Sunday, January 23, 2005

Nuremberg: relevant to Abu Ghraib?

In the LA Times, Human Rights attorney Scott Horton argues that the same principles which led to the conviction of high-ranking Nazis, specifically for abuses of Soviet prisoners of war, apply to the abuses committed in Abu Ghraib. (Read it at Z-Mag.) He is of course, skating on thin ice for comparing American and Nazi abuses, but he is attempting to make the link between the policies which allow for "contemplation" of abuses and the abuses themselves.

At Nuremberg, U.S. prosecutors held German officials accountable for the consequences of their policy decisions without offering proof that these decisions were implemented with the knowledge of the policymakers. The existence of the policies and evidence that the conduct contemplated in them occurred was taken as proof enough.

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