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The
White House decision last week involves officers accused of war
crimes in Afghanistan and Iraq, including the alleged killings
of civilians. Trump has previously acknowledged that pardons
would be controversial but said they were justified because they
had been treated "unfairly".
"In the present cases no circumstances have been advanced to
suggest anything other than simply voiding an otherwise proper
process...," United Nations human rights spokesman Rupert
Colville told journalists in Geneva on Tuesday, adding that the
failure to investigate and prosecute war crimes was itself a
violation of international humanitarian law.
He said that the decision to terminate criminal proceedings in
the case of Major Matthew Golsteyn was "particularly troubling
as it cuts short the regular judicial process". Golsteyn, an
Army Green Beret, was charged with murdering an Afghan man
during a 2010 deployment to Afghanistan.
Most pardons are granted for those already convicted who have
served time for a federal offence. But presidents have
occasionally granted pardons pre-emptively to individuals
accused of or suspected of a crime.
Colville said he was not aware of pardons of this type since the
Vietnam War. "These pardons also send a disturbing signal to
militaries all around the world," he added.
(Reporting by Emma Farge; Additional reporting by Stephanie
Nebehay; Editing by Alex Richardson)
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