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Ritter: U.S. should
mind policy
Scott Ritter, former U.N. weapons inspector, speaks at
Convocation Thursday about the importance of following
international law.
ERIN MADSON / UNIVERSITY JOURNAL
By MARC DOTSON
UNIVERSITY JOURNAL
Scott Ritter, former major and U.N. weapons inspector
in Iraq, said the United States must stop its unilateral
foreign policy and “resurrect the foundation of
legality” at the Convocation and open forum Thursday.
Ritter said the United States will set a dangerous precedent
if it acts unilaterally outside the framework of international
law.
“We are shredding the fabric of international law
that holds the world together,” which has prevented
conflicts between China and Taiwan, India and Pakistan
and North Korea and South Korea, Ritter said.
“Once we say international law is no longer relevant
to the United States, what does that say to the rest of
the world?” he added.
The United States has defied international law as set
forth in the United Nations Charter on a number of issues,
Ritter said, including the United States’ policy
of regime removal.
“... It puts us in the same category as Saddam Hussein
as a violator of international law,” Ritter said.
He resigned from the weapons inspection because the United
States was using the investigation as a “vehicle
for espionage,” he said.
“The problem . . . was the information we were gaining
access to was too valuable for those seeking regime removal,”
he said.
Ritter said he does not give Saddam Hussein “a clean
bill of health.”
He added, “But we cannot hold Saddam Hussein accountable
if we ourselves are unable to run a clean
prosecution,” Ritter said.
Ritter also said the United States will never be able
to run a clean prosecution while regime removal comes
before disarmament.
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U.N. resolutions have placed economic sanctions
on Iraq until it is found to be in compliance with disarmament,
Ritter said, but George Herbert Walker Bush’s administration
said sanctions would stay in force until Hussein was removed,
even if U.N. resolutions were fulfilled.
“Do we honestly believe that the international community
wakes up every morning and collectively takes a stupid pill,
that we’re the only ones blessed with insight into
how the world works?” Ritter said.
He said the Constitution puts forth “that (we are)
a nation of laws. That is how we treat and govern ourselves
— within the framework of law.”
He also said through the Constitution, international agreements
have the same force of law for the United States’
actions outside the country.
“But if we corrupt the process . . . the law itself
is no longer viable,” he said, adding that the United
States has the chance to regain international legality.
“We can regain the integrity of the process, resume
the prosecution of Saddam Hussein,” he said.
There are times when “we must go to war to defend
our nation, to defend the world that we live in,”
Ritter said.
He added that if war is engaged half-hazardly, the war on
terror could escalate into a clash of civilizations: the
West versus Islamic fundamentalism.
“Baghdad is as big as Los Angeles and . . . as modern
. . . populated by 5 million citizens, defended by over
50,000 fanatics,” Ritter said.
If the United States moves to remove Saddam Hussein, “we
will have to take Baghdad, and it will be bloody fighting
indeed: building by building, block by block, neighborhood
by neighborhood,” he said.
“We will kill them by the tens of thousands and they
will kill us by the thousands,” he added.
Ritter said there is an obligation to make sure that “before
we send out soldiers ... off to fight, kill and be killed,”
that every potential to resolve the conflict peacefully
has been exhausted.
He said war must be undertaken only for the right reason
and the right cause.
Ritter said the United States must run a clean investigation
before committing to war.
“If (Saddam) cheats, he’s guilty,” Ritter
said. “If he’s guilty, he’s going to die
... I would be the first to sign up for that war because
that would be a just war.”
Citizens must hold their government accountable, he said,
“not because it’s the unpatriotic thing to do,
but because it’s the most patriotic thing we can do.”
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On liberty
Club promotes expression
guaranteed in Bill of Rights
By MELISSA NIELSEN
UNIVERSITY JOURNAL
By ALISON DAY
UNIVERSITY JOURNAL
SUU students are standing up for their right to free expression
and questioning efforts to limit basic civil liberties guaranteed
by the First Amendment, which according to a new poll, have
lost significant support since Sept. 11, 2001.
The newly formed Student Association for Free Expression will
submit a bill for charter to the C&O Assembly Tuesday as
it works to unite students on issues related to First Amendment
rights.
The bi-partisan group was formed after a series of debates in
and out of SUU classes in which students and professors discussed
free-speech issues.
Students in the group argue that the majority of those offended
by an illustration of a condom-sheathed banana in the University
Journal’s Sept. 5 edition were administrators, advertisers
and people who donate money to the university.
Most students, they contend, were not offended. That poses the
question of who has the right to dictate what goes into the
student newspaper.
Mark Justice, a senior political science major from Huntington
and president of the organization, said contrary to what some
may think, the genesis of the organization “has nothing
to do with sex or with a banana and a condom.”
“We would be fighting just as hard for any other issue
that calls to question student rights,” Justice said.
Although the controversy began with the student newspaper, it
goes beyond that, he said.
“It doesn’t matter the group; it could be the Journal,
the senate, LDSSA, or the Earth Club,” Justice said.
Stephen Roberds, professor of political science, said many of
his students had commented on how good the student newspaper
was at the beginning of the year, but after the paper apologized
on Sept. 12 for offending readers with the photo illustration,
the paper’s coverage of controversial issues has dwindled.
“Newspapers by very definition are supposed to be controversial,”
Roberds said. “They are not meant to be popular; they’re
meant to be informational.”
Paul Husselbee, managing director of the University Journal,
said the paper’s student editors are feeling the heat
of outside influences.
“Has there been a chilling effect on free speech in the
Journal due in part to the heavy-handedness of
the response from some people who believe they have the right
to censor student expression? Yes — no question,”
Husselbee said.
At the same time, Husselbee defended the editors.
“It’s real easy to be so critical when your only
view of the situation is from the cheap seats,” he said.
“Some critics are not close enough to the situation to
make accurate judgments. They need to know that they don’t
know the whole truth — yet.”
A new poll commissioned by the First Amendment Center in Arlington,
Va., released last month, found that support for the First Amendment
has eroded significantly since last year’s terrorist attacks.
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Deanna Parker, a junior communication major from West
Valley City, takes a minute to read the Bill of Rights.
Replicas of historic political documents, such as the
U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Independence,
are on display in the Centrum Arena.
ELIZABETH MILLER / UNIVERSITY JOURNAL |
That included a decrease in the percentage of people who believe
that newspapers should publish freely.
The survey also found that more people believe the government
should have the freedom to monitor religious groups in the interest
of national security, and restrictions should be placed on the
academic freedom of professors to criticize government policy
during war.
“History has proven that whenever America is threatened,
civil liberty is threatened,” Roberds said.
He also said that if people question their own First Amendment
rights, they’re looked at as the enemy.
“They’re unpatriotic,” he said.
Thursday’s convocation speaker and former U.N. weapons
inspector Scott Ritter encouraged students to stand up for their
rights as members of a democracy.
i“To function effectively as an American democracy, you
need to be empowered with information so you make the right
decisions,” Ritter said, “To get that information
you must engage in a debate, a dialogue, a discussion.”
“The most patriotic thing you can do as an American citizen
is to criticize the President of the United States,” Ritter
quoted from President Theodore Roosevelt.
During Friday’s diversity discussion, students again expressed
their concern for freedom of expression.
Shanna Hales, a senior sociology major from Duchesne, asked,
“In cases where we cannot even handle diverse thought,
how do we think we can handle bringing more diversity to campus?”
The Student Association for Free Expression plans to demonstrate
and protest any situation where students cannot express their
opinions.
“We don’t care what those opinions are, as long
as students have the right to speak them,” Justice said.
He added, “We condemn any act made by university officials
that would threaten the employment of an advisor or a scholarship
held by a student because they disagree with the administration
on what the best course of action may be with regards to their
club or organization.”
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