Headline from the BBC Online:
Spain has issued an international arrest warrant for three US soldiers accused of causing the death of a TV cameraman during the Iraq war.
During the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the Palestine Hotel housed the majority of foreign journalists on assignment in Baghdad. In Iraq working for Spain’s Telecinco television station, Jose Couso, 37, was one of those journalists. He died in early April 2003 when a US tank crew fired at the Palestine in retaliation for small-to-mid arms fire, tank crewmen said originated at the hotel.
More below:
The US Military has admitted its tank crew fired at the hotel but has cleared Sgt. Thomas Gibson, Cpt. Philip Wolford and Lt-Col Philip De Camp of all blame for the incident.
Working for Reuters at the time, Ukrainian cameraman Taras Portsyuk was also killed in the direct blast. Three other staff members of Reuter’s were injured in the blast as well.
Here’s the point of contention:
Footage of the incident on the day before the fall of the regime of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein - which did not record any fire from the hotel - was witnessed around the world.
A US review of the incident ruled that the use of force by the tank was justified, but the family of Mr Couso decided to press criminal charges through the Spanish courts.
In December 2006, Spain’s Supreme Court ordered the murder investigation re-opened, overturning a previous ruling indicating that the Spanish legal system was not competent to try the three US soldiers.
Judge Santiago Pedraz issued an international search-and-capture order for the three tank crewmembers, while demanding prosecutors also investigate whether it’s possible to freeze the soldier’s U.S. based assets in case of compensation claims in the future.
Apparently, Spain’s justice department is no stranger to taking on international cases. However, whether or not they have the standing to prosecute this particular case successfully remains to be seen.
The BBC's Danny Wood in Madrid says Spain's justice system is accustomed to taking on controversial international cases.
In 1998, Spain attempted to extradite Chile's former leader, Augusto Pinochet, while he was in London.
The British government turned down that request, and the US authorities are very unlikely to co-operate with this latest international arrest warrant issued by a Spanish judge, our correspondent says.
But four years after the death of Mr Couso, his family has achieved a symbolic victory, he says.
Those three tank crewmen are the only ones in the world who know why they fired on the Palestine Hotel that day in April 2003. Where the fire came from that was directed at the tanks is also a mystery.
I don’t like what this war has done to the preeminent defenders of freedom on earth. Whether it’s one of our tanks lobbing shells at crowded hotels, using white phosphorus rounds in Fallujah, torture at Abu Ghairib and Guantanamo Bay, or revenge rape and murder of innocent Iraqi citizens in Haditha, I’m getting scared. U.S. Military leaders are either promoting this sort of abhorrent behavior or turning a blind, calculated eye to what’s really going down on the Iraqi battlefields. Mistakes happen, I know. But with this godforsaken occupation, they've come one right after another, and it's got to stop.
It all starts with leadership and I don't believe everything can be blamed on Rumsfeld's failed reign as defense secretary. Our top military brass are supposed to be the best in the world -- yet atrocity after atrocity -- has happened on their watch, and there's been very little or no accountability.
The deaths of Jose Couso and Taras Portsyuk should be re-opened here in the states, and the standing rules-of-engagement exposed in a U.S. Military court. Let the chips fall where they may.
We need our troops home... yesterday.