Amnesty International's Stance in regards to the War In Iraq

Essay by monkalilliCollege, UndergraduateA-, June 2006

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Since the beginning of the United States led war on Iraq in 2003, the country has been the centre of a geopolitical nightmare, with responsibility and governance over issues such as humans rights abuse shifted from one authority to another with little chain of accountability present. After the initial goal of removing Saddam Hussein's regime from Iraq was complete the United States was left with the huge problem of maintaining law and order without the physical or administrative infrastructure it was relying on to restructure the country (Daalder, I.H and Lindsay, J.M. 2003). A power vacuum was created with the removal of Hussein and as civilians had no water, electricity or security, anti-American and coalition sentiment boiled over leading to the violent insurgent activities seen over the past two years. Warfare has meant the human rights violations present in the country before its liberation have escalated as the absence of accountable branches of government and numerous fighting parties has allowed human rights violations to go unchecked (Tutunji 2004).

The Coalition Provisional Authority transferred sovereignty to the Iraqi Interim Government in June 2004 amidst violent insurgent attacks on Coalition bases and strong holds and amongst emerging reports of unlawful torture of detainees by United States forces in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantánamo. On the 30th of January 2005 Iraqis voted to elect a 275 member Transitional National Assembly that will draft a permanent constitution in time for the new election at the end of 2005.

Publicly, the United States justified the war on Iraq under the threat of weapons of mass destruction. Yet there are also a number of geopolitical reasons as seen from a historical perspective for the United States to go to war on Iraq according to Mingst (2004) including:

* Regret over not removing Saddam Hussein's regime in the...