UPDATE: From Media With Conscience Blackwater guards told to surrender , Dec. 7,2008
A group of five private security guards who allegedly killed 17 Iraqi civilians in Baghdad have been ordered to surrender themselves to the FBI within 24 hours.
The order was given on Sunday and lawyers for the men, who were working for the private contractor Blackwater in Iraq, said they would hand themselves in on Monday.
The details over the group's identities and charges against them had been kept secret for more than a year, but were released on Sunday.
The men are all decorated war veterans who were contracted to protect US diplomats in Iraq.
They are accused of firing on 17 Iraqi civilians in Nisoor Square, in September 2007.
US to unveil charges in Blackwater shooting - 7 Dec 08
AlJazeeraEnglish
December 07, 2008
They behaved like cowboys on the streets of Baghdad" - a damning accusation directed at five decorated war veterans facing criminal charges over the shooting of Iraqi civilians.
They have now been ordered to surrender themselves to the FBI.
and heres a bit from PBS documentary on Blackwater , Halliburton & KBR
5/6 PBS Frontline (June2005) Private Warriors, Blackwater, KBR, Halliburton
Waste and unneeded luxury in a War Zone
And more revelations on the Crimes committed under the Bush Regime. Of course the Bush Regime while in power were able to call the shots and to re-write laws so that many of these Crimes were no longer criminal acts but just Business as usual. Which means that the Corporations tied to American interests have been able to do as they please. If hired thugs known as Mercenaries are being provided to the government by a Private Corporation then they are merely employees who do the biding of their employer on behalf of the government. Once Mercenaries or Private Security Firms as hired guns can be defined as being a legitimate business then their duty like that of the Wal-Mart employee is to their employer not to their country or some International Body other than that of Wal-Mart. The corporation is no more responsible for its employees actions as in committing a criminal offense. Doesn't this strike anyone as odd.
The CEO and other administrator can not be held responsible for the actions of their employees . But Blackwater is not like Wal-Mart since its employees use lethal force and therefore we would expect them to screen its applicants and then train them in their duties as Security Guards, Prison Guards and Interogators or whatever else they have been contracted to do. The individual conduct of an employee does in the case of Blackwater reflect on its CEO's and others in authority. They are in effect a Private Army .
Since Blackwater was contracted out to the US Government and the Pentagon & the Regime in power its actions are a reflection on the those who were responsible for a rigorous oversight because in the end it is a matter of life in death in a war zone. This is the same rule that should apply to the military itself . Yes the individual soldiers may need to be prosecuted but if their crimes were a matter of orders and policies then those further up the Chain of Command including the Commander in Chief .
Bush's privatization and the unleashing of War Profiteers is one of the worst things Bush did yet his defenders say Blackwater does the dirty work the military should be doing or that these Americans see nothing wrong with Blackwater or American soldiers mowing down unarmed Iraqis or raping Iraqi women this is just seen a matter of High Spirits Young American men doing what comes naturally or it is sometimes characterized as no more than the sorts of pranks and hazing rituals that still go on in College Fraternities.
Will Bush Pardon all the members of Blackwater- will Obama crack down on these mercenaries or are they too powerful for Obama or any elected official to take them on - If Obama did would it unleash the anger of Blackwater individuals or its Dark Prince who is a fundamentalist nutter of the highest degree. One wonders to whom Blackwater and other Private Contractors or mercenaries owe their allegiance to America or to their corporate bosses and to those politicians whether Republican or Democrats who have given them free reign in Iraq and elsewhere.
Five Blackwater Guards Face US Charges in Iraq Deaths
Saturday 06 December 2008 by: Ginger Thompson and James Risen, The New York Times
Washington - The Justice Department has obtained indictments against five guards for the security company Blackwater Worldwide for their involvement in a 2007 shooting in Baghdad that killed at least 17 Iraqi civilians and remains a thorn in Iraqi relations with the United States.
The indictments, obtained Thursday, remained sealed. But they could be made public in Washington as soon as Monday, according to people who have been briefed on the case and who spoke on condition of anonymity because the indictments had not been unsealed.
A sixth guard was negotiating a plea, those people said.
Peter A. Carr, a spokesman for the Justice Department, declined to comment on Friday. Anne E. Tyrrell, a spokeswoman for Blackwater, also declined to comment.
The six guards have been under investigation since the shootings occurred Sept. 16, 2007, as their convoy traveled through a traffic circle in Nisour Square that was filled with cars, pedestrians and police officers. The guards have told investigators that they fired after coming under attack. Blackwater has maintained that its guards did nothing wrong, and the company itself is not being charged in the case. Investigations by the Pentagon, the F.B.I. and the Iraqi government found no evidence to support the guards' version of events.
KBR & Halliburton
Halliburton Cheney's corporation claims innocence
Suit Claims Halliburton, KBR (Kellogg Brown & Root ) Sickened Base
Friday 05 December 2008 by: Kelly Kennedy, Army Times
A Georgia man has filed a lawsuit against contractor KBR and its former parent company, Halliburton, saying the companies exposed everyone at Joint Base Balad in Iraq to unsafe water, food and hazardous fumes from the burn pit there.
Joshua Eller, who worked as a civilian computer-aided drafting technician with the 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing, said military personnel, contractors and third-country nationals may have been sickened by contamination at the largest U.S. installation in Iraq, home to more than 30,000 service members, Defense Department civilians and contractors.
"Defendants promised the United States government that they would supply safe water for hygienic and recreational uses, safe food supplies and properly operate base incinerators to dispose of medical waste safely," according to the lawsuit, filed Nov. 26 in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. "Defendants utterly failed to perform their promised duties."
Eller and his attorneys are seeking to have the lawsuit declared a class action.
Diana Gabriel, a spokeswoman for Halliburton, said her company is "improperly named" in the lawsuit. "As such, we expect Halliburton to be dismissed from the action as Halliburton has no responsibility, legal or otherwise, for the actions alleged," Gabriel said. "It would be inappropriate for Halliburton to comment on the merits of a matter affecting only the interest of KBR."
And in this next article from McClatchy Newspapers it appears that KBR and Halliburton and their CEOS and those of other corporations given contracts in Iraq or Afghanistan see nothing wrong with treating workers as if they were prisoners or serfs or slaves. We know that many in the Bush Regime have little regard for any foreigners and little regard for those Americans who are not part of the Powerful Elite.
at TruthOut
Military Contractor in Iraq Holds Foreign Workers in Warehouses
Tuesday 02 December 2008 by: Adam Ashton, McClatchy Newspapers
Baghdad - About 1,000 Asian men who were hired by a Kuwaiti subcontractor to the U.S. military have been confined for as long as three months in windowless warehouses near the Baghdad airport without money or a place to work.
Najlaa International Catering Services, a subcontractor to KBR, an engineering, construction and services company, hired the men, who're from India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. On Tuesday, they staged a march outside their compound to protest their living conditions.
"It's really dirty," a Sri Lankan man told McClatchy, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he still wants to work for Najlaa. "For all of us, there are about 12 toilets and about 10 bathrooms. The food - it's three half-liter (one pint) bottles of water a day. Bread, cheese and jam for breakfast. Lunch is a small piece of meat, potato and rice. Dinner is rice and dal, but it's not dal," he said, referring to the Indian lentil dish.
After McClatchy began asking questions about the men on Tuesday, the Kuwaiti contractor announced that it would return them to their home countries and pay them back salaries. Najlaa officials contended that they've cared for the men's basic needs while the company has tried to find them jobs in Iraq.
The laborers said they paid middlemen more than $2,000 to get to Iraq for jobs that they were told would earn them $600 to $800 a month. Some of the men took out loans to cover the fees.
"They promised us the moon and stars," said Davidson Peters, 42, a Sri Lankan. "While we are here, wives have left their husbands and children have been shut out of their schools" because money for the families has dried up. The men live in three warehouses with long rows of bunk beds crammed tightly together. Reporters who tried to get a better glimpse inside were ushered away by armed guards.
and so it goes,
GORD.
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