Blackwater Operatives Indicted for Slaughter of Iraqi Civilians

By Jeremy Scahill, TheNation.com. Posted December 9, 2008.

The Nisour Square killings propelled Blackwater to international infamy and sparked demands from the US-installed Iraqi government for Blackwater to be expelled from the country. The Bush administration rejected those calls and in April renewed Blackwater's Iraq contract for another year. Blackwater, the largest US security contractor in Iraq, has worked on a US government contract since August 28, 2003, when it was hired on an initial $27.7 million no-bid contract to protect the head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, Ambassador L. Paul Bremer. To date, Blackwater has been paid over a billion dollars for its "security" work for the State Department.

The shootings on September 16, 2007 were labeled "Baghdad's Bloody Sunday." They occurred shortly after noon when Blackwater forces opened fire on a civilian vehicle in a crowded intersection, killing a young Iraqi medical student, Ahmed al-Rubaie, and his mother, Mahasin. That shooting kicked off fifteen minutes of sustained gunfire, as civilians fled for their lives. Witnesses say the shooting was unprovoked, and according to ABC News, Ridgeway admitted to prosecutors that "'there was no attempt to provide reasonable warning' to the driver of a vehicle that was first targeted." For more than a year, Blackwater has claimed its forces were the victims of an armed ambush. "Among the threats identified were men with AK-47s firing on the convoy, as well as approaching vehicles that appeared to be suicide bombers," Prince claimed in prepared Congressional testimony in October 2007. Prince insisted that "based on everything we currently know, the Blackwater team acted appropriately while operating in a very complex war zone."

The company's claims were rejected by both the US military and the FBI. The military concluded there was "no enemy activity involved," determined that all of the killings were unjustified and labeled the shootings a "criminal event." That investigation found that many Iraqis were shot as they attempted to flee, saying "it had every indication of an excessive shooting." The US military unit that responded to the shootings that day said they were "surprised at the caliber of weapon being used." Two weeks after the massacre, the FBI finally was dispatched to Baghdad.

In November 2007, the first glimpse into the conclusions of the FBI probe emerged in the New York Times, which reported that the federal agents had "found that at least 14 of the shootings were unjustified and violated deadly-force rules in effect for security contractors in Iraq." The report added, "Investigators found no evidence to support assertions by Blackwater employees that they were fired upon by Iraqi civilians," quoting one official as saying, "I wouldn't call it a massacre, but to say it was unwarranted is an understatement." A military investigator "said the F.B.I. was being generous to Blackwater in characterizing any of the killings as justifiable."

While the indictments in the Nisour Square case are significant and historic, there will be substantial legal hurdles for prosecutors, not the least of which is the State Department's move in the immediate aftermath of the shootings to immunize the shooters from prosecution. The Bush administration left the initial investigation to Blackwater's employer, the State Department. Investigators from the department's Diplomatic Security Division offered the Blackwater shooters "limited-use immunity" before questioning them, meaning that their statements and information gleaned from them could neither be used to bring criminal charges against them nor even be introduced as evidence. When the FBI eventually arrived in Baghdad, some of the Blackwater guards involved in the shooting refused to be interviewed, citing promises of immunity from the State Department. The agency also discovered that the crime scene had been severely compromised.

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Jeremy Scahill, an independent journalist who reports frequently for the national radio and TV program Democracy Now!, has spent extensive time reporting from Iraq and Yugoslavia. He is currently a Puffin Writing Fellow at The Nation Institute. Scahill is the author of Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army.

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