WASHINGTON: US prosecutors have sent letters to six Blackwater security guards involved in a Baghdad shooting last year in a move that could lead to groundbreaking criminal indictments, The Washington Post reported yesterday.
Bodyguards from US security firm Blackwater Worldwide opened fire in a traffic jam last September, killing 17 Iraqi civilians while escorting a convoy of US diplomats through the capital under a contract with the State Department.
The incident enraged the Iraqi government, which called it a “massacre” and demanded the right to try the guards in Iraq. Iraqis were further upset in April when the State Department renewed Blackwater’s contract to protect its embassy staff.
The question of where and how the contractors can be tried has yet to be publicly resolved, and the incident set off debate in Washington on the use of contractors in war.
The Post, citing three sources close to the case, said prosecutors are still considering evidence after a 10-month FBI investigation of the shooting. The sources said any charges against Blackwater employees probably would come under the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act.
Iraqi government spokesman Ali Al-Dabbagh told a news conference yesterday: “The Iraqi government stresses that Blackwater has committed a crime and the Iraqi government retains the right to prosecute the company”.
He said US civilian contractors would not be granted immunity from Iraqi law after the end of this year, when a UN mandate for the US force in Iraq is replaced by a new bilateral deal Washington is negotiating with Baghdad.
The guards from the North Carolina-based private security firm say they acted lawfully and fired in self-defense, but an Iraqi government investigation said there was no provocation.
The Post said the “target letters” sent to the Blackwater employees offer them a chance to contest evidence and present their own version of the incident. Such letters often are a step taken before indictments are issued.
