Berkeley City Council considers role in Rumsfeld war crimes case

[Kadie]

BERKELEY
City Council considers role in Rumsfeld war crimes case
Carolyn Jones, Chronicle Staff Writer

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

The Berkeley City Council was in the spotlight Tuesday night as it grappled with whether to become the first U.S. government entity to support the prosecution of former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other Bush administration officials for war crimes.

If the council approves the resolution, Berkeley would become a co-plaintiff if Germany files a criminal complaint against Rumsfeld, former CIA Director George Tenet, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and other U.S. officials for their alleged involvement with torture at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay.

Berkeley has a long history of protesting U.S. policy, but the city manager recommended that the council stop short of participating in the prosecution of Rumsfeld and his associates.

"Charging United States officials with crimes in a foreign country is of course a very serious matter," City Manager Phil Kamlarz wrote in a memo to the council. "The city does not have the resources to undertake this entirely new and serious responsibility."

He said the issue would take too much time for the city attorney's staff and expose the city to potential financial and legal liability.

Berkeley would join two Nobel Peace Prize winners and about three-dozen human rights groups around the world as co-plaintiffs in the suit, which was filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York and calls on German federal prosecutors to file charges.

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