In an era where our biggest threats are non-state entities and where our wars have become asymmetrical, traditional national security, law enforcement, and criminal justice structures sometimes struggle to cope with these new challenges. Enter NBC's new television show The Wanted, which poses the critical question of whether a mass market television show can shame governments into acting against some of the world's most notorious criminals.
As a former adviser to the Tribunal that convicted Saddam Hussein for crimes against humanity in December of 2006, I spent nearly three years in Iraq painstakingly interviewing witnesses to horrific crimes, exhuming mass graves, negotiating the Tribunal's statute and rules of evidence and procedure, and managing one of the most complicated war crimes trials to occur since Nuremberg. It was therefore with professional and personal interest that I watched last week's premier of The Wanted.
The show's premise, for those of you who missed it, is to confront suspected terrorists, genocidaires, and others accused of committing mass atrocities while also pressuring relevant governments to take action against them. Like a myriad of non-governmental organizations, such as Human Rights Watch, the International Center for Transitional Justice, Amnesty International and others, the show's creators believe that they can effectuate real and positive change by embarrassing those in power to take action against people accused of perpetrating the most egregious crimes known to man.
Nobody can quibble with this premise considering the storied interplay between media and our criminal justice system. For example, the longest running television show in the history of the Fox Television Network is not, contrary to popular belief, The Simpsons. It is America's Most Wanted -- a show built upon the premise that millions of viewers who watch reenactments of a crime and learn the identities of the suspects can report these suspects to the police for capture and eventual trial. And America's Most Wanted has successfully bridged the gap between entertainment and law enforcement with the end result being a highly profitable show for Fox and over 1,000 suspected criminals captured as of July 17, 2009.
The Wanted attempts to do this, but on an international scale and for crimes that have countless victims. And the show's initial airing has demonstrated yet again the tremendous power of the media to compel governments to take action against known criminals living freely in their midst.
Take for example, The Wanted's decision to track down Najmuddin Faraj Ahmad, aka Mullah Krekar. By way of background, Mullah Krekar founded a notorious Islamic terrorist group that eventually became known as Ansar Al-Islam and that has been linked to scores of car bombings, suicide attacks, kidnappings, and other atrocities, mostly in northern Iraq. The Wanted team located Mullah Krekar in Oslo, Norway where he was living openly in a genteel suburb outside the city's center.
When The Wanted team learned that Norway would not deport Mullah Krekar to Iraq without relevant diplomatic assurances that he would receive a fair trial and that the death penalty would not be imposed upon him, The Wanted folks traveled to northern Iraq, received such assurances from the Kurdish Regional Government, and presented these assurances to the Norwegian Government. In response, the Norwegian Prime Minister supposedly declared to The Wanted team that it was now engaging in diplomatic communications with the Iraqi government and that Mullah Krekar would be deported.
Score one for The Wanted and for the power of the media to shape world events. The question remains, however, will anyone but the Norwegian government watch?