More on KL War Crimes Tribunal.

1.11.2009.

I took the 6.15 commuter train from Seremban to make it to PWTC on Saturday and made it by 8. Thinking there was plenty of time before the 9 o'clock commencement of the second and last day of the Tribunal at Dewan Tun Hussein, I stopped at McDonalds for tea & pancakes (they renamed them "hotcakes"). I needn't have, because when I came to the Dewan they had put up a large spread of food & drinks the length of the  corridor. So I helped myself for the whole duration of the day's proceedings, through morning tea, lunch and afternoon tea. 

While having a break in mid-morning, two of the participants joined me at the stand-up table where I'd parked my tea and cakes, and asked what organization I come from. They were surprisingly surprised that I represented myself. "You are interested in all this ?" came the surprising question. By way of answering I replied "which organization do you represent ?". The two mentioned different organizations. "You wouldn't come on your own ?" I quizzed. The answer was "no". "What do you do, to be interested ?" came the counter-question. I added "we should all be interested, because wars are crimes against humanity." "Do you think all these deliberations will have any effect ?" "Immediately, no. Malaysia is too small, too weak and has short reach to have real impact. But we should all support this, because we have to start somewhere. The school children who came for the Conference - that's  a good start. They are exposed, and they can spread the word ." 

The 7 - strong Tribunal delivered the opinion sought by the KL War Crimes Commission on "whether a Head of State and/or Government can unilaterally exempt itself from complying with any provisions of any International Treaties/Conventions (such as the Geneva Conventions) duly ratified by the State without first abrogating the relevant treaty/convention". A unanimous "No". No surprise in that. But the presentations were, to me, properly conducted, and the arguements both from the petitioners and the presiding Justices were professionally made, the Bench even stopping the petitioners many times to insist that they stayed on path to the pertinent submission, and not stray to unrelated monologues of generalized reporting. This, to me, was acting out the conscience of the people gathered in KL for the 4-day proceedings, to say to the world as loudly as possible that at least here in KL people are making a civilised protest to the manner in which many countries in our modern and "civilised" world are conducting their business. This is a call to account, even in the face of the obviously out-manuvered UN. This is to say clearly that USA cannot be allowed to get away with murder. Its citizens must be made to realize this so that they can call their government to account.

The 4-day Conference, small and weak it may be in comparison to what the UN and USA can conduct, has produced sufficient evidence to support this call for accounting. A few important allegations must be put on record here. 

(1) Democracy is only possible at the national level. Even the loudest champion of democracy, USA, does not practice it fully within its borders.  Pushing for democracy is surely quite different from killing or going to war or lying for democracy. That happened with Iraq. That's happening in Afghanistan and Pakistan. 

(2)The UN is undemocratic. The Security Council is anything but democratic. 

(3)The Iraq war was an illegal invasion of a sovereign nation, waged on false pretences, and outrageously rationalised by otherwise intelligent, sane and civilised personalities in the US, UK, Australia and many in the western governments.

(4)The September 11 attacks on the World Trade Towers of New York should be fully re- investigated. A number of facts must be examined:

  (i) How can the two large airlcrafts be so precise in executing the sharp turns into the towers if the people accused had minimal training ? 

  (ii) How can the two modern towers completely and symmiterically collapse in less than two hours merely from the pennetration of the two unarmed aircrafts ? 

  (iii) Why was Bush, on live tv, totally unsurprised when the "news" were broken to him ? 

 (iv) Why was the report made on the disaster so quickly "completed" ? 

   (v) Is there truth in the early rumours that Israel personnel working in the buildings were told earlier not to come to work on the day of the attack ? 

  (vi) Is there truth in the statement made that a US news reporter televised live said that a third building had also collapsed, when in fact the building, shown live on the background, only started to collapse after the statement was made ? 

There is a lot to be answered on the obvious fraud and hypocracy exhibited by the the US. That it boasts as the leader of the world and the champion of justice looks in dire need of proof right now. 

KL has so far been a lone and quite helpless voice. The world needs to listen anyway. 

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