Annan: Coalition is occupying force

Annan cited the 1949 Geneva Conventions and the 1907 Hague Convention, international accords which set down the responsibilities of occupiers — ranging from maintaining public order to collecting taxes.

"We’re simply saying that the issue of an occupying power has not yet been dealt with," Moley said.

"We’ll come to that and we’ll presumably come to that quickly. But there should be no question — and certainly no question in the mind of the Secretary General — that we need to make it any clearer than we already have … about being in conformity and wanting to be in conformity in every way with" international accords.

Last week, Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks, deputy operations director at U.S. Central Command, said the United States did not currently consider itself an occupying power in Iraq, instead seeing the coalition as a "liberating force" — a category that does not exist in the Geneva or Hague Conventions.

"While there may be a number of similarities to what the Geneva Convention describes, that’s not a category that we have stated publicly at this point," Brooks said on April 14. "Whether that changes over time needs to be seen."