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Sex and security in Afghanistan
By David Isenberg
But AG International, the parent corporation, obstructed Gordon's efforts to
ensure that AGNA conduct a full investigation and report all information to
DoS. Shortly after receiving his recommendation, Semancik informed Gordon that
AGI officials had rejected his plan for either him or Vrentas to direct the
investigation, and instead decided that AGI chief operating officer Noel Philp
and AGI director of operations Nick Powis would handle the investigation
themselves. This plan of action was in direct contravention of both AGNA's
policies and the FOCI program requirements.
Around the same time, Chris Duffy, a temporary medic for AGNA who had relieved
Montefiore while he was on leave, noted that there had been an outbreak of
sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) among AGNA workers in 2007. Duffy reported
this to Powis in London, who in turn informed Gordon during a routine
telephone call that these issues had been uncovered.
Subsequently, Philp and Powis claimed to conduct an investigation into the
allegations that AGNA employees, including the program manager, had violated
the Trafficking Victims Protection Act.
Gordon was denied access to the investigative reports or any information about
the nature or extent of the investigation. The only document provided to Gordon
was a three-page report of the findings by Philp and Powis. The report stated
that Du Plessis was aware that "some members of the workforce had abused the
MWR [Moral, Welfare and Recreation] policy for the purpose of seeking out
prostitutes, but this represented only a minority against the overall net
benefit of having a 'light-touch' MWR policy." No mention was made of the fact
that the conduct at issue violated the Trafficking Victims Protection Act's
blanket prohibition of the procurement of commercial sex acts and the DoS's
"zero tolerance" policy for violations of this law.
The only corrective action taken per the report was to direct the program
manager to revise the MWR policy, which had allowed AGNA personnel to frequent
bars, restaurants and other places in which human trafficking activity
occurred.
In a letter dated December 13, 2007, US Congressman Henry A Waxman, then
chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, sent a letter to
AGI requesting information about ArmorGroup's security services in Iraq and
Afghanistan from January 1, 2003, to the present, as part of the committee's
ongoing investigation into the role of private military contractors in Iraq and
Afghanistan. Waxman requested: all incident reports, investigative
reports, correspondence and other documents relating to ... (b) all incidents
involving improper or unprofessional behavior by company personnel, including
all incidents resulting in termination or other disciplinary action against
security contractor personnel ... (c) all incidents that could reflect
negatively on the company or its clients, including all incidents that led to
complaints or allegations of misconduct by company personnel. AGI was to
provide "a written certification by an authorized company official that
ArmorGroup has provided all [responsive] information and documents".
On or around January 3, 2008, Gordon learned that an AGNA trainee who had
previously worked under Du Plessis' supervision for another security contractor
in Kabul had bragged to other employees in training that his primary reason for
returning to Kabul was to take advantage of the human trafficking activities
there.
This trainee boasted that his friend in Kabul owned a brothel and six Asian
women and that he (the trainee) was considering purchasing a woman for
US$20,000, thus enabling him to start making a profit on this purchase after a
month. Another student who was privy to this conversation reported it to AGNA
officials. In addition, a DoS investigator, David Lydek, was on site when the
issue was reported and was aware of the allegation.
Gordon promptly obtained a statement from the witness and reported the incident
to a DoS official, and to AGNA senior management, including James D Schmitt,
then vice president of business development for AGNA, and Jerry Hoffman, then
interim chief executive officer of AGNA. In discussions with Schmitt, Gordon
insisted that AGNA needed to take decisive action to investigate and repudiate
these activities. While they both paid lip service to the seriousness of the
allegations, neither took appropriate action to investigate whether such
conduct was in fact occurring among the current AGNA guard force.
In mid-to-late January 2008, AGNA formulated a response to Waxman's document
demand that deliberately omitted inclusion of any documents relating to the
allegations that AGNA's program manager, armorer and medic frequented brothels,
the outbreak of STDs among the workforce, or the incident involving the trainee
referenced above.
Gordon discussed the submission with Schmitt, who had assumed responsibility
for preparing the report to Waxman. In response to Gordon's objections, Schmitt
responded that AGNA decided that those items "were best left out of the
report", as it would "not look good for the company".
On February 27, 2008, according to Gordon, Schmitt provided false testimony to
the US Congress about AGNA's business practices during his appearance before a
hearing of the United States Senate Committee on Homeland Security and
Governmental Affairs. The hearing was titled "An Uneasy Relationship: US
Reliance on Private Security Firms in Overseas Operations".
At one point, Schmitt stated, "In the case of ArmorGroup, we have long
established formal corporate programs to ensure that company employees act at
all times within the relevant international and local legal and humanitarian
frameworks, including an employee code of conduct, a stringent ethics policy,
and an ethics review board."
Schmitt further testified, "We ensure our employees are trained and certified
on the tenets of international humanitarian law as well as the local laws of
the countries in which they operate." He further gave examples of corporate
ethics programs, such as "full adherence to and mandatory induction and
continuation training on US and host nation local laws and international human
rights and humanitarian law", fully knowing that AGNA had been woefully
deficient in providing armored vehicles, legally procured weapons, and other
items necessary for effective security management and with the knowledge that
AGNA employees had violated local, US, and international laws with impunity.
Ironically, in light of Gordon's current allegations, Schmitt also said: As
private security contractors, or PSCs, it is the actions we do, good or bad,
and the image we project, that influence and shape how the local civilian
populations view our nation. Perceptions matter. The conduct and disposition of
private security contractors is the striking canvas from which we, as a nation,
are viewed by local inhabitants ... We implement deliberate leave rotation,
provide personal insurance and welfare policies, and we teach cultural training
to ensure our employees, whom we refer to as our "quiet professionals", are
prepared to provide our protective services in an ethically sensitive fashion
in the most complex of environments. And in a comment that can
only be viewed as prescient in light of the current ArmorGroup scandal he also
said, "As to the question on whether there is a need to establish
government-wide standards, licensing requirements, or contract provisions for
security providers, the answer can only be 'Absolutely yes'."
Interestingly, in 2007, Schmitt served as the chair of the Private Security
Industries Association in the International Peace Operations Association
(IPOA), a leading US trade association for both private military and security
contractors. ArmorGroup has been a member company of IPOA since August 2003.
On September 14, the Commission on Wartime Contracting, a congressionally
established body mandated to study wartime contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan,
held a hearing. Among the witnesses was IPOA founder and president Doug Brooks.
He said, "Membership in IPOA is not automatic and requires disclosure and
information not typical of trade associations. Companies can be expelled if
they violate the association's code of conduct."
IPOA's code, currently in its 12th version, adopted on February 11, 2009,
states: 3.2. Signatories shall support effective legal accountability
to relevant authorities for their actions and the actions of their personnel.
Signatories shall proactively address minor infractions, and to the extent
possible and subject to contractual and legal limitations, fully cooperate with
official investigations into allegations of contractual violations and breaches
of international humanitarian and human rights laws.
3.3. Signatories shall take firm and definitive action if their personnel
engage in unlawful activities. For serious infractions, such as grave breaches
of international humanitarian and human rights laws, Signatories should report
such offences to the relevant authorities.
6.12, Signatories shall not engage or allow their personnel to engage in the
act of trafficking in persons. Signatories shall remain vigilant for instances
of trafficking in persons and, where discovered, shall report such instances to
relevant authorities.
6.13. Personnel shall be expected to conduct themselves humanely with honesty,
integrity, objectivity and diligence.
11.4. Signatories shall have an effective mechanism for personnel to internally
report suspected breaches of international humanitarian and human rights laws
and violations of other applicable laws or the IPOA Code of Conduct.
Signatories shall not retaliate against any person who reports in good faith
and on reasonable grounds such suspected violations.
David Isenberg is a researcher and acting director of the Norwegian
Initiative on Small Arms Transfers at the International Peace Research
Institute, Oslo. He is a US Navy veteran and author of the book, Shadow
Force: Private Security Contractors in Iraq. His study "Private Military
Contractors and US Grand Strategy" will be published in the near future. The
views expressed are his own. His e-mail is sento@earthlink.net.
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