In the lead-up to the US-led invasion of Iraq on March 20, 2003, proponents of the war characterized the Iraqi people as helpless victims of an authoritarian regime. Yet the Iraqi people paid the heaviest price for the invasion. About five lakh people lost their lives, loss of millions homes, and countless civilians suffered abuse by all sides of the conflict.
Then and now, Human Rights Watch urged parties to the conflict to compensate victims and hold perpetrators accountable, but impunity persists.
Soon after the start of the military operation, evidence emerged Violation of the Alliance Laws of War, Coalition forces, including those of the United States and the United Kingdom, naturally dropped thousands of people indiscriminately. Cluster munitions in populated areas and held indiscriminate airstrikes who killed civilians.
The US Army also subdued the prisoners Abu Ghraib and other places of detention subject to abuse, including sexual abuse and humiliation; wrongly hit the protestors, and hired private military contractors who killed and injured dozens of civilians. UK forces He is responsible for the ill-treatment of hundreds of Iraqi detainees, including torture and extrajudicial killings.
After the American invasion, the insurgency not only attacked the American-led military but also iraqi citizen, Al-Qaeda on the rise in Iraq boarded And finally replaced in the Islamic State (ISIS). In 2014, ISIS captured large swathes of Iraq and neighboring Syria and imposed brutal rule war crimes and crimes against humanityand prompted a second US-led invasion, which resulted in Big, regularly undercounts civilian number of casualties,
In October 2019, thousands of Iraqis took to the streets, some demanding repairs to excessive Contested election The political system established after the 2003 invasion. In response, the authorities chose repression over reform, killed over 600 protesters, And hundreds more are disappearing.
For Iraqis, it is past time for meaningful commitments to human rights reform and accountability.
The US and the UK must conduct credible, independent investigations and provide redress for civilian harm by their military forces. A new plan by the US Department of Defense to investigate such civilian casualty incidents is not authorized to look into past cases; This is an unacceptable difference. UK government Requirements Stop interfering with justice as it has done so often in the past when its armed forces have been accused of misconduct.
The Iraqi government must also protect free expression and assembly so that Iraqis can voice grievances and debate the future of their country. The authorities should give priority to the reforms of the judicial sector, reform abusive laws And judicial practicesAnd hold perpetrators of abuse of rights accountable, they should Involved war crimes, crimes against humanityand include the crime of genocide in the country’s criminal code and the International Criminal Court.
This is the only way to address both the problems of Iraq’s past, including the legacy of the US-led invasion, as well as the challenges of its future.