ISIS and AlQaeda leaders must be tried in absentia and sentenced to die

Submitted by Prashant (United States), Jul 16, 2016 at 10:34

Dear Dr Pipes,

If the recent Orlando and Dhaka shootings were not bad enough we got yesterday's shooting in Nice. If it can be established that ISIS and Al-Qaeda have commanded individual Muslims to attack and kill innocent people, some nation of the world must issue a direct warning to the leadership of these organization to retract that command in no uncertain terms within one month. And if they do not do so then they should be tried in absentia and sentenced according to the full extent of the law.

An Indian citizen was killed in the Dhaka attack. Almost all people killed in Orlando were US citizens. Citizens of Bangladesh and France were killed in the recent attacks in Dhaka and Nice. Is their any law in the books of these countries to punish a foreigner who orders the killing of one of their citizens? If someone orders a murder in Mumbai while he lives in the US, can he be prosecuted in India? What about if someone in Mumbai orders a killing in Paris or Los Angeles?

Let there be an open trial according to the law and let the head of ISIS be sentenced to die. Even if the sentence cannot be carried, the message will be driven home.

If there is no law in any country to process this kind of a crime, then new laws must be created. Rather than quibbling about tax rates all night, the US Congress must create laws to handle this situation.

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