Skip Nav | Home | Mobile | Editorial Guidelines | Mission Statement | About Us | Contact | Help | Security | Support Us

World

George Bush & Tony Blair's trial: Sparks fly at Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal

Cynthia McKinney | 19.11.2011 14:11 | Anti-militarism | Iraq | Social Struggles | South Coast | World

Today, seven judges of the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal sat to hear formal charges against former President of the United States George W. Bush and former United Kingdom Prime Minister Tony Blair for Crimes Against the Peace.

But before the actual proceedings could get underway, Defense Counsel Team Leader Jason Kay Kit Leon charged one of the Judges with bias. Prosecutors characterized the allegation of bias and request for recusal as a "surprise" attack for which the Court had not had the opportunity to prepare.

George Bush and Tony Blair attend the NATO summit in Istanbul, 28 June 2004
George Bush and Tony Blair attend the NATO summit in Istanbul, 28 June 2004




The Trial of George W. Bush and Tony Blair: Sparks Fly at the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal

by Cynthia McKinney, Global Research, 19 November 2011


Today, seven judges of the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal sat to hear formal charges against former President of the United States George W. Bush and former United Kingdom Prime Minister Tony Blair for Crimes Against the Peace.

But before the actual proceedings could get underway, Defense Counsel Team Leader Jason Kay Kit Leon charged one of the Judges with bias. Prosecutors characterized the allegation of bias and request for recusal as a "surprise" attack for which the Court had not had the opportunity to prepare.

Judge Niloufer Bhagwat, who served as a Judge with the Tokyo International Tribunal for War Crimes in Afghanistan, wrote in her decision that she found George W. Bush guilty for waging war against Afghanistan and the Afghani people. In addition, Judge Bhagwat served as a prosecutor of George W. Bush at the People's Tribunal on Iraq in 2005 in Istanbul. Defense Counsel alleged that because of Judge Bhagwat's participation in these various efforts and due to the opinions she has issued, that she cannot be fair in these Kuala Lumpur proceedings. Judge Bhagwat did find that no Head of State, including George W. Bush, can exempt himself from international treaty organizations.

Judge Niloufer implored the panel in Istanbul to have the courage to speak the truth. Counsel for the defendants found Judge Alfred Webre made the point that George W. Bush was served appropriately but failed to appear at the various people's tribunals seeking justice for the victims of his Presidential decisions to take the people of the United States to war.

However, he made the point in defense of his colleague, Judge Bhagwat, that President Bush did not fail to appear at a Vancouver dinner at which he collected a US$150,000 speaking fee. Judge Webre stated that perhaps the Tribunal should have offered the former U.S. President a sizeable speaking fee in order to gain his attendance at the Tribunal.

Francis Boyle, a part of the prosecuting team, spoke on the matter of bias and recusal based on precedents at the International Court of Justice and the United States Supreme Court, where judges are presumed to be able to render judgments despite what might appear at first glance to be conflicst of interests. Interestingly, both Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. have currently turned their sights onto two the Supreme Court Justices alleged to have bias on the President's health care law which the Supreme Court has agreed to hear during this term. Justices Clarence Thomas and Elena Kagan have been challenged for by Republicans and Democrats, respectively, in the Court's health care deliberations due to the financial ties of Mrs. Clarence Thomas to organizations against the law and Justice Kagan's role in preparing the defense of the controversial health care law while she served as the Administration's Solicitor General.

The Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal Chief Judge Abdul Kadir Sulaiman announced that he was "shocked" by the turn of events that required this matter to be aired in public. Judge Bhagwat announced that she would recuse herselF from Charge 1 deliberations; her decision was accepted by the Court, and she left the Chambers.

Defense Counsel then proceeded to argue that the Tribunal lacked jurisdiction to consider the actions of the President and Prime Minister. The Prosecution anticipated this line of argument and was prepared with its counter-argument and declared that they are prepared to show that war crimes have been committed and deriving its power directly from the people who refuse to be complicit in war crimes, the people will not be silenced and conscience cannot be silenced. Francis Boyle added that complaints had already been filed at the International Criminal Court (ICC) against both Bush and Blair, but that the ICC had refused prosecution. The Tribunal is expected to overrule Defense objection based on jurisdiction and proceed to the trial of President George Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Cynthia McKinney
- Homepage: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=27749

Comments

Display the following 2 comments

  1. Former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair: Iran is the real enemy — propaganda alert
  2. The Planning and Doing of Aggressive War is the Supreme Crime. — Hans B.

Publish

Publish your news

Do you need help with publishing?

/regional publish include --> /regional search include -->

World Topics

Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista

Kollektives

Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World

Other UK IMCs
Bristol/South West
London
Northern Indymedia
Scotland

Server Appeal Radio Page Video Page Indymedia Cinema Offline Newsheet

secure Encrypted Page

You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.

If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

IMCs


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech