The UN Human Rights Council’s month-long session ended in Geneva on Friday, along with any justification for believing that President Obama is a champion of human rights. The president insisted that America join the UN’s lead human-rights body for the first time very early in his presidency, and the consequences are now painfully clear. The enemies of democracy and freedom are having a field day at the expense of American interests and values.
The Council is the personal playground of the Organization of the Islamic Conference. They hold the balance of power by controlling the Asian and African regional groups, which together form a majority at the Council. The Council’s agenda is accordingly fixated on issues of priority to the Islamic bloc -- number one, delegitimizing Israel; number two, trumping free speech in the name of Islam; and number three, avoiding any criticism of human-rights violations in their own backyards. None of which has anything to do with protecting human rights.
More troubling than the Council’s growing infamy, however, is the Obama administration’s relationship to it. The America on display in Geneva is an embarrassment, and the only people oblivious to how the U.S. is perceived by those assembled are the American representatives themselves.
Having jumped on the Council bandwagon last year without insisting on any reform-minded preconditions, U.S. diplomats now sit there taking it on the chin and lending predictable and immutable Council routines undeserved legitimacy. This past session, the Council adopted five resolutions condemning Israel and fewer resolutions on the rest of the world combined: one each on the Democratic Republic of the Congo, North Korea, Burma/Myanmar, and Guinea. The other 187 states on the planet got a free pass from the Council, notwithstanding the pressing reality of Nigeria’s butchered Christians, Saudi Arabia’s gender apartheid, Egypt’s systematic torture, China’s iron fist, Sudan’s genocide, and Russia’s slain human-rights defenders. In fact, over the entire four-year history of the Council, more than half of all resolutions and decisions condemning any state have been directed at Israel alone.
This session, one of these Israel resolutions created yet another UN committee dedicated to the demonization of the Jewish state. The new body will be charged with monitoring compliance with the notorious Goldstone Report, which contains the diabolical accusation that Israel intended deliberately to murder civilians in Gaza rather than to defend itself from Hamas rocket attacks aimed at the Israeli civilian population. A 2009 General Assembly resolution had already called for “credible” investigations within a three-month period. Notwithstanding that any Israeli investigation that does not end in self-immolation will be dismissed out of hand, in January Israel gave the UN a report running more than 60 pages detailing its continuing supervision and evaluation of the actions of the Israel Defense Forces, in accordance with the rule of law. The Palestinian side responded to the General Assembly’s deadline by submitting a piece of paper from Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas. He announced that he had set up a committee four days before the time ran out to begin to plan an investigation. Needless to say, the Palestinians who actually run Gaza and the terror campaign against Israeli citizens in the south of Israel, namely Hamas, did nothing at all.
This new UN committee will be added to the existing collection of UN standing bodies already fixated on Israel-bashing, such as the UN Committee on the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People, the UN Special Committee to Investigate Israeli Practices, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories, and the UN Division for Palestinian Rights. Dozens of reports on Palestinian rights and Israeli wrongs are also commissioned every year from UN actors, including the secretary-general. Congress has adopted provisions that deny American funds to the Inalienable Rights Committee, the Special Committee and the UN Palestinian Division, and unless it now takes quick action, American taxpayers will be footing 22 percent of the bill of this latest Goldstone outrage.
As happened with all the anti-Israel resolutions, the Obama administration perfunctorily voted against the Goldstone resolution -- to no avail. The administration then pulled its punches when explaining its vote. American Ambassador Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe noted that her full speech could be found somewhere on a website, and then proceeded to make a telling omission from that speech when delivering her oral remarks, which were webcast around the world. When she read the entirety of the first few paragraphs, which called on both sides to conduct investigations, she skipped over just one sentence therein: “Hamas is a terrorist group and has neither the legitimacy nor the willingness to investigate credibly its repeated and deliberate violations of international law.” Apparently, an honest statement that points out the obvious flaw in the logic of Goldstone-inspired investigations wouldn’t have fit neatly into Obama’s engagement strategy -- or sit well with his preferred audience.
The Obama administration lost every time it called for the vote on a resolution at the Council session. But more than that, it failed even to get that close on the most troubling human-rights issues of our time, such as those involving Iran. Despite the Iranian government’s systematic brutality and the presence of American hostages in Iranian prisons, the Obama administration decided not to table a single resolution critical of Iran, nor to ask the Council to convene a special session to focus on human-rights violations in Iran. (The Council has had six special sessions on Israel alone.)
Administration apologists had plenty of excuses. They whined that they didn’t have the votes to convene a special session; and even if they did, they were still short the votes to guarantee a robust resolution critical of Iran, and they were concerned that a failure would diminish the Council’s credibility. For many years at the previous Human Rights Commission, the U.S. put forward a resolution condemning China -- which never passed -- as a matter of principle. For this administration, however, the reputation of the UN is an end in itself. American diplomats also claimed it was up to the Europeans to take the lead on Iran because perceived European “neutrality” would garner more support. In turn, the Europeans (worried about their lucrative contracts with Iran) claimed that the U.S. should take the lead.
The most widely trumpeted American (and European) excuse for going soft on Iran was that any attempt to criticize the country would prompt a wave of sympathy that would improve Iran’s chances of becoming a Council member. Council elections are scheduled for May, and American diplomats fretted that the successful election of Iran would harm the Council’s credentials. Since such human-rights role models as Angola, Cuba, China, Russia, and Saudi Arabia are already members of the Council (and come May, Libya is a shoo-in, because the slate of African states has been fixed), the idea of preserving membership quality on the Council is a very bad joke.
The administration’s foot-in-mouth foray into the Human Rights Council also became evident when the Council adopted a resolution on the defamation of religion. Hoping further to ingratiate itself with the “Muslim world,” Obama diplomats at the last Council meeting in September co-sponsored a resolution on freedom of expression with Egypt, a country which doesn’t have freedom of expression. In order to win Egyptian support, U.S. negotiators stomached references to “special duties and responsibilities” on the exercise of free speech and “voluntary codes of ethical conduct” on the media. In return, Egypt took the very first opportunity at this Council session to throw the free-speech façade overboard. It championed a resolution attacking freedom of expression in the name of defending Islam from “defamation”; the resolution is entitled the defamation of religions, but Islam is the only religion the Council deemed worthy of mention.
In a final dismal spectacle, the only resolution the administration did put forward over the entire four-week meeting crashed and burned. The American proposal had been designed to forestall efforts by Islamic states to write free-speech curbs into international law. The battle is over support for drafting so-called complementary standards -- which claim to complement existing laws combating racism and related intolerance but which in fact will undermine them. When Obama’s representatives learned that African and Asian states vehemently objected to their resolution, they simply withdrew it. Not only did they withdraw it, they then sought to manufacture the appearance of harmony by throwing American support behind the rival African resolution, which pushed complementary standards forward. Even the European Union balked and refused to support the African text.
Many in the corridors of the Council meeting mistakenly believe that the Obama contingent is some combination of naïve, idyllic, weak, and pathetic. I give the president more credit than that. The Council’s record was clear when Obama decided to join it, and any first grader is capable of doing the math that proves the inability of any Western government to change the Council’s course. Contributing to an aura of credibility surrounding this twisted and incorrigible institution is, therefore, a solid piece of evidence of President Obama’s priorities -- good relations with the Muslim world, poor relations with the state of Israel, and human rights be damned.
As Libya Bans a Lebanese UN Bodyguard, UN's Ban Says Nothing, Sources Say, Vanished Imam
By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, March 26 --
At the UN, often it is the questions not answered, and the protests not made, that are the real story. On Thursday morning after answering Inner City Press' questions about Myanmar, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was asked to comment, "One of your bodyguards was denied a visa because he is Lebanese. What's your comment?"
One of Ban's bodyguard, the raiser says, is Mohammed Abdul-Hussein of Lebanon. Libya and its Leader have problems not only with Switzerland -- for the arrest of Gadafi's son for abusing his employees -- but also with Lebanon, on the matter of the Vanished Imam.
The Libyan mission, the raiser says, told Ban's office that Mohammed Abdul-Hussein of Lebanon was "persona non grata." Rather than protest this, Ban or his office accepted, and submitted a list without Mohammed Abdul-Hussein, which was accepted.
UN's Ban on a previous, sUNnier trip to Sirte
The raiser says a member of the Office of Ban Ki-moon's spokesman told him clearly that Ban knew of the issue, but let it go and decided, if he'd say anything, to say it after the trip to and from Sirte -- this was later denied.
But inevitably the failure to protest would be contrasted to Ban's protest of blockage of a journalist from one of his traveling parties. Is the difference class, nationality or religion, the raiser asked Inner City Press? Watch this site.
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At UN, As Friends on Myanmar Calculate Their Share, Ban Splits Difference
By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, March 25 -- Following the closed door meeting on Myanmar by the UN Secretary General's "Group of Friends" on Thursday morning, S-G Ban Ki-moon took two questions from the Press. One of his advisors told Inner City Press that both the United States and France have become "more nuanced," with only the UK still beating the drum about what they call Burma.
He said that donors like Norway and Australia and Japan are trying to "recalibrate." He snidely pointed out that on roads outside of Yangon, the construction equipment is "all from Caterpillar," the U.S. firm.
Meanwhile, India's Tata now plans a truck factory in Myanmar. India is said to be concerned that if they don't invest, Myanmar will become an economic colony of China. Money is talking.
Ban was flanked by his interim envoy to Myanmar, Vijay Nambiar and performed under the watchful eyes of diplomats from Friends of Myanmar who urge a hands-off approach. One of these told Inner City Press, before Ban began, that he would mention something about "that lady." Inner City Press was about to say, "The Lady?" but then asked Ban about it. See below.
Last Friends on Myanmar meeting- of this one, no photos were allowed
From the UN's transcript:
Inner City Press: Mr. Secretary-General, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has said, she has actually encouraged the NLD not to register for the polls under the current laws. I wonder what do you think can happen between now and when a date is set. Would you view that as a fatal flaw to the election, if the NLD didn’t participate? And are you thinking of naming a more permanent successor to Mr. [Ibrahim] Gambari to carry out the good offices? Some say that having an interim person may either reflect or be interpreted as a lack of commitment on the issue.
Inner City Press: There was at least one report that you proposed a name to Myanmar and they turned it down. Maybe the report was wrong?
SG: No. I have never proposed any names.
The purveyor of the report was the only other journalist to ask Ban a Myanmar question. Before he did, a UN Security Officer asked him to move away from the meeting room. He maintained to Inner City Press that Nambiar traveled to Myanmar to deliver Ban's letter, and that Ban has received a response that emphasizes Myanmar's sovereignty.
Inner City Press asked at the noon briefing for confirmation that a response had been received, but the spokesman merely said he would look into it. Watch this site.
Click here for an Inner City Press YouTube channel video, mostly UN Headquarters footage, about civilian deaths in Sri Lanka.
Click here for Inner City Press' March 27 UN debate
Click here for Inner City Press March 12 UN (and AIG bailout) debate
Click here for Inner City Press' Feb 26 UN debate
Click here for Feb. 12 debate on Sri Lanka http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/17772?in=11:33&out=32:56
Click here for Inner City Press' Jan. 16, 2009 debate about Gaza
Click here for Inner City Press' review-of-2008 UN Top Ten debate
Click here for Inner City Press' December 24 debate on UN budget, Niger
Click here from Inner City Press' December 12 debate on UN double standards
Click here for Inner City Press' November 25 debate on Somalia, politics
and this October 17 debate, on Security Council and Obama and the UN.
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These reports are usually also available through Google News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click here for a Reuters AlertNet piece by this correspondent about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click here for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali National Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an undefined trust fund. Video Analysis here
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