Training mishaps

This report from Singapore catalogs how a variety of training-related injuries and deaths have been handled as between civilian and military judicial authorities. Excerpt:

[Defense Minister] Dr Ng [Eng Hen] had also stressed that when training incidents occur, MINDEF and the SAF must “rely on our judicial system to determine the facts and mete out the appropriate punishment where required”.

“It would be wrong and unfair to punish SAF servicemen beyond the level of offence committed which has been determined by independent and impartial judicial processes,” he stated.

Whistleblowing and the Spanish Army

Ex-Lieut. Luis Gonzalo Segura

A former Spanish Army junior officer is fighting his discharge and wants two issues referred to the Court of Justice of the European Union, as Público reports here. Lieut. Luis Gonzalo Segura's case will be heard by the military chamber of the Spanish Supreme Court on Tuesday. He contends that he was improperly punished because his complaints about misconduct by his superiors were truthful. Additionally, he argues that the lower court decision is defective because it relies on a regulation that applies solely to the Guardia Civil, of which he has never been a member. The issues he wishes to have referred to the EU court: whether his right to free speech was violated and whether the military court lacked independence and impartiality. See Panicello, No. C-503/15, ¶ 37 (CJEU Feb. 16, 2017):

[T]he requirement for a body making a reference to be independent is comprised of two aspects. The first, external, aspect presumes that the court exercises its functions wholly autonomously, without being subject to any hierarchical constraint or subordinated to any other body and without taking orders or instructions from any source whatsoever (see judgments of 17 July 2014, Torresi, C‑58/13 and C‑59/13, EU:C:2014:2088, paragraph 22, and of 6 October 2015, Consorci Sanitari del Maresme, C‑203/14, EU:C:2015:664, paragraph 19), and is thus protected against external interventions or pressure liable to jeopardise the independent judgment of its members as regards proceedings before them (see judgments of 19 September 2006, Wilson, C‑506/04, EU:C:2006:587, paragraph 51; of 9 October 2014, TDC, C‑222/13, EU:C:2014:2265, paragraph 30; and of 6 October 2015, Consorci Sanitari del Maresme, C‑203/14, EU:C:2015:664, paragraph 19).

ABA Journal article on military commissions

The ABA Journal's November 2018 issue has a cover story by Lorelei Laird about the Guantanamo military commissions. It's available here.

Planned abandon of sexual assaults victims

October 28, 2018. In an article "Cabinet documents show transfer of sex-assault investigations to military police (in 1998)", the Globe and Mail reports that in 1998 the Cabinet was told that a public relations problem the military was then facing, in addition to its mishandling of the Somalia Scandal, that of rampant sexual assault would be quelled if Parliament transferred the investigation of these most serious crimes to the military police and their prosecution to court martials.  It is well know that at the time the military police totally lack any training, expertise, experience to be dealing with any such serious crimes. The military disciplinary tribunals (court martials) also lacked any training and experience in dealing with such serious offences.  The argument used by the military to convinced Cabinet to trust them with that important new responsibility was that it could act "more swiftly" with such matters as if speed and expediency was an antidote to the lack of experience, expertise and training. No wonder that in 2015, retired Supreme Court Justice Marie Deschamps, who conducted an external review of sexual misconduct within the armed forces, said the Military police lacked skills and training to deal with sexual

Plus ça change plus c'est la même chose.

Another case headed for trial at Guantanamo, slowly

Human Rights First reports here on renewed interest in bringing another case before a military commission at Guantanamo. The accused include an Indonesian man and two Malaysians. The charges arise from bombings in Bali in 2002 and Jakarta in 2003. The lead accused was apprehended in 2003 and has been at Guantanamo since 2006 -- 12 years ago.