Bin Laden Sons Say U.S. Violated International Law

WASHINGTON — The adult sons of Osama bin Laden have lashed out at President Obama over their father’s death, accusing the United States of violating its basic legal principles by killing an unarmed man, shooting his family members and disposing of his body in the sea.

The statement said the family was asking why the leader of Al Qaeda “was not arrested and tried in a court of law so that truth is revealed to the people of the world.” Citing the trials of Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milosevic, the statement questioned “the propriety of such assassination where not only international law has been blatantly violated,” but the principles of presumption of innocence and the right to a fair trial were ignored.

“We maintain that arbitrary killing is not a solution to political problems,” the statement said, adding that “justice must be seen to be done.”

The statement, prepared at the direction of Omar bin Laden, a son who had publicly denounced his father’s terrorism, was provided to The New York Times by Jean Sasson, an American author who helped the younger Bin Laden write a 2009 memoir, “Growing Up bin Laden.” A shorter, slightly different statement was posted on a jihadist Web site on Tuesday.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/11/world/asia/11binladen.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

In response to your Freedom of Information request the Central Intelligence Agency does not acknowledge the existence of a Mr. bin Laden and cannot confirm his employment in the years between 1982-2011.

Two wrongs do not make a right, but I actually think we had the authority in this case.

OBL didn't mind arbitrarily killing 3500 people. Suddenly, they give a shit about the law.

But you'd have to give a shit about the facts or read the OP to know that.

I'll just ditto your remarks.

from our government.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/05/201151143347815396.html

They only care about the law, when it suits their need.

many times about his father, he denounced his extremism and I have no idea what his politics are, he lives in Europe as far as I know. But anyone who is concerned about due process doesn't sound like a person with a 'rightwing mindset' to me.

And he is correct about due process. But I can see that due process, like so many other rights we used to take for granted here, especially on the 'left' (no one expected the 'right' to worry about such quaint ideas) is not longer even worth discussing.

None of this is about the person, OBL, it is about the rapid destruction of our rule of law and how willingly Americans have abandoned it, for political purposes.

Then totally forgetting all about them.

You understand, I hope that we are not responsible for deaths caused by insurgents or by Sadam's crumbling military. Anyway, what does that have to do with bin Laden? You are changing the subject (kind of like how Bush did when he invaded Iraq.)

That we just used 9/11 as an excuse to invade Iraq?

We are responsible for most of those deaths because we invaded an innocent country and destroyed its government.

But don't let facts get in your way.

for a long,long time. Even when they had a hand in writing the international law.

nt

there goes the argument that regarding torture "The US doesn't do that" but regarding killing unarmed enemies, "we DO that"... lol

I have a few interviews with him. He seems like a reasonable guy.

Rules are different in war. I'm good with that. Nobody would have batted an eyelash if someone had the chance to shoot Hitler in the eye and took it. Just because this isn't a war of uniforms doesn't mean the rules are different.

If he was resisting arrest, the killing may have been justified.

The Seals; were put in a position of being in an extremely hostile environment directly because of Bin Ladens promotion, support and encouraging the mass killing of innocents and then hiding out in Pakistan, so their survival instincts were acutely attuned to be against anything but total submission.

I feel sorry for Osama Bin Laden's son but his father brought this on himself.

If Bin Laden had followed in the footsteps of Ghandi or MLK he could've brought about the change he was seeking and if still killed as those two were, at least be revered as a Martyr on behalf of humanity instead of having his death celebrated as being against it.

Thanks for the thread, The Northerner.

venues that the SEALs were sent to 'kill, not capture' OBL. That brushes right up against the line of 'war crime' if it does not cross over it in a major way.

There are further reports in Arab media that OBL was executed after being taken into custody. There's no ambiguity there. That is a war crime, whether it was SEALs or the KGB doing it.

as to whether it was a capture or kill, or just a kill mission.

At this point, I'm giving the benefit of the doubt to the U.S.

made this salient point:

Don't you think if Obama had ordered them to capture OBL, that the SEALs could have done it?" (paraphrasing the original comment with the implication that the SEALs were instead ordered to kill him).

If the U.S. government had not changed his story, throwing out the SuperMan OBL 'engaged in a firefight" but cowardly OBL "using his wife as a human shield," I might be willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. Now all I can think is that they're all busy writing CYA memos and leaking their CYA bullshit to the New York Times.

and I mean that in both meanings. Dumb fucking bastards.

They do understand that this wasnt going to happen right? Military Tribunal was the most he would get.

:shrug:

Was it against international law to hide a criminal of such stature in your country for 10 years?

If you can call, you can raise.

Sorry, couldn't help it. :P