Center for Constitutional Rights – 2010-08-31 00:16:52
http://www.ccrjustice.org/newsroom/press-releases/rights-groups-file-challenge-targeted-killing-u.s.
Rights Groups File Challenge To Targeted Killing By US
Vincent Warren / Center for Constitutional Rights
Will the US government get away with the power to target and kill individuals, including US citizens, far from any armed conflict and without charge, trial, or judicial process? This is the central question in Al-Aulaqi v. Obama, a lawsuit CCR and the ACLU filed today in federal court.
We recently had a small victory in our efforts to contest the legality of a kill-list maintained by the US government. On August 3, 2010, we wrote to tell you that we filed a lawsuit against the US Treasury Department and the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to dispute the constitutionality of a licensing scheme that requires lawyers to seek government permission to represent individuals the same government intends to kill.
The government put US citizen Anwar Al-Aulaqi on a kill-list, then added him to an OFAC list last month, making it a crime for CCR and the ACLU to challenge the government’s authority to kill him. On August 4, the day after we filed our lawsuit against OFAC, OFAC granted CCR and the ACLU a license to provide pro bono legal services to Anwar Al-Aulaqi’s father Nasser Al-Aulaqi as representative of his interests.
Although we obtained a license, we will continue to pursue our challenge to the OFAC regulations because it is unconstitutional to require lawyers to ask the government for permission to challenge the legality of its conduct.
Today, CCR and ACLU have filed a lawsuit on behalf of Nasser Al-Aulaqi against President Obama, CIA Director Leon Panetta, and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates.
The lawsuit aims to stop the US government from carrying out a “targeted killing” far away from any armed conflict, without due process, and where there is not an imminent threat and lethal force is not necessary. Anwar Al-Aulaqi has not been charged with any crime, but has reportedly been the target of several strikes in Yemen, a country in which the US is not engaged in war but where air strikes have caused civilian casualties and popular protests, and where he is believed to be in hiding.
Outside the context of armed conflict (Yemen is almost 2000 miles away from Iraq and Afghanistan), targeted killing is permissible under international law only as a last resort and in the face of a truly imminent threat – and then only because the imminence of the threat makes judicial process infeasible. Outside these narrow circumstances, targeted killing amounts to the imposition of a death sentence without charge or trial.
The government’s authorization to kill US citizen Al-Aulaqi far from any armed conflict violates his Fourth Amendment right to be free from excessive force and his Fifth Amendment right to due process before being deprived of life and to have notice of the criteria that make a person targetable for death. It also constitutes an extrajudicial killing in violation of international law.
Regardless of the government’s allegations against Anwar al-Aulaqi or any person suspected of wrongdoing, authorizing the death of individuals on secret standards, far from any conflict zone, and outside of any legal process not only violates the Constitution and international law, but seriously undermines our collective safety.
The executive should not be able to act as judge, jury, and executioner, substituting its own bureaucratic process for the due process required by law. The US government should not be able to claim the sweeping authority to carry out extrajudicial killings of US citizens or other individuals far from any actual battlefield, nor make the dangerous contention that the entire world is now a battlefield.
Such assertions of power will inevitably target innocent people — the US government has a long and well-documented history of wrongly accusing both citizens and foreigners of terrorism and of being a threat to national security-and kill scores of innocent bystanders, undermining the rule of law and effectively creating a war without boundaries or end.
If the government suspects individuals of criminal activity, they should be charged and tried in a court of law, not put to death on the government’s say-so.
We will keep you updated on this important case. To read more, visit our case page.
Thank you for your continued support.
Vincent Warren is Executive Director of the Center for Constitutional Rights
For more information on the case, including fact sheets and legal papers, visit: www.aclu.org/targetedkillings and ccrjustice.org/targetedkillings.
The ACLU is our nation’s guardian of liberty, working daily in courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties that the Constitution and laws of the United States guarantee everyone in this country. Visit www.aclu.org.
The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Founded in 1966 by attorneys who represented civil rights movements in the South, CCR is a non-profit legal and educational organization committed to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change.
Targeted Assassinations – The Case Details from Center for Constitutional Rights on Vimeo.
CCR and the ACLU v. OFAC & Al-Aulaqi v. Obama
Synopsis
On August 3, 2010, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit against the US Treasury Department and the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to challenge the legality and constitutionality of the licensing scheme that requires them to obtain a license in order to file a lawsuit concerning the government’s asserted authority to carry out targeted killings of individuals, including US citizens, far from any battlefield.
On August 30, 2010, CCR and the ACLU filed suit on behalf of Dr. Nasser Al-Aulaqi against President Obama, CIA Director Panetta, and Defense Secretary Gates, challenging their decision to authorize the targeted killing of his son, US citizen Anwar Al-Aulaqi, in violation of the Constitution and international law.
Status
CCR and the ACLU filed suit against the Department of Treasury and OFAC on August 3, 2010 and filed suit on behalf of Nasser Al-Aulaqi against President Obama, CIA Director Panetta, and Defense Secretary Gates, on August 30, 2010. Both cases are pending in the US District Court for the District of Columbia.
Description
In early July 2010, CCR and the ACLU were retained by Nasser al-Aulaqi, the father of US citizen Anwar Al-Aulaqi, to bring a lawsuit in connection with the government’s decision to authorize the death of his son, who was placed on kill lists maintained by the CIA and the US military’s Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) earlier this year.
On July 16, 2010, however, the Secretary of the Treasury labeled Anwar al-Aulaqi a “specially designated global terrorist,†which makes it a crime for lawyers to provide representation for his benefit without first seeking a license from OFAC. CCR and the ACLU sought a license, but after the government’s failure to grant one despite the urgency created by an outstanding authorization for Al-Aulaqi’s death, CCR and ACLU brought suit challenging the legality and constitutionality of the licensing scheme as applied to the representation they seek to provide. CCR and the ACLU have not had contact with Anwar Al-Aulaqi.
The OFAC requirements generally make it illegal to provide any service, including legal representation, to or for the benefit of a designated individual. A lawyer who provides legal representation for the benefit of a designated person without getting special permission is subject to criminal and civil penalties.
In their lawsuit, CCR and the ACLU charge that OFAC has exceeded its authority by subjecting uncompensated legal services to a licensing requirement, and that OFAC’s regulations violate the First Amendment, the Fifth Amendment, and the principle of separation of powers. The lawsuit asks the court to invalidate the regulations and to make clear that lawyers can provide representation for the benefit of designated individuals without first seeking the government’s consent.
The underlying representation that CCR and the ACLU seek to provide Nasser Al-Aulaqi would challenge the government’s decision authorizing the CIA and JSOC to target and kill his son, who is currently hiding in Yemen, without charge, trial or any form of due process.
While the government can legitimately use lethal force against civilians in certain circumstances outside of a judicial process, the authority contemplated by senior Obama administration officials is far broader than what the Constitution and international law allow.
Under international human rights law, lethal force may be used in peacetime only when there is an imminent threat of deadly attack and when lethal force is a last resort. A program in which names are added to a list though a secret bureaucratic process and remain there for months at a timeplainly goes beyond the use of lethal force as a last resort to address imminent threats, and accordingly goes beyond what the Constitution and international law permit.
Moreover, targeting individuals for killing who are suspected of crimes but have not been convicted — without oversight, due process or disclosed standards for being placed on the kill list — also poses the risk that the government will erroneously target the wrong people. Since 9/11, the US government has detained thousands men as terrorists, only for courts or the government itself to discover later that the evidence was wrong or unreliable and release them.
For additional information see:
• CCR Press Release
o Rights Groups File Challenge To Targeted Killing By US
• CCR Legal Director Bill Quigley
o Why We Sued to Represent Muslim Cleric Aulaqi
Timeline
On July 23, 2010, CCR and the ACLU submitted an urgent request to OFAC for a license authorizing them to continue to provide pro bono legal services to Nasser Al-Aulaqi as representative of the interests of Anwar Al-Aulaqi.
On August 3, 2010, CCR and the ACLU filed suit against the Department of Treasury and OFAC challenging the legality and constitutionality of the licensing scheme requiring them to obtain a license to continue their representation of Nasser Al-Aulaqi as representative of the interests of Anwar Al-Aulaqi.
On August 4, 2010, OFAC granted CCR and the ACLU a license to represent Nasser Al-Aulaqi.
On August 30, 2010, CCR and the ACLU filed suit on behalf of Dr. Nasser Al-Aulaqi against President Obama, CIA Director Panetta, and Defense Secretary Gates, challenging their decision to authorize the targeted killing of his son, US citizen Anwar Al-Aulaqi, in violation of the Constitution and international law.
On August 30, 2010, CCR and the ACLU also filed a Motion for a Preliminary Injunction asking the court to declare that it is illegal for the government to kill Anwar Al-Aulaqi, unless he is found to present a concrete, imminent threat, and there are no other means besides lethal force that could be used to stop the threat.
Attached Files
o Al-Aulaqi v. Obama
o Complaint
o PI Motion
o Wizner Declaration with Exhibits
o Declaration of Dr. Nasser Al-Aulaqi
o CCR and the ACLU v. OFAC
o Complaint_8-3-10
o TRO Application_8-3-10
o PI Motion_8-3-10
o TRO & PI Memo in Support_8-3-10
o Wizner Decl_8-3-10
