Carter blasts drone policy
The former United States President Jimmy Carter broke with tradition this week to criticise his fellow Democrat, Barack Obama, for his extensive use of drones.
‘‘I think it’s a violation of human rights,’’ he said in an interview with The Times.
‘‘It [the use of drones] means you assassinate people without bringing charges, without finding them guilty, and in the process inadvertently causing collateral damage, that is the killing of completely innocent people who might be in the neighbourhood.’’
Mr Carter, 87, is a member of a group of retired statesmen known as The Elders – other members in London included Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the former Irish President Mary Robinson – who advise on conflict resolution and human rights issues.
Although Mr Carter says that he usually writes a report on his activities for the State Department and the White House on the plane home, he emphasises that he is a free and independent agent.
‘‘Yes, it annoys people,’’ he conceded. ‘‘For instance, when I go to Cuba it sometimes annoys the incumbent president of the US – but I always notify the president in advance.’’
So far, though, he has always made a rigorous distinction between criticising US policy and the president himself. He blames Congress rather than President Obama for continuing imprisonment in Guantanamo Bay.
‘‘We have now 166 people still left there, maybe 165, half of whom have been found innocent, but they’ll never be liberated or never given a trial,’’ he complained.
But on drones and on the scratching away of individual liberties in the US, Mr Obama draws the ire of his predecessor, who served one term, from 1977 to 1981.
Speaking about Mr Obama’s review of lists of targets to be struck by drones, he said: ‘‘I personally don’t approve of that . . . it’s hard to say what I would have done under the circumstances, but my opinion is that I wouldn’t have done that.’’
As president, Mr Carter passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which put court controls on wiretapping.
He is upset that the restraints have been lifted and that the president has approved ‘‘the authorisation for our defence department to condone arrest and imprisonment of people without charge and without a trial, the indefinite incarceration of people who are accused of terrorist activities. I object to that as well’’.
The timing of Mr Carter’s criticisms will sting the White House, reminding liberal voters that while Mr Obama set out with specific promises to wind down the war against terrorism, he has become increasingly dependent on drone warfare.
Both men won the Nobel Peace Prize, Mr Obama controversially at the beginning of his presidency, and Mr Carter in 2002 for his conflict resolution attempts. He has talked to Hamas, visited North Korea three times and called for human rights guarantees for Palestinians in Gaza.
Next week a delegation from his Carter Centre will visit Syria to talk to President Bashar al-Assad and oppositionists.