Twenty years since the US-led coalition invaded Iraq, impunity reigns supreme

On the 20th anniversary of the invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq, Amnesty International today renewed its calls for justice and full reparations for the gross human rights violations and serious violations of international humanitarian law committed by the United States-led Coalition. United.

Between 2003 and 2011, Amnesty International documented the engagement of US forces in rampant violations, including indiscriminate attacks that killed and injured civilians, secret detentions, clandestine prisoner transfers, enforced disappearances, torture and other cruel, inhumane treatment. or degrading. Former detainees have credibly alleged a range of abuses in detention centres, including sleep deprivation, forced nudity, deprivation of adequate food and water, mock executions and threats of rape.

To this day, Iraqis are suffering the devastating impact of war crimes and other atrocities committed by the US-led coalition in its invasion and subsequent occupation of Iraq, said Elizabeth Rghebi, Director of Middle East Advocacy. and North Africa at Amnesty International USA.

Twenty years later, impunity reigns supreme and accountability remains elusive for human rights violations committed in Iraq. The US has failed to adequately investigate widespread human rights abuses and war crimes committed by US forces and hold those responsible accountable at all levels, including senior US officials and commanders. Victims of gross human rights violations, including prisoners who survived torture and other ill-treatment at Abu Ghraib, have been largely denied their rights to justice and reparations. Iraqi victims who have tried to seek redress for US human rights abuses in US courts have faced systemic obstacles.

Amnesty International has previously called on the US government to establish a full and independent commission of inquiry into US detention and interrogation policies and practices in Iraq, but to date, successive US administrations have failed to do so. .

Several investigations have taken place, leading to the court-martial of dozens of US soldiers, mostly low-ranking, in connection with prisoner abuse. However, no senior US administration official has been brought to justice for crimes committed in Iraq since 2003, despite public admissions of involvement in secret interdictions by former President George W. Bush and former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. , behaviors that according to international law should cause crimes. investigations. Similarly, there have been no criminal charges against senior British officials, however discovery by the International Criminal Court in 2020 that British armed forces committed war crimes in Iraq, including deliberate killings, torture and rape.

Twenty years later, impunity reigns supreme and accountability remains elusive for human rights violations committed in Iraq.

Elizabeth Rghebi, Amnesty International USA

Amnesty International calls on the US government and the governments of other countries in the coalition to take concrete steps to ensure that all allegations of enforced disappearance, torture or other ill-treatment or other serious human rights violations and international humanitarian law by the national forces that were part of the Coalition Forces in Iraq are immediately, thoroughly, transparently and independently investigated. Anyone against whom there is sufficient credible evidence of responsibility for crimes under international law should be prosecuted in civilian courts in proceedings that respect international fair trial standards. All victims of such human rights violations must be given full compensation.

Along with the egregious violations that the US and allied forces committed against Iraqis, ill-advised US policies such as the so-called de-Baathification process, the disbanding of the security forces and the injection of large quantities of weapons into the country . contributed to a security vacuum that allowed sectarian violence to spiral. Since the invasion, Iraq has been mired in successive cycles of violence and a culture of impunity that the US-led coalition, through their policies, helped foster. This devastating legacy of the US-led occupation continues to claim new Iraqi casualties to this day.

Background

On March 20, 2003, a US-led coalition invaded Iraq, toppling the government of Saddam Hussein. A military occupation was established and led by the Coalition Provisional Authority, an interim Iraqi government was formed in June 2004, and a transitional government was elected in 2005. US troops withdrew in 2011.