https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ck5ye7v88qy7o
“A UN report has concluded that recent US airstrikes on vessels allegedly
trafficking drugs breached international law and could constitute crimes
against humanity.
The report by Special Rapporteur Ben Saul said since September last year there
had been at least 68 US strikes in the Caribbean and Pacific, outside US
territorial waters, which killed more than 220 people.
Saul said that even if targets could be identified as members of designated
terrorist groups, they had not staged an armed attack on the US which would
trigger a right to self-defence under international law.
The report comes two days after the US military said it killed four people in a
strike on a vessel in the Caribbean.
"Confirmed intelligence revealed the vessel's active involvement in
narco-trafficking. The operation killed four narco-terrorists," Southcom, which
commands US forces in the region, said in a statement about the latest attack,
which was accompanied by a grainy video.
But in a briefing note released by the UN Human Rights Council on Monday, Saul
said that "such attacks amount to serial extrajudicial killings in violation of
the right to life, being unjustified in national or personal self-defence or
under international humanitarian law, the international law of the sea,
narcotics suppression conventions, or international counter-terrorism law".
"There are reasonable grounds to believe that the reported 68 attacks that
killed 223 people constituted crimes against humanity of murder under customary
international law," Saul concluded.
BBC News has contacted the White House and State Department for a response to
the report.”
Via Lisa Stranger.
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
