US Training of Death Squads in Iraq? - War Is A Crime .org

working within the country's interior ministry. Iraq's national highway patrol was establishedlargely to stave off insurgent attacks on roadways. But US military officials, interviewed over thelast several days, say they suspect the patrol of being deeply involved in illegal detentions,torture and extrajudicial killings.”But then comes the plausible deniability: “We don't train them, we don't give them equipment,we don't conduct site visits over there. They are just bad, criminal people”, the LA Timesreported a high-ranking US military officer who advises the interior ministry as saying.And then came the admission: “The officials said that in recent months the US has withdrawnfinancial and advisory support from the patrol in an effort to distance the American trainingeffort from what they perceived to be a renegade force.”At the same time, occupation and Iraqi officials were still peddling the line that the killings werebeing carried out by militias “outside” of government control, even though most of those militiasbelong to parties now in the government, such as SCIRI and Dawa.Typical of the spin-doctors was Iraqi human rights minister Nermine Othman, who said shebelieved lower-level interior ministry officials were assisting criminals involved in killing Iraqis:“I think there are many people inside the interior ministry involved with these deaths or givingthe uniforms of colleagues to criminals... These officials are helping the criminals by informingthem on where targeted people are going or where people are living. They are helping them indifferent ways.”Fuller concludes: “Clearly the purpose of stating or implying that unaccountable militias arebehind the extrajudicial executions and/or that sectarian rivalries, especially Shia control of theinterior ministry ... are to blame, is to distance the US from the almost unthinkable ongoingcrimes against humanity.“Comparable disinformation strategies have been employed in every counterinsurgency conflictwith which the US has been involved; it is known as establishing ‘plausible deniability'. Forexample, in Colombia, where the US has been deeply involved for decades, paramilitary deathsquads are invariably described in the media as a third force in the armed conflict, despite thefact that their victims are typically civilian opponents of the government, their members aredrawn directly from serving members of the armed forces and they are only able to operate withthe active complicity of the army (Human Rights Watch: The 'Sixth Division’). In reality, theyfunction as part of a shadow state, which exists to implement policies that must remainunaccountable.”source: http://www.greenleft.org.au/back/2006/661/661p14.htm139