Open Letter to Congress -- Dismissal of Case Against Blackwater Contractors Condemned, Groups Unite behind Stop Outsourcing Security Act

NEWS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Dismissal of Case Against Blackwater Contractors Condemned

Congress Must Investigate the Mishandling of Blackwater Case and Enact the “Stop Outsourcing Security Act”, Coalition Groups Agree in an Open Letter to Congress

BACKGROUND

Open Letter to U.S. Congress

    Investigate the Mishandling of Blackwater Case

    Enact the Stop Outsourcing Security Act.

1. Conduct a Congressional investigation into the prosecutorial misconduct of U.S. Attorney Kenneth Kohl and the trial team. Judge Urbina’s decision describes in detail the many times the investigators and prosecutors seemed determined to sabotage the case from the beginning. It is also known that senior officials of the Justice Department did not want this case to go to trial. According to Scott Horton, international law expert and contributor to Harper’s, reported one Congressman who was present at early briefings of the case held on Capitol Hill said the Justice Department prosecutors assigned to the case were behaving like defense lawyers building a case to defend the Blackwater employees, not prosecute them. A Congressional investigation is needed to verify and explain the Justice Department’s actions and motivations in this case.
   
   
2. Our military personnel are bestowed with a special responsibility to use lethal force in the course of their work and are held to a higher standard of conduct as a result, the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). The current trend to outsource military operations to private contractors eliminates that higher standard, resolving it instead through corporate contract provisions and civilian law which is far from the higher standard of conduct implied by the authority to use lethal force. The indictments in this case specifically stated that Blackwater Worldwide, the primary contractor in the matter, had no responsibility for the events, despite the fact that the guards were trained by Blackwater and working according to the “culture” of the firm. Blackwater (Xe Services) must be held accountable for their involvement in this event and other events, and the U.S. Congress should grapple with the shortcoming of current contract law when applied to actors in combat zones using lethal force who would otherwise be subject to the UCMJ.
   
   
3. The U.S. Congress should cancel and cut off all funding of contracts with Blackwater (Xe Services) and with all of their affiliates. This should include all contracts now in effect under the Department of Defense, the Department of State, Homeland Security, The Drug Enforcement Agency, and the CIA. In addition to the above incident, Blackwater and its owner Erik Prince are named in two other Grand Jury investigations involving the company’s possible smuggling of weapons into Iraq and tax evasion. The company may face charges for obstruction of justice related to the shooting incident in Nisour Square. In August of 2008 Rep. Henry Waxman, then chair of the House Oversight and Government reform Committee, called on then candidate Obama to cancel Blackwater’s contracts if elected President. Candidate Hillary Clinton also said that Blackwater contracts should be canceled. We agree with Rep. Waxman when he said, “I don’t see any reason to have a contract with Blackwater. They haven’t lived up to their contract and we shouldn’t be having these private military contracts. We should use our own military.”
   
   
4. This decision also puts the U.S. in breach of its treaty obligations to prosecute this case, which was an international law obligation. Now if the U.S. cannot, for the technical reasons set forth in the ruling, prosecute the case, the U.S. is required to waive the immunity and surrender these individuals to the Iraqi authorities for prosecution. Congress should ensure that our Government satisfies all of our international obligations as they pertain to this case.
   
   
5. Reintroduce and swiftly enact the “Stop Outsourcing Security Act” (known as House Resolution 4102 in the 110th Congress) which cites that a) the United States is increasingly relying on private security contractors, b) one quarter of these contractors are third-party nationals, c) these contractors operate at cross-purposes with our larger mission and undermine the mission, jeopardizing the safety of American troops, d) events such as the Nisour Square massacre have negatively affected the relationship of our country with other countries in those areas, e) security contracts suffer from inadequate oversight, f) Congress does not even have access to security contracts, and g) the use of private security contractors for mission critical functions should be phased out.
   
   The bill required that a) personnel at any United States diplomatic or consular mission in Iraq are provided security services only by Federal Government personnel, b) the military will transition away from the use of private contractors for mission critical or emergency essential functions in all conflict zones in which Congress has authorized the use of force, c) contracts with security contractors shall be open to inspection by Congress, d) no contracts shall be renewed during the transition period unless those companies have a clean record, and e) that the defense department fully document the number and disposition of all security contractors.
   
   When reintroducing this bill, Congress should insure the scope is adequately broad to include recent revelations of “black-ops” CIA activities, and to update it to include regions and operations of relevance today, including domestic and foreign training operations, which is a core-competency of our military and must not be relegated to for-profit firms.