“Lawyers representing Mr. Rumsfeld and three US Army commanders are set to appear in federal court here Friday in response to a lawsuit charging that the Defense secretary authorized torture and other illegal abuse of military detainees in Afghanistan and Iraq – including at the infamous Abu Ghraib prison.The case is important because it represents an attempt to hold US officials accountable for alleged illegal abuse of Iraqi and Afghan civilians who were never detained as enemy combatants or charged with any crime. But some legal analysts say the suit may be aimed more at shaping public opinion than winning in court because such cases are difficult to pursue.
The Justice Department lawyers representing Rumsfeld have not responded directly to the torture charges. Instead, they are asking Chief US District Court Judge Thomas Hogan to throw the suit out because Rumsfeld is entitled to immunity from lawsuits challenging his official actions as Defense secretary. Chief Judge Hogan has scheduled two hours of argument on the dismissal request.”
Suit by Iraqis and Afghans claims Rumsfeld ordered torture
The suit was brought by the ACLU and Human Rights First.
From the ACLU see:
The Lawsuit Against Donald Rumsfeld Over U.S. Torture Policies
also:
From Human Rights First see:
The Case Against Secretary Rumsfeld
26 Oct 2007: The International Federation of Human Rights, the French League for Human Rights, the Center for Constitutional Rights, and Germany’s European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights filed a suit against Rumsfeld in Paris on the occasion of his arrival there:
“They accuse Rumsfeld of being “personally responsible for authorizing and ordering the carrying out of acts of torture” in the Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq, and the US base in Guantanamo, Cuba, during his time as defense secretary from 2001 to 2006, according to lawyer Patrick Baudouin.
“From the moment Donald Rumsfeld sets foot on French territory, he falls within French jurisdiction with regard to the 1984 New York convention against torture,” said Baudouin.”
According to the article, Germany, Argentina, Sweden and Spain have also filed suits against Rumsfeld, Germany having filed two.
THe FIDH press statement:
DONALD RUMSFELD CHARGED WITH TORTURE DURING TRIP TO FRANCE
23 Nov 2007: The French case has been dismissed:
“A Paris prosecutor has thrown out a complaint against former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld for torture in Iraq and at the U.S. military detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, a lawyer for one of the four groups that filed the case said Friday.
The prosecutor dismissed the case on the grounds that Rumsfeld benefits from immunity, said attorney Patrick Baudoin, president of the International Federation of Human Rights. The organizations that brought the complaint have asked the prosecutor to reconsider.”
accessed 16 Dec 2008: I think this is a different case?:
Handing another defeat to the Bush administration, the US Supreme Court on Monday summarily reversed a federal appeals court decision that had upheld the administration’s restrictive view of detainee rights at the Guantánamo Bay prison camp.
The high court reinstated a lawsuit filed against former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other military officials by four former detainees at Guantánamo. The four men, all British citizens, were held at the camp from 2002 to 2004.
Once released, they filed a lawsuit alleging that they’d been subjected to abuse, torture, and religious discrimination while being held without charge at the US military detention camp in Cuba.
“Government lawyers had argued successfully to a federal appeals court panel that American officials were protected from such lawsuits by qualified immunity. The panel threw the case out in a decision announced in January. “
Supreme Court reinstates detainee suit against Rumsfeld, others
