Voice of America
10 Jul 2020, 08:15 GMT+10
GENEVA, Switzerland - A U.S. drone strike that killed Iran's top general, Qassem Soleimani, at Baghdad International Airport in January is a violation under international law, according to a U.N. report Thursday.
Investigator Agnes Callamard said more than 100 nations have an active military drone inventory and about a dozen allegedly have deployed armed drones for the use of force, such as targeted killings.
The uncontrolled proliferation of armed drones poses a threat to international peace, she added, and the U.S. killing of Soleimani has elevated the dangers. She noted the U.S. carried out its attack without first obtaining Iraq's consent, thereby violating Iraq's territorial integrity.
"That is a significant and troubling new development," Callamard said. "It is the first known incident in which a state invokes self-defense as justification for an attack against a government official outside a declared armed conflict.
"No evidence has been provided that General Soleimani specifically was planning an imminent attack against U.S. interests, particularly in Iraq, for which immediate action was necessary and would have been justified."
Days after the drone attack, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Soleimani had "planned a broad, large-scale attack against American interests, and those attacks were imminent."
Callamard countered that the U.S. self-defense argument is just a tipping point. She said Turkey has fully accepted the U.S. doctrine and other countries, including Britain, have expressed their support for it.
She told VOA she fears an increasing number of countries are likely to justify armed drone attacks by invoking the war on terror.
"So, my response to you is that if I were in the shoes of a government or member of the government who will be deemed a terrorist by the U.S., at this point, I would be wary and extra careful," she said.
Callamard submitted her report to every country mentioned early in May. She said the U.S. has not responded.
Earlier this week, State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said, "It takes a special kind of intellectual dishonesty to issue a report condemning the United States for acting in self-defense while whitewashing General Soleimani's notorious past as one of the world's deadliest terrorists."
The Iranian ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, Esmaeil Baghael Hamanch, called Washington's assassination of Soleimani brutal, arbitrary, unjust and unlawful.
He told the U.N. council the United States had committed an international crime of grave nature and must be held to account.
Get a daily dose of Albuquerque Express news through our daily email, its complimentary and keeps you fully up to date with world and business news as well.
Publish news of your business, community or sports group, personnel appointments, major event and more by submitting a news release to Albuquerque Express.
More InformationWASHINGTON, DC The man who struck down three U.S. Capitol Police officers with a fire extinguisher during last week's storming ...
WASHINGTON, DC - A Utah man has been charged with breaking into the U.S. Capitol last week wearing a bullet-proof ...
Provided by Xinhua | &A 6.2-magnitude earthquake has killed 35 people in Indonesia, injuring 637 and displacing around 15,000 people.JAKARTA, ...
Five United Nations peacekeepers lost their lives on Wednesday, 4 in Mali and one in the Central African Republic. 4 ...
BEIJING, China - A team of 10 World Health Organisation (WHO) experts arrived in Wuhan on Thursday to investigate the ...
WASHINGTON, DC - U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday became the second U.S. president in history to be impeached.Democrats were ...
NEW YORK, New York - Wall Street ended the week on a negative note Friday with all the major indices ...
WASHINGTON, DC - U.S. President-elect Joe Biden on Thursday (local time) announced a USD 1.9 trillion plan to revive the ...
SYDNEY, NSW, Australia - Stocks were mixed on Friday despite U.S. President-elect Joe Biden announcing a $1.9 trillion stimulus package ...
BEIJING, Jan. 15 (Xinhua) -- China continued to see a generally stable housing market in December, with home prices in ...
NEW YORK, New York - U.S. stocks fell on Thursday following data showing a larger-than-expected increase in weekly unemployment claims, ...
DUBLIN, Ireland an. 12 (Xinhua) -- A total of 84,309 units of new private cars were sold in Ireland in ...