A U.S. congressman from North Carolina has reintroduced a bill to clarify how American laws apply to overseas contractors. Democratic Congressman David Price of Chapel Hill originally submitted the legislation in 2007 after contractors with the company Blackwater were up a public square in Baghdad. The law met resistance from the White House at the time and was never passed.
As it stands, Price argues, the legal structure governing how contractors behave and who is responsible for them is complex.
"This creates a kind of radical uncertainty for contractors, and a lack of certainty on the part of the American people that our laws will be honored and observed by people acting in our name," said Price.
A companion bill in the U.S. Senate has been introduced by Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont.
The Blackwater case has taken years and much legal wrangling to get to this point, where last week four individuals were convicted of charges ranging from manslaughter to murder. Price argues there still a need to clarify where these cases fall in terms of legal oversight, in order to avoid a lack of justice based on technicalities.
"It still could be successfully appealed," said Price. "We don't know. The case was thrown out once. This actually is the exception that proves the rule, I think. That this jurisdiction, this responsibility for such cases needs to be clarified".
