New York Times Justice?

The New York Times’ editorialists continue their fishwife crusade to criticize anything in Iraq that they can imagine. And, imagine mostly it is, divorced from facts on the ground or context.

The NYT’s editorial charges about today’s start of Saddam Hussein’s trial: “What we have is a narrow sectarian government, still struggling to come up with a nationally inclusive constitution, that is conducting what looks like a show trial, borrowing noxious elements of Baathist law to speed the way toward an early and politically popular execution.”

“Captain” Ed Morrissey calls them on today’s inanity. “The Times fails to grasp the historical and cultural impact of Saddam's trial, bitching about the details while missing the big picture. At least they're consistent.” Consistently wrong, that is.

In contrast to the Nuremberg Trials after World War II, Saddam’s trial is based on established international procedure. Some criticized the Nuremberg Trials as “victor’s justice”, as the indictments were created ex post facto and were not based on any nation's law. Further, Article 19 of the Nuremberg International Military Tribunal Charter reads: "The Tribunal shall not be bound by technical rules of evidence. It shall adopt and apply to the greatest possible extent expeditious and nontechnical procedure, and shall admit any evidence which it deems to be of probative value. ."

The Case Western Reserve University School of Law has assembled a dozen famous international law experts to evaluate the trial. All are impressive, independent thinkers, with vast experience in international law and war crimes trials. For example, included is the president of the International Human Rights Law Institute, who helped draft the Iraqi court’s statute, and the legal assistant to the judges of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. Their bios are available here. Key documents, FAQ’s, expert debate and public commentary is available at the special website they’ve created.

Here’s what the Case site says about the trial court, the Iraqi Special Tribunal (IST) : “The IST has been called an ‘internationalized domestic court’ since its statute and rules of procedure are modeled upon the U.N. war crimes tribunals for the former Yugoslavia, Rwanda, and Sierra Leone, and its statute requires the IST to follow the precedent of the U.N. tribunals.” The site also points out that Saddam is being tried for crimes committed prior to the U.S. entry in July 2002, so there’s no “victor’s” or ex post facto about the trial.

James Taranto quotes a German judge sitting on U.N. tribunals trying war criminals from former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, who said the world could have set up a special court for Saddam.

The Case Western site answers “why not an international court?”: “Creating a new U.N. ad hoc war crimes tribunal…requires the approval of the U.N. Security Council. Several countries that wield a veto on the Council made it known that they would not vote for an ad hoc tribunal to try Saddam Hussein.”

Taranto also points out a Reuters dispatch that “the trial of Slobodan Milosevic may take another 4 to 5 years”. As Taranto comments, “Saddam Hussein would probably die of old age before he could be executed for his crimes.” For the Iraqis, justice delayed is justice denied.

For the New York Times’ editorialists, an opportunity to display ignorance and cant is not to be missed.