The New Nation - Internet Edition

A US Senate panel has reportedly found that President George W. Bush was responsible for approving War Crimes (torture and abuse) at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, Dick Cheney admitted in a recent interview to helping to approve War Crimes (torture and abuse) in interrogations.

The International Herald Tribune in an editorial article yesterday noted, 'Equally as troubling is the media's collective disinterest in these developments, and the eerie similarity with their collective silence and lack of curiosity about Bush's bogus rationale for invading Iraq --- a dereliction of duty that has cost the United States a steep price in both blood and treasure.'

The IHT article continues, 'Does the citizenry simply not care about War Crimes? Of course they do. But not unless they know about them, and not unless the argument that they occurred, and the evidence of it, is presented in the detail that such an issue merits. While a handful of --- or even just one or two --- outraged citizens who take action actually can make enormous differences on the local level, accountability for International War Crimes requires untiring, responsible, focused media to inspire the mobilisation of a nation.'

'Allowing Bush, Cheney, and company to escape justice now risks repercussions in the future. It radically increases the likelihood that U.S. citizens will be tortured when they are captured. It also sends the signal to future corrupt politicians like Bush and Cheney that they can get away with crimes such as these,' the article pointed out.

The most dangerous aspect of it is that state-sponsored terrorism cannot really stop private terrors unless the root causes of terrorism are addressed. Rather, it hardens the attitude of terrorists because if terrorism is considered a crime state terrorism cannot be given tacit approval.

Right thinking people in the US are blaming the corporate media for not adequately covering war crimes committed by the top-notchers in the administration.

The corporate media also cannot set two standards for terrorism and highlight one while ignoring the other. Much of the unwelcome developments of the past few years possibly owe their origin to glorifying state terrorism while demonising private terrors. And some top officials of the US administration reportedly ignored warnings from lawyers that they were subjecting soldiers to possible criminal charges and authorising abuses that were not only ineffective but were actually counterproductive.

President-elect Barack Obama, who has promised review and reversal of executive orders that eroded civil liberties, has thus been urged to reverse Bush's order of February 2002 declaring that the US was no longer legally committed to comply with the Geneva Conventions.

But nothing short of indicting those guilty of war crimes would help restore the US image as the champion of democracy and civil liberties.

What the American people should understand is that shoes were thrown neither at the US nor the American President but at the crimes committed by Bush, Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney and others of the US administration in Iraq. It is a hopeful sign that the American people are condemning the Bush administration for the atrocities inflicted on Iraqi people and Muslims elsewhere.