There is No Justice In Murder: Why We're Protesting the Blackwater Decision

If Blackwater were read their rights, they’d sound a little different than what we’re used to; they’d probably sound something like this: “Nothing you say can or will be used against you in a court of law.”
On September 16, 2007 a Blackwater convoy sped into Nisour Square in Baghdad—a congested intersection in the once upscale Mansour district. By the time they left about fifteen minutes later, seventeen people were dead—all of them Iraqi civilian men, women, and children.
But the Blackwater shooters were investigated by the State Department with the understanding that their statement could not be used to bring criminal charges against them or be used as evidence. Copies of sworn statements from the operatives obtained by ABC News read “I further understand that neither my statements nor any information or evidence gained by reason of my statements can be used against me in a criminal proceeding.”
Paul Bremer, head of the occupation until June 2004, furthered Blackwater’s growing immunity by signing Order 17, which prevented Blackwater or its operative from being charged in Iraqi courts.
Now this outrage has been brought into the US judicial system. District Judge Ricardo Urbina threw out manslaughter and weapons charges brought against five Blackwater security guards. “If a judge ... dismissed the trial, that is ridiculous and the whole thing has been but a farce,” Dr. Haitham Ahmed—whose (unarmed) son and wife were killed in the massacre—said. “The rights of our victims and the rights of the innocent people should not be wasted.”
The messages Judge Urbina has sent with the dismissal of this case—that war crimes are permissible and human lives expendable in the pursuit of profit and that the Justice Department is happy to play an active role in the imperialist American war machine—is both dangerous and intolerable.
This is why we, the women of Salem AntiWar, take action. If an Iraqi citizen is expendable, then so are we. The Iraqi people are our brothers and sisters. To deny them basic human rights, to deny them their own voice is to deny our own humanity. It’s to implicate ourselves in the war crimes of this government and its companies/contractors that enforce is hegemonic imperialist policies.
Blackwater claims that no VIP protected by its forces has been killed, but the company admits that they have no idea how many Iraqi civilians they have killed. Blackwater and its operative must be held accountable for their war crimes, for the murder of innocent civilians. We will not tolerate a government, a judicial system that refuses justice to people to protect imperialist interests and corporate profits. There is no justice in murder.




1 Scahill, Jeremy. "State to Blackwater: Nothing You Say Can and Will Be Used Against You in a Court of Law." Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeremy-scahill/state-to-blackwater-noth_b_70479.html (accessed January 4, 2010).

2 Scahill, Jeremy. Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army. New York: Nation Books, 2008, 15.
Associated Press, .. "Iraq Dismayed by Blackwater Dismissal." CBS News. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/01/01/world/main6044525.shtml (accessed January 2, 2010).

3 Scahill, Jeremy. Blackwater, 209-231.