On the demise of Gaddaffi...

The internet is awash with the brazen way in which Col. Muammar Ghaddaffi was captured and killed. Video clips of his victors celebrating over his dead body have made many a person wince while others have justified this in equal measure. The UN has called for an investigation into this killing although the demise of Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden in similar extra judicial or after botched judicial proceedings has not raised any significant response.

I have argued elsewhere that however controversial they might be, there are laws governing the treatment of prisoners of war. The development of international humanitarian law and the law of armed conflict and the law in war- jus in bello- was meant to deal with the situations we saw online today(http://rt.com/news/mutassim-gaddafi-alive-dead-463/).

While some of us might choose trash these laws at our convenience on grounds that we were not fighting -in Libya- or that we did not lose relatives, we risk falling into the trap of selective application of the law (while at the same time criticising the alleged excesses of the dead Libyan Leader). If the people who killed Gaddaffi behaved just like him, then we have arguably just replaced one form of evil with another. Does that make us (read humanity) any better? The Geneva Conventions are the standards that humanity -however controversial that might sound- has chosen to be judged by. Lets not side-step them now. Excusing our actions or the actions of others because of what others have said was 'rage, emotion and vengeance' makes one wonder what form of humanity we espouse - if we espouse it at all anyway -

Therefore, those of us who talk about law - envisage laws that should be neutral in application. Laws that discriminate against perceived criminals are simply put , bad laws. Everyone - even those perceived to be guilty or evil, should be subjected to the criminal processes that various societies have deemed fit - in the current case, we should not excuse breach of the laws of war based on 'longevity in power' etc. Two wrongs do not make a right - inspite of the fact that Machiavelli's ''end justifies the means'' argument is plausible

To re-iterate, once people take up arms, they should be expected to abide by the laws of war - that is why the use of land mines, cluster bombs, nuclear weapons -which inter alia caused indisciriminate killing are prohibited - in the same way that mistreating of civilians and Prisoners of War are.

As succinctly put by Michelle Maiese,

''... when soldiers (and i contend that the victorious Libyan rebels fall in this category), attack non-combatants, pursue their enemy beyond what is reasonable, or violate other rules of fair conduct, they commit not acts of war, but acts of murder.International law suggests that every individual, regardless of rank or governmental status, is personally responsible for any war crime that he might commit.If a soldier obeys orders that he knows to be immoral, he must be held accountable. War crimes tribunals are meant to address such crimes. See http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/j/justwar.htm; and L.C. Green, The Contemporary Law of Armed Conflict. (Manchester, Canada: Manchester University Press, 1993), 17.

Such are the dictates of humanity - the humanity which - inter alia - requires the wronged to act better than the perceived culprit and makes us wince at the sight of fellow human beings dancing on the corpse of another - regardless of who the deceased might have been.

I humbly submit

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