Case law professors help Iraq train new judiciary
Judges who practiced under Saddam Hussein get crash course in international human rights law
June 4, 2004 | For more information: Susan Griffith (216)-368-1004
 Forty-eight defense attorneys from Iraq risked their lives as they traveled by twos in unmarked cars as protection against sniper fire along the war-torn route to Baghdad's airport to reach their flight to the United Arab Emirate of Dubai.
At the end of their journey, they were met by Melissa Waters, a visiting professor at Case Western Reserve University's School of Law and acting director of Case's Frederick K. Cox International Law Center's War Crimes Research Office.
Waters-along with five other international law experts from Canada, Ireland, Scotland, Egypt and the United States-had traveled to Dubai to give these Iraqis, who had practiced law during Saddam Hussein's regime, a crash course on international human rights law.
The human rights course was the second in a series of training sessions, sponsored by the International Legal Assistance Consortium. Michael Scharf, ILAC co-founder and Case professor of law, ILAC's mission is to assist governments in resurrecting their judicial systems and ensuring accountability for atrocities in the aftermath of armed conflicts or political transitions.
Scharf and Mark Ellis, executive director of the International Bar Association, founded the non governmental organization in 2000. It has provided assistance to the nations of Afghanistan, Liberia and East Timor. ILAC receives financial support from the governments of Sweden, Ireland and the United Kingdom. The research arm of ILAC is located in the Frederick K. Cox International Center at the Case School of Law.
Earlier this year, Scharf and other members of the ILAC Board of Directors met in Cairo to develop the human rights training program and manuals for Iraq. The first training session for the judges and prosecutors was held in Dubai in March. The goal of the program is to assist the Iraqi people in making the transition from the old regime to a democratic government that respects the human rights of its citizens.
ILAC plans to hold a dozen training sessions over the next months. Eventually some of the Iraqi lawyers participating in the training sessions will form a group of trainers, who will continue the task of educating the Iraqi legal community about human rights and due process protections.
Scharf, the Cox Center director, will train Iraqi legal professionals in June. Case law professors Jessie Hills and Chip Carter also will participate in future training sessions for the Iraqis.
"It was a life-changing experience," said Waters, who spent April 24-May 1 teaching the Iraqi defense lawyers about basic human rights enjoyed by criminal defendants, such as the right to remain silence, the right to have an attorney and right to protection against torture. The course also addressed key international human rights treaties-the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; the Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights; and the Convention against Torture.
Waters described her days in Dubai as having a window onto Iraq and an outsider's view of her own country.
She spent the week listening to the lawyer's stories of life under Saddam Hussein and under the Coalition Provisional Authority and answering their many questions about American polities in Iraq and the Middle East.
"We had so much to learn from them about the importance of human rights," said Waters.
She described how some participants bore visible scars from the torture that they had suffered under Hussein. One lawyer recounted how he fled Iraq, only to be forced to return several months later when the regime threatened to murder his brother. One of the approximately 10 female lawyers told Waters that the principal at her son's school had demanded that she and her husband register their son in the Baath Party, telling them that if they did not do so, the entire family would be arrested.
Waters added that she emphasized to the Iraqi lawyers that they come from a great historical legal tradition.
"What most people do not know about Iraq is that it is the birthplace of codified law, a legal system used by much of Europe and most of the world," said Waters. Iraq also was one of the founding members of the United Nations and is one of the signers of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well as several major international human rights treaties.
Waters said that she acknowledged to the group that she cannot begin to understand the oppression that they experienced under Hussein, but that she and other international lawyers were eager to help Iraq emerge from this period and rebuild a strong legal system.
At the same time, Waters said that she and other trainers emphasized that the building of a democratic society in Iraq must begin at the grass roots level, and that Iraq's lawyers and judges must play a key role in ensuring that democratic values and human rights take hold in Iraqi society.
Waters said it took some time for the Iraqi lawyers to decide to trust her and the other trainers-initially leery that they were agents for the American and British governments.
As conversations became more frank, many of the Iraqis also shared their frustrations with life in Iraq today under the Coalition Provisional Authority. They told her that while Iraqis initially welcomed America's liberation of the country, their views of Americans had begun to change as they lived through what they described as "daily humiliations" by the CPA. Many of the lawyers complained that under the CPA, Iraqis do not enjoy many of the rights that they had been learning about over the course of the week.
"At first I took some of these complaints with a grain of salt," Waters said.
But on her last day in Dubai, the news broke that terrible incidents of prisoner abuse by Americans had taken place at Abu Ghraib Prison. "I was absolutely devastated, and I just wept," Waters said. She was struck by the fact that some of the prisoners in the photographs could have been any one of these lawyers, innocently swept up in a military raid in their neighborhoods.
"That last day, I did not want to face them," said Waters. "As an American, in that moment, what credibility did I have to teach the Iraqis anything about human rights?"
Just before returning to the United States, she encountered an elderly Iraqi lawyer who had become a friend over the course of the week, "I have learned much this week," the Iraqi told her. "Governments-the Iraqi government, the American government-all do bad things to people. But I have learned that American people and Iraqi people are different-we are not our governments."
Called "Miss Melissia" by the group, Waters said over the course of the week she could begin to see how the concept of democracy had started to take shape for these lawyers.
"I spent a lot of time thinking about what makes America different from countries like Iraq," said Waters. "The answer is our tremendously strong human rights and civil rights tradition that is so well-entrenched in the U.S. Constitution."
Waters said that her week with the Iraqi lawyers impressed upon her how precious human rights are, how fortunate Americans are to enjoy these rights, and how easily these rights can be lost.
About Case Western Reserve University
Case is among the nation's leading research institutions. Founded in 1826
and shaped by the unique merger of the Case Institute of Technology and Western
Reserve University, Case is distinguished by its strengths in education, research,
service, and experiential learning. Located in Cleveland, Case offers nationally
recognized programs in the Arts and Sciences, Dental Medicine, Engineering,
Law, Management, Medicine, Nursing, and Social Work. http://www.case.edu.
|
