US Commission on Wartime Contracting: Correcting over-reliance on contractors in contingency operations

The Commission on Wartime Contracting concluded in its second interim report to Congress that the use of contractors has become a “default option,” pointing to the estimated $177 billion spent since 2001 on contractors in Afghanistan and Iraq. Yet vigorous oversight and management of contractors by the Pentagon, State Department and U.S. Agency for International [...]

Blackwater Founder Is Said to Back African Mercenaries

The NY Times reports that Erik Prince, the founder of the international security giant Blackwater Worldwide, is backing an effort by Saracen International, a controversial South African mercenary firm to insert itself into Somalia’s bloody civil war by protecting government leaders, training Somali troops, and battling pirates and Islamic militants there, according to American and [...]

Details emerge on role of private contractors in CIA secret prison system and CIA’s indemnity promise

The CIA agreed to cover at least $5 million in legal fees for psychologists Jim Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, who were the architects of the agency’s interrogation program and personally conducted dozens of waterboarding sessions on at least three terror detainees, former U.S. officials said. The revelation of the contractors’ involvement is the first known [...]

International Code of Conduct for Private Security Service Providers

Fifty-eight private security companies (PCSs) have already signed the International Code of Conduct for Private Security Service Providers, committing to adhere to numerous international human rights principles and support the rule of law while also protecting the interests of their clients. Although signing the code is the “first step in the process towards full compliance,” [...]

Efforts to Prosecute Blackwater Are Collapsing

The NY Times reports that nearly four years after the federal government began a string of investigations and criminal prosecutions against Blackwater Worldwide personnel accused of murder and other violent crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, the cases are beginning to fall apart, burdened by a legal obstacle of the government’s own making. In the most [...]

Public Private Cooperation: Challenges and Opportunities in Security Governance

DCAF has a new report on Public Private Cooperation: Challenges and Opportunities in Security Governance. Abstract: When faced with both traditional and non-traditional security challenges, states, acting alone, are poorly equipped. Ad hoc security governance networks have increasingly been the response. Such networks involve cooperation between governments, the private sector, non-governmental and international organisations and [...]

Scholarschip: Democratic Governance Challenges of Cyber Security

This new DCAF publication adresses democratic governance challenges of cyber security. Abstract: Cyber security encompasses borderless challenges, while responses remain overwhelmingly national in scope and even these are insufficient. There are enormous gaps in both our understanding of the issue, as well as in the technical and governance capabilities required to confront it. Furthermore, democratic [...]

UN panel calls for more oversight of contractors

A U.N. panel has called for greater oversight and regulation of private military contractors working in war zones such as Afghanistan. The U.N. working group on the use of mercenaries says there is a lack of effective vetting procedures with some companies employing individuals who may have been involved in human rights abuses. The panel [...]

Supreme Court asks US government to offer views in Saleh et al v CACI International

The Supreme Court opened a new Term on Monday by asking the federal government to offer its views on  lawsuits against private contractors who work overseas for the U.S. military.  The new case involves former Iraqi civilian detainees who had been held at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison that the U.S. military operated in Baghdad [...]

UN report urges heightened regulation of US military contractors

A report presented Tuesday by the UN Working Group on the Use of Mercenaries urges the US to increase regulation of military contractors employed worldwide, citing alleged human rights abuses and the contractors’ lack of transparency and accountability. The UN Working Group met with US officials last summer to discuss the actions of US private [...]