When the US lobs a missile at someone and kills them, who decides if it is in accordance with international law?
At the moment no one, but that could change in UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Ben Emmerson gets his way. Emmerson, a top London lawyer, is pushing for the US to hand over video footage of all of its assassinations to the UN for examination.
“We can’t make a decision on whether it is lawful or unlawful if we do not have the data,” noted Emmerson, saying that the issue of drone killings will be at the top of the UN human rights agenda until some method of transparency is achieved.
Emmerson also lashed the Obama Administration for “the position that it will neither confirm nor deny the existence of the drone program, whilst allowing senior officials to give public justifications of its supposed legality in personal lectures and interviews.”
Pakistan in particular has objected to the hundreds of drone strikes launched against its territory by the US, arguing that it violates their sovereignty as well as undermining support for their own war on militancy. The US has ruled out ending the strikes.
When a nation becomes addicted to killing, it will be hard for them to change. And when killing those that don't agree with our point of view becomes the standard, how can a nation expect to lead by example? The rampant killing with guns of innocent persons in the USA is a direct result of the public policy of their national government.
Ruh Roh… this is like the pedophile who records the crime for posterity and then rues the day when the law uses those same videos to put them away for a long time. Oh…wait…you mean those .wmv files that were mistakenly destroyed by some malcontent in Rome, NY? Good luck getting your UN hands on them…the government (and military) doesn't answer to the US citizens, much less the UN.
Need more drones. Works so well.
Why doesn't Pakistan just shoot down the drones? It's not like they are stealth or flying at speeds faster then SAM missiles.
That would force the US to stop its indiscriminent killing sprees.