The Department of Justice's systematic failure to hold private security contractors operating in Iraq and Afghanistan criminally responsible for acts of excessive violence and abuse has created a dangerous "culture of impunity," a new report finds. Released today by Human Rights First, the report entitled "Private Security Contractors at War: Ending the Culture of Impunity," offers the first comprehensive look at this growing crisis and includes a number of practical recommendations for addressing and correcting this increasingly dangerous situation. The report is based on interviews, court records, government reports, declassified documents and other documentary sources.

The report concludes that existing laws indeed could and should be strengthened and expanded, but that the current legal framework already "covers most criminal misconduct by most contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that arguments to the contrary merely rationalize inaction" by the Justice Department. The Justice Department's failure to allocate sufficient investigative and prosecutorial resources have led private security contractors to feel that they operate in a law-free zone in which systems of criminal accountability are absent, unused or dysfunctional.

"While high profile incidents of contractor abuses like that which occurred at Nisoor Square deservedly draw public outrage at companies like Blackwater, we should also be focusing attention on the Department of Justice for its inaction in investigating and prosecuting these abuses," says Maureen Byrnes, executive director of Human Rights First. The report estimates that there are now at least 35,000 private contractors employed by 181 different companies operating in Iraq alone, comprising the second largest armed security force in the U.S.-led coalition. Driven by the demands of fighting wars in both Afghanistan and Iraq with an all-volunteer military force, the U.S. government has come increasingly to rely on a record number of private contractors to undertake many assignments typically performed by soldiers.

Source: Common Dreams