New human rights fears in Iraq

By Tom Geoghegan
BBC News Online, at Amnesty, London

A figure who became the source of Amnesty International campaigns for 20 years has been toppled.

But the post-Saddam Hussein era and the end to his barbarity has brought with it new fears for the human rights group.

Amnesty has urged the US not to transfer Iraqi prisoners to Cuba

Amnesty is optimistic that the estimated 7,000 Iraqi prisoners of war are being fairly treated.

But it fears the Iraqi people are not being protected by the military, amid a lawlessness that it predicted and forewarned of.

At a press conference at its central London office on Tuesday, Amnesty launched a document aimed at emphasising to the US and the UK their human rights responsibilities in Iraq.

Speaking to 25 journalists crammed into a small upstairs room, Amnesty International Secretary General, Irene Khan, outlined the key points in the 16-page report, called Iraq: Responsibilities of the Occupying Power.

Ms Khan told the news conference: "There seems to have been more efforts to protect the oil wells than the citizens.

"And the first efforts to preserve law and order will not have inspired confidence among the Iraqi people."

Looting and violence had caused many Iraqis to be displaced, with insufficient efforts to restore order, she said.

Human rights was a selective and convenient cover to undertake military action

Irene Khan
Secretary General
Amnesty

Her comments were supported by claims which emerged from another organisation, Human Rights Watch, on Tuesday.

It says dozens of civilians have been killed in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk since 10 April, in clashes between armed civilians and Baath Party officials.

Ms Khan said: "Human rights was a selective and convenient cover to undertake military action and now we feel it's time for those occupying Iraq to ensure human rights are at the centre of reconstruction efforts."

Corruption fears

She called for United Nations human rights monitors to immediately begin work in the country to help investigate any past or present abuses.

And she expressed fears that Iraq police officers returning to work could have been guilty of abuses or corruption under the old regime.

The days of torture under Saddam have gone

Similarly, Amnesty claims members of the interim Iraqi administration could be perpetrators of human rights abuses in the past.

Amnesty's fears are based on reports because their first representative only arrived in Iraq earlier on Tuesday.

This delay - caused by efforts to establish security - meant reporters asking Amnesty about prisoners of war figures and imprisonment conditions were instead referred to the Red Cross.

'No concern'

Amnesty is also urging the US not to transfer any prisoners of war to its camp in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

Hundreds of Afghan detainees there have been given the status of "unlawful combatants", instead of POWs under the Geneva Convention, provoking outrage about the denial of their human rights.

But Amnesty's senior legal director Claudio Cordone told BBC News Online that no repeat of Guantanamo Bay was expected.

Mr Cordone said: "I don't expect them to take any prisoners of war there. They have the camps they need in Iraq and in neighbouring countries."

He added: "The prisoners of war are not a source of concern to us."

The Amnesty document also sets out the legal obligations of the US and the UK in restoring order and upholding civil rights.

Ms Khan warned the coalition it had limited powers to make the "radical reforms" needed to Iraqi legislation in respect of human rights.

But she added: "We're not calling for the end of the occupation, just as we didn't call on the UK and the US to go into Iraq, but now they're in Iraq, they must carry out their responsibilities."