28.05.2008 - Source: Amnesty International

Abuses by private military and security guards (killing of civilians, impunity according to Order 17 and its abolition) ("Annual Report 2008") [ID 23523]

"Foreign armed guards employed by private military and security firms killed civilians. Security firms were immune from prosecution according to Order 17 issued in 2004 by Paul Bremer, then head of the Coalition Provisional Authority. However, following a major incident in September involving the US-based Blackwater company, the Iraqi government introduced draft legislation that would revoke Order 17.

On 16 September, 17 Iraqi civilians were killed and 27 injured when Blackwater security guards opened fire at a busy crossroads in Baghdad’s al-Mansour district. The company said that its guards had fired in self-defence but witnesses and the Iraqi government alleged that the guards had fired first. Both the Iraqi authorities and the US State Department announced that they were conducting investigations and in November the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) concluded that the shooting had been unjustified. The company said that any of its guards guilty of wrongdoing would be held to account. The Iraqi government demanded that Blackwater pay US$8 million in compensation to each of the families of the 17 people killed."

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