THREE years ago, the World Tribunal on Iraq (WTI) charged the British government, then under prime minister Tony Blair, and the United States government of George W. Bush with “planning, preparing and waging the supreme crime of a war of aggression in contravention of the United Nations Charter and the Nuremberg Principles”.

The tribunal also charged the two governments with targeting the civilian population of Iraq and civilian infrastructure; using disproportionate force and weapons systems with indiscriminate effects, such as cluster munitions, incendiary bombs, depleted uranium and chemical weapons; subjecting Iraqi soldiers and civilians to torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment; and failing to protect humanity’s rich archaeological and cultural heritage by allowing the looting of museums and historical sites and positioning military bases in culturally and archeologically sensitive locations.

These charges were made after deliberations by the WTI’s 14-member Jury of Conscience, of which I was a member. The jury met in Istanbul from June 24 to 26, 2005, at the end of a series of 20 hearings held in different cities of the world. In Istanbul alone, we heard 54 testimonies from advocates and witnesses from across the world, including Iraq, the US and Britain.

The panel was headed by one of the world’s most distinguished authorities on international law, Professor Emeritus Richard Falk.

Among the recommendations of the jury were “that there be an exhaustive investigation of those responsible for the crime of aggression, war crimes and crimes against humanity in Iraq, beginning with Bush and Blair, those in key decision-making positions in these countries and in the Coalition of the Willing, those in the military chain-of-command who masterminded the strategy for and carried out this criminal war, starting from the very top and going down; as well as personalities in Iraq who helped prepare this illegal invasion and supported the occupiers”.

Though Blair has not been convicted by a court of law like the International Criminal Court in The Hague, the fact that a tribunal “located in the collective conscience of humanity”, representing the citizenry of the world, has charged him with war crimes and crimes against humanity in Iraq should make any peace-loving person sit up and take notice. And yet, the University of Malaya saw fit to invite Blair to deliver the 22nd Sultan Azlan Shah Law Lecture on Aug 1 in Kuala Lumpur.

Have the organisers of the lecture series forgotten that their guest speaker is the initiator (together with Bush) of an unjust, immoral war that has already killed more than 1.2 million people, the vast majority of them civilians, and maimed tens of thousands of others? How could local human rights lawyers and human rights activists, who are quick to react to the slightest human rights transgression in the country, listen to the lecture of a man who helmed a war borne of monstrous lies and monumental deception — a war which because of the huge human carnage and the devastating impact upon an entire nation constitutes the most heinous human rights violation of the 21st century?

It is sad but true that the act of honouring Blair has demeaned the Sultan Azlan Shah Law Lecture series and tarnished the University of Malaya.

DR CHANDRA MUZAFFAR, PresidentInternational Movement for a Just World (JUST)

Source: NST – August 5, 2008