VII. On the Violation of Human Rights in Other Countries
The United States has a notorious record of trampling on the sovereignty of and violating human rights in other countries.
The invasion of Iraq by American troops has produced the biggest human rights tragedy and the greatest humanitarian disaster in modern world. It was reported that since the invasion in 2003, 660,000 Iraqis have died, of which 99 percent were civilians. That translates into a daily toll of 450. According to the Los Angeles Times, the number of civilian deaths in Iraq has exceeded one million. A report from the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) revealed that about one million Iraqis were homeless, half of whom were children. There were 75,000 children living in refugee camps or makeshift shelters. About 760,000 pupils could not go to school. According to media report, guards of Blackwater, a security service company with State Department background, shot dead 17 Iraqis for no reason on September 16, 2007, and it was given immunity by the State Department (The China Press, October 31, 2007). Investigation by the Iraqi government found that Blackwater guards had killed 21 Iraqis and injured 27 others before that. State Department investigation showed that Blackwater was involved in 56 shooting cases in Iraq in 2007. A U.S. Congress report said the company was involved in nearly 200 shooting cases in Iraq since 2005, and 84 percent of them were random shooting. The Associated Press reported that an Apache gunship opened fired on October 23, 2007 at a group of people suspected of planting roadside bombs near Samarra in north Baghdad, killing at least 11 people, including 6 Iraqi civilians. But local police and eyewitnesses said the number of civilians killed was 14 (The Associated Press, Baghdad, October 23, 2007). Commanders of the 1st Battalion of the 501st Infantry Regiment made a baiting program to kill more insurgents, in which weapons were dropped as a bait, and if someone picked them up, the snipers would shot them. Many Iraqi civilians were killed in this way (Los Angeles Times, October 5, 2007; Washington Post, September 24, 2007).
U.S. troops have killed many innocent civilians in the anti-terrorism war in Afghanistan. The Washington Post reported on May 3, 2007 that as many as 51 civilians were killed by U.S. soldiers in one week (Karzai Says Civilian Toll is No Longer Acceptable, The Washington Post, May 3, 2007). An Afghan human rights group said in a report that U.S. marine unit fired indiscriminately at pedestrians, people in cars, buses and taxis along a 10-mile stretch of road in Nangahar province on March 4, 2007, killing 12 civilians, including one infant and three elders (New York Times, April 15, 2007).