Winds of Change.NET: Human Rights Watch: Credit Where It's Due

April 7, 2003

Human Rights Watch: Credit Where It's Due

by Joe Katzman at April 7, 2003 4:30 AM

Recently, I took a large brickbat to Amnesty International for betraying its founding purpose. Deservedly so. Organizations who only care about some countries' human rights violations, don't really care about human rights at all.

Here's one human rights organization that's making more of an effort to stay true to its calling, by sharply criticizing Iraqi perfidity as well. Kudos to Human Rights Watch:

"Feigning civilian or noncombatant status to deceive the enemy is a violation of the laws of war, Human Rights Watch said today. On March 29 at a U.S. military roadblock near Najaf, an Iraqi noncommissioned officer reportedly posing as a taxi driver detonated a car bomb that killed him and four U.S. soldiers. Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan said at a Baghdad news conference that such attacks would become "routine military policy."

When combatants disguise themselves as civilians or surrendering soldiers, that's a serious violation of the laws of war. Any such blurring of the line between combatant and noncombatant puts all Iraqis at greater risk."

Eugene Volokh has more.

P.S. Here's another person with real ethics. A well-known Chicago-based film critic protests Iran's recent arrest of Iranian film critic Kambiz Kahe. Because it's wrong and should be opposed, even if the USA isn't responsible. Or read Nat Henthoff's excellent "Why I Didn't March This Time" in The Village Voice. That's what a decent left looks like - and most of the time, does not.

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