Iraq Press Roundup

The Al-Basaer newspaper of the Association of Muslim Scholars said Wednesday it is important to remember that U.S. President George Bush, through his two presidential terms, has done worse things than simply invading and destroying Iraq.

With the headline "Bush's war on Iraqi children is the worst of all war crimes," the newspaper said imprisoning a substantial number of Iraqi children is worse than continuing military operations in Iraq, worse than encouraging torture in prisons, and worse than Bush's campaign to illegally spy on U.S. citizens in the United States.

According to reports from the U.S. government, a number of 17-year-old Iraqi "children" have been detained, sent to the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and put in a detainment facility called Camp Iguana, the editorial said.

"A 21-year-old detainee's suicide after spending five years in the Guantanamo prison without being charged for a crime amounts to a war crime perpetrated by Bush, adding to his other heinous war crimes," the editorial announced.

Two weeks before the detainee committed suicide, the Pentagon announced his release, yet for unknown reasons, nobody informed him of the decision, the newspaper said.

The editorial said Bush was a "criminal" because the United States signed onto the Geneva Conventions, which say children under the age of 15 who engage in hostilities still maintain their protections under international law. Holding children in Guantanamo, the editorial says, therefore violates the Geneva Conventions, and subsequently the U.S. Constitution.

It added that in 2002, the Bush administration re-signed the convention and added protections for individuals up to the age of 18.

Although it appears this part of the U.S. Constitution means nothing to Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney or the rest of his administration, the newspaper says, it remains an important deal to the rest of the world.

The Saudi-based Al-Basaer newspaper said it should be noted that even the detention of children is not the worst crime Bush committed, as he also allowed mistreatment, torture and abuse in U.S. military prisons.

"The U.S. military in Iraq and Afghanistan considers 14-year-old children as 'possible enemies' and can therefore shoot at them, and when caught in battles, they are imprisoned, mistreated and tortured," the newspaper said.

The editorial said when the U.S. military launched an attack on Fallujah in 2004, it threatened the lives of more than 300,000 residents, inevitably leading to the killing of four U.S. contractors whose bodies were burned and hanged from a nearby bridge.

"The U.S. forces allowed women, children and the elderly to leave the city, yet prevented people aged 12 and above from fleeing death, considering them as 'possible weapons carriers,'" the newspaper said.

It said the attack on Fallujah was a triple insult because it first implemented the use of collective punishment employed by the Nazi regime, which the Geneva Conventions later forbade; second, it prevented people from exiting the city; and third, it treated children as enemies, even though international law says they should be treated as victims of war.

The influential Sunni newspaper demanded that after presenting evidence, the U.S. Congress must convict Bush as a war criminal.

"Knowing what a group of cowards the Congress is, we have little hope that Bush will be held responsible for the crimes he committed or that the U.S. Constitution will be defended," it said.

The editorial concluded there will be a light at the end of the tunnel when Bush leaves the White House.

"Spain or Germany are possible powers that might carry out the concept of international justice to punish Bush for his war crimes, as was the case with (Chilean dictator) Augusto Pinochet when he left for England," the editorial summarized.