. Hassan Salman is among the Iraqis who were shot during the ambush. More were arriving in the backs of trucks. Mohammed was a businessman dealing in auto salvage. [99], Clemency caused outrage among Iraqi citizens and family members of the victims. Survivors and victims' relatives of a 2007 shooting in Iraq by Blackwater contractors meet with United States prosecutors in Baghdad in 2008. When Blackwater security guard Nicholas Slatten was tried and convicted for murder and sentenced to life imprisonment, the U.S. legal system determined that he needed a new trial. How is Eric Prince still breathing? I sued Blackwater, its founder Erik Prince, and the four men who were convicted of murder, manslaughter, or weapons charges in a civil lawsuit filed in North Carolina, the home of Blackwaters headquarters and training facility in Moyock. But its the much more subtle and insidious tactic of economic warfare for which Russia has no antidote, as the global neocolonial order is being led by the United States and its Western European clients since the signing of the Bretton Woods Accord in 1945 following the Second World War. Hussein Saheb Nasser, 35, told NBC News by telephone from his home in Baghdad on Wednesday. [45] Also, it is not clear whether the license revocation is permanent. hide caption. Are they going to release me?". He was ensured a fair trial and convicted for his crimes. ", "By investigating these crimes and completing legal proceedings, the US complied with its obligations under international law," she added. Iraqi traffic police initially tried to wave down the Blackwater men that there was no threat, but they too had to run for cover. Their belief in our legal system was misplaced. Nicholas Slatten, Evan Liberty, Paul Slough and Devin Heard were convicted on charges of first-degree murder and manslaughter by a federal jury in October 2014. "[21] Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki harshly criticized the dismissal. Now justice has been undone by the stroke of a pen," Sarah Holewinski, the organization's Washington director, said in a statement. Thats what lawyers do in the United States: We fight for those who cant fight for themselves. ", "After years of waiting, the victims finally saw justice served when these men were convicted," she said in an email. [72] A sixth Blackwater guard, Jeremy Ridgeway of California, struck a deal with prosecutors on December 4, 2008 and pleaded guilty to one count each of voluntary manslaughter, attempted manslaughter, and aiding and abetting,[72][3] and agreed to testify against the other five men. "How are. (L-r) Dustin Heard, Evan Liberty, Paul Slough, Nicholas Slatten. They started out as a private security firm providing training support to law enforcement, the justice department, and military organizations and received their first contract from the United States government in 2000 after the bombing of the USS Cole. The Nisour Square massacre occurred on September 16, 2007, when employees of Blackwater Security Consulting (now Constellis), a private military company contracted by the US government to provide security services in Iraq, shot at Iraqi civilians, killing 17 and injuring 20 in Nisour Square, Baghdad, while escorting a U.S. embassy convoy. [37][38] The incident caused Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to call on the U.S. government to end its contract with Blackwater USA,[39] and for the Iraqi government to push for an apology, compensation for victims or their families and for the guards involved in the shooting to be held "accountable". The headrest next to him where his sister sat had a bullet hole through it. As Raven 23 was departing Nisour Square, several members continued to discharge their weapons, causing additional civilian deaths and injuries. They would turn Blackwater into roadkill. The incident was allegedly resolved only after another Blackwater contractor pointed his weapon at the man still firing and ordered him to stop. They claimed they were fired on, but prosecutors said the Blackwater guards opened fire first. After capturing Kherson yesterday, Russian forces even apprehended several suspicious and armed foreign nationals who are currently being interrogated by Russias military intelligence GRU. There are numerous reported incidents of mass murder conducted by US soldiers, special forces. October 22 2014, 9:58 a.m. A federal jury in Washington, D.C., returned guilty verdicts against four . On Tuesday, President Trump pardoned 15 people, including Dustin Heard (from left), Evan Liberty, Nicholas Slatten and Paul Slough, the four former government contractors convicted for a 2007 massacre in Baghdad that left more than a dozen Iraqi civilians dead. Majid survived because he was on the passenger side of the car and was protected from most of the barrage of bullets. [54] He served one tour in Iraq before being hired as a Personal Security Specialist in Iraq. She turned the location into an exotic bookstore and caf, offering erotica readings, among other licentious pastimes. Mohammed kept seeing the man on the ground next to him being fired upon as he lay dead. Among the pardons made by President Trump this week, the pardon of four former guards for Blackwater has been regarded by some as particularly galling. Mohammed met members of the U.S. Army on the streets and handed out candy and juice when he saw them. Although NATO powers did provide Stingers to their jihadist proxies that helped turn the tide in the Soviet-Afghan war in the eighties, since then, despite providing anti-tank munitions and rest of weapons to militant groups during the proxy wars in Libya and Syria, Western powers have consistently avoided providing MANPADS to proxy forces, because such deadly anti-aircraft munitions could become a long-term threat not only to military aircraft but also to civilian airlines. Convoy Attacked in Baghdad, Sparking a Shootout", "3 Blackwater Guards Called Baghdad Shootings Unjustified", "Blackwater Denies Any Wrongdoing in Shooting Incident (Update1)", "Iraqi leader urges U.S. to cancel Blackwater contract", "Iraqi Investigators say Videotape Shows Blackwater Guards Fired Without Aggravation", "House Passes Bill That Would Hike Penalties for U.S. Security Contractors in Iraq", "Private Security Company Association Iraq", "Iraqi Government Disputes Blackwater USA's Version of Shooting", "Iraq battle was self-defense, security firm says", "FBI takes lead in probe over Blackwater crisis", "Blackwater most often shoots first, congressional report says", "Report: Blackwater Killings Unjustified", "From Texas to Iraq, and Center of Blackwater Case", No forensic match for ammo in Blackwater shooting, "The Associated Press: APNewsBreak: Blackwater founder questions FBI work", "Overcoming post-colonial myopia: A call to recognize and regulate private military companie"s, Judge Advocate General's Corps, U.S. Army, "Wounded Iraqis: 'No one did anything' to provoke Blackwater", "Blackwater incident witness: 'It was hell', Family Members of Slain Iraqis Sue Blackwater USA for Deadly Baghdad Shooting, "Blackwater Verdict a U.S. 'Snub' of Iraqi Leader Nouri al-Maliki: Kayhan, Islamic Republic of Iran", "White House: Contractor bill would have 'intolerable' effects", "Blackwater settles Nisoor Square lawsuit", "5 Blackwater guards face manslaughter charges", "Blackwater Guard in Secret Deal to Testify in Massacre Case", "US judge sets trial in 2010 for Blackwater guards", "Appeals court revives Blackwater shooting case", "US judge dismisses charges in Blackwater Iraq killings", "Reopening of Blackwater Case Confuses Iraqi Victims", "Biden Says U.S. Will Appeal Blackwater Case Dismissal (Published 2010)", "ICD - Slough et al.
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