[41] Senate Democratic leaders said they planned to pass similar legislation as soon as possible. It remains unclear whether the team member mistook the civilians for insurgents. Following Russias intervention in Ukraine, Germany alone hasproudly bragged[4] of dispatching caches of 500 US-made surface-to-air Stinger missiles and 2,700 Soviet-era, shoulder-fired Strelamissiles to Ukraines conscript military. I was thinking the same thing about the Chechens a few days ago. [21]:116[22] The Blackwater commander, Jimmy Watson, had received an order to stand by and not leave the Green Zone upon reaching a checkpoint, but he made a "tactical decision" to advance to Nisour Square after waiting for a few minutes; upon informing the Blackwater Tactical Operations Center of this, he was ordered to return to the Green Zone. While the #RussianOligarchs are vile post-Soviet capitalists, the hypocrisy of the US media is revealing. Ali was slumped over against the glass. [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. Adela Sulimanis a London-based reporter for NBC News Digital. "We've backed off that. "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. [48] According to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice promised a "fair and transparent" investigation into the incident. [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. He is a regular contributor of diligently researched investigative reports to alternative news media. Instead of returning the favor, however, the conceited leader of supposedly the worlds sole surviving superpower turned down the hand of friendship and even snubbed Putin. In November last year, he pardoned a former US army commando who was set to stand trial over the killing of a suspected Afghan bomb-maker, and a former army lieutenant convicted of murder for ordering his men to fire at three Afghans. The hospital was too busy. 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. [54] He enlisted in 1999, and served in Bosnia with the 3rd Infantry Division. Prosecutors asserted the heavily armed Raven 23 Blackwater convoy launched an unprovoked attack using sniper fire, machine-guns and grenade launchers. What Is Blackwater? He was told that he had to go to a neurologic hospital on the other side of Baghdad. Dec. 24, 2020 Mohammed Hafedh Abdulrazzaq Kinani with a photo of his 9-year-old son, Ali, who was killed by Blackwater. Russian Forces strike Ukrainian Armys Electronic Intelligence Center in Kiev Region. Monday's sentencing was. USA: Four Blackwater contractors jailed for massacre of Iraq civilians [66] Howard Krongard, who was appointed Inspector General of the U.S. State Department in 2005,[67] resigned in December 2007 after he was accused by the House Oversight Committee of improperly interfering with investigations into the Blackwater Baghdad shootings. They would turn Blackwater into roadkill. Mohammed quickly got out of the car and saw blood inside the rear window. He never received treatment. In fact, private military contractors in close coordination and consultation with covert operators from CIA and Western intelligence agencies are not only training Ukraines conscript forces in the use of caches of Stingers and Javelins provided by Germany and the rest of the European nations as military assistance to Ukraine but are also directing the whole defense strategy of Ukraine by taking an active part in combat operations in some of the most hard-fought battles against Russias security forces north of Kyiv and at Kharkiv and Donbas. "How are. Their bodies were beaten and burned, with their charred corpses then dragged through the city streets before being hanged over a bridge crossing the Euphrates River. The civil lawsuit was filed as a wrongful death and personal injury suit against the men and companies responsible for my clients losses. The ones who were killed on the street were shot running for their lives. During the litigation, an appeal was ongoing in the 4h Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Virginia. The result is not just that we see an injustice in the United States, but that the world must surely see cracks in the pillars of justice upon which our system is based. [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. [10][11] The next day, Blackwater Worldwide's license to operate in Iraq was temporarily revoked. 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. Now justice has been undone by the stroke of a pen," Sarah Holewinski, the organization's Washington director, said in a statement. On Tuesday, President Trump pardoned four former Blackwater contractors convicted in the killings. "I am overwhelmed with emotion at this fantastic news.". Donald Trump has pardoned four security guards from the private military firm Blackwater who were serving jail sentences for killing 14 civilians including two children in Baghdad in 2007, a massacre that sparked 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. The Intercept is an independent nonprofit news outlet. How is Eric Prince still breathing? FBI investigators who visited the scene in the following days described it as the My Lai massacre of Iraq a reference to the infamous slaughter of civilian villagers by US troops during the Vietnam war in which only one soldier was convicted. Blackwater Mercenaries: NATOs Secret Weapon in Ukraine War, VT RADIO: Alternative Foreign Policy Talk, Khazarian Mafia at War: The Jewish Oligarch Who Planned the Terror, Russias Future Predicted by Well-Known Christian Saints, Most Front-Line Ukrainian Soldiers Killed Within 4 Hours, How Russia managed to survive Western sanctions, How War Began The Genesis of NATOs Coup in Ukraine , From Global Warming Denial to Holocaust Denial, On this day in 1940, Woody Guthrie writes This Land Is, Former U.S. President Carter to Hospice, Will Pariah Trump Attend State, Dr. Fauci Admits COVID Shots Didnt Have A Chance Of Controlling. October 22 2014, 9:58 a.m. A federal jury in Washington, D.C., returned guilty verdicts against four . The U.N. Human Rights Office says it's "deeply concerned" by the pardons. Their belief in our legal system was misplaced. As he was leaving, his youngest son, who was affectionately given the nickname Alawi, asked to go with his father. Also quoted in the memorandum was David Boslego, a retired US army colonel, who said the massacre was a grossly excessive use of force and grossly inappropriate for an entity whose only job was to provide personal protection to somebody in an armoured vehicle. [57], In October 2007, the United Nations released a two-year study that stated that private contractors, although hired as "security guards", were performing military duties. 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. And it will be a success, Im sure. But unsurprisingly, he did not describe who those thousands of daredevil volunteers willing to sacrifice lives and limbs in a foreign war were. Nasser, who attended the 2014 trial in the United States, said his brother's death had broken his father's heart. "This was the slaughter of innocent civilians who were merely going about their day when a Blackwater convoy rolled through a traffic circle after having violated orders to stand down and not exit the Green Zone and began firing indiscriminately into cars that were carrying people going to work.". "I'm really shocked. 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. Using the good offices of his sister Betsy Devos, who worked as Trumps secretary of education, Erik Prince even made an offer to Trump for the outsourcing of the Afghanistan war to private military contractors advising and assisting Afghan security forces following the withdrawal of US troops. He was ensured a fair trial and convicted for his crimes. December 23, 2020 at 2:57 pm. It was his business partner who lay in the pool of blood and was repeatedly shot. security contractors who had previously been sentenced over the death of 17 Iraqi civilians in the 2007 Nisur Square massacre . [95][96] Heard, Liberty, and Slough were resentenced on September 5, 2019 to terms approximately half the original 30-year periods. NPR reports that sometime after the Al-Qaeda bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen in October 2000, where 17 sailors were killed, Blackwater won a $46 million contract from the U.S government for "training sailors in counterterrorism." After the September 11th attacks, Blackwater expanded their security-related work . The efforts of the investigators, the prosecutors, and the men and women who supported them was immeasurable. He was shot through the roof of his car as the Blackwater convoy drove past firing down into traffic. 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. [1][2][3] The killings outraged Iraqis and strained relations between Iraq and the United States. A rocket grenade was fired into the car next to him. Iraqi authorities say 17 people were killed; the Department of Justice has said the total was 14. Constellis did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The incident was allegedly resolved only after another Blackwater contractor pointed his weapon at the man still firing and ordered him to stop. And none of the I.P. [49], An Interior Ministry spokesman said Iraqi authorities had completed their investigation into the shooting and concluded that Blackwater guards were responsible for the deaths. [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". [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. [97], On December 22, 2020, U.S. President Donald Trump granted full presidential pardons to Slatten, Slough, Liberty, and Heard. An Iraqi looks at a burned car in Nisour Square in the western Baghdad neighborhood of Yarmukh, on Sept. 24, 2007, eight days after Blackwater guards who were escorting U.S. Embassy officials opened fire there. The fire has since been extinguished after the plant was captured by Russian troops and no radiation leakage has been detected. Mohammed had not been shot. Slatten, whom prosecutors said started the shooting, was sentenced to life in prison. [84], The other four went on trial starting on June 17, 2014;[5] ten weeks of testimony and 28 days of jury deliberations resulted in convictions for all four men on October 22, 2014. [55], On April 1, 2009, the Associated Press reported that forensic tests on bullets were inconclusive. Supporters of the former contractors at Blackwater Worldwide had lobbied for the pardons, arguing that the men had been excessively punished. The U.S. legal system, a pillar of fairness in the world, had worked. Blackwater and its employees had been given immunity from any criminal or civil exposure in Iraq that was part of Princes contract with the State Department. Survivors and victims' relatives of a 2007 shooting in Iraq by Blackwater contractors meet with United States prosecutors in Baghdad in 2008. 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! "These four individuals were given sentences ranging from 12 years to life imprisonment, including on charges of first-degree murder," spokesperson Marta Hurtado said in a statement. Before VT Nuclear Education: The Beirut Nuclear Coverup, The Hidden History of the Incredibly Evil Khazarian Mafia. [28] Nicholas Slatten was found guilty of first-degree murder, and Slough, Liberty and Heard were found guilty of voluntary and attempted manslaughter charges, and of using a machine gun to commit a violent crime. hide caption. President Donald Trump's decision to pardon four Blackwater private security contractors convicted of a massacre in Baghdad has been met with fury by the victims' families in Iraq. "[51][52][53], On January 19, 2008, The New York Times reported that the contractor responsible for many of the deaths in the engagement, previously known only as "turret gunner no. 2004 Fallujah ambush - Wikipedia That changed yesterday with President Donald Trumps pardons. He saw the man next to him run. Trump pardons Blackwater contractors jailed for massacre of Iraq "Victims of gross human rights violations and serious violations of international humanitarian law also have the right to a remedy. Lead FBI investigator in Blackwater case likens Iraq massacre to My Lai Thats all it takes to support the journalism you rely on. 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. 15 years after US Blackwater mercenaries massacred civilians in Baghdad Each time the criminal charges were seemed lost, the U.S. Department of Justice told them they were not forgotten that we would continue to pursue the convictions of those who committed the crimes against them. RT has asked experts to share their thoughts on what the incident meant for Washington's Middle East policy and the likelihood of another tragedy like this. Blackwater Guards Found Guilty in 2007 Iraq Killings "Paul Slough and his colleagues didn't deserve to spend one minute in prison," Brian Heberlig, a lawyer for Slough, told The Associated Press. 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. "These are four innocent guys, and it is completely justified," Bill Coffield, a lawyer for Evan Liberty, told the AP. The shooting ended as suddenly as it started. Trump's pardon of Blackwater contractors convicted of massacre greeted Opinion | Trump's Most Disgusting Pardons - The New York Times The four armored vehicles drove away. It was as if someone had targeted the area in his SUV where a persons head would have been. Blackwater mercenaries in helicopters also fired into traffic from overhead. [16] The FBI investigation found that, of the 17 Iraqis killed by the guards, at least 14 were shot without cause. I had never imagined that Trump or any other politician would affect American justice.". Nicky Woolf in New York. 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. [37] A senior aide to al-Maliki said that three of the Blackwater guards were Iraqis and could be subject to prosecution. Being so close to the Green Zone, he thought someone important might be entering or leaving the area. Before Nord Stream Sabotage, VT RADIO: Exposing East Palestine Train Derailment Disaster with VTs Jack Heart, Dr. Fauci Admits COVID Shots Didnt Have A Chance Of Controlling The Pandemic, More Home Care Services Needed for Military Veterans, VA is Lying Facebook Group is Social Media Done Right, Pregnant Dog Found Starving to Death in Cage Needs Help to be Reunited With Marine Who Rescued Her, Healthy Eating Options More Accessible to Military Community through the Exchange, Israels Illegal Violent Occupation: When De-Escalate Means Ramp Up, Citizen Kane Rupert Murdoch Openly Admits Fox News is Complete Bullshit. [36], On September 19, as a result of the incident, the United States temporarily suspended all land travel by U.S. diplomats and other civilian officials in Iraq outside Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone. Victims were everywhere. 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. More were arriving in the backs of trucks. Four guards fired on unarmed crowd in Baghdad in 2007, killing 14 and sparking outrage over use of private security in war zones. 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. If it is determined that one person was complicit in the wrongdoing, we would support accountability in that. "Pardoning the Blackwater contractors is an affront to justice and to the victims of the Nisour Square massacre and their families," said Jelena Aparac, Chair . Raven 23 "returned defensive fire" and withdrew from Nisour Square with one of its BearCat vehicles in tow. The order did not say when the suspension would expire. Suddenly, bullets began to riddle Mohammeds car. Extending the hand of friendship, Russia significantly drawdown its forces along the western border before the summit last year. Ukraine War Anniversary: UN and China Work for Peace, Devilish Zelensky, Kiev Hid Its Dead Soldiers in the Ravines. AP 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. Donald Trump has pardoned the four contractors jailed over the killing of 14 civilians. "Before he died, he went crazy as he used to go out into the street and whenever he saw a young man, he imagined that he was Mahdi," he said. As many as 504 children, women and older men were killed by a US infantry company, members of which also raped numerous women and girls. [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. They beat citizens and scorn them. 3", is named Paul Slough. "I consider what the security company personnel have done is a terrorist act, as many civilians were martyred and wounded," said Hashem, 41, a father of five who was partially disabled and forced to retire after the incident. Former Blackwater mercenary convicted of Baghdad civilian massacre