By Nigel Thorpe
Senior English Editor
Albawaba.com - Amman
Monday saw the publication of the annual State Department report on human rights which may help polish America’s heavily tarnished image as an independent broker on the international scene. Wide in scope, and deep in its level of analysis and detail, the voluminous report paints a grim picture of human rights and freedoms in the world at the start of the new millenium by attacking friend and foe alike.
Predictably, many of the report’s barbed spear thrusts are directed towards standard bête noires such as Cuba, North Korea, Iraq, Afghanistan and Myanmar (formerly Burma ) in the ever expanding menagerie of “un-favored” nations. The “bête-blanches” across the great US international policy divide, are also attacked with pointed accusations, for example, that ally Israel had “sometimes used excessive force in contravention of their own rules of engagement.” The report was published as secretary of state, Colin Powell, completed his whirlwind tour of the troubled Middle East.
The current “gray” status of China is confused by its recent accession to the World Trade Organizations (WTO) and its promises to reform both its economy and improve its human rights record. As highlighted in the reports introduction, “China’s poor human rights record worsened during the year” when it should have improved. The new fragile ties between China and the US are likely to be stretched to near-breaking point by the reports that Chinese authorities are suppressing religious groups such as the Christians, Tibetan Buddhists and the Falun Gong meditation sect. In stinging right and left combination of diplomatic punches on Monday, the US continued its attack on China by saying that it would sponsor a resolution critical of Beijiing’s human rights record at the UN Commission on Human Rights in Geneva. In a sharply worded counter attack quoted in CNN newscasts, China described the Falun Gong as “a dangerous cult” and recommended the commission “review the many human rights’ infringements in America itself.”
The US report also insists that Russia’s record of press freedom “worsened” last year and that “serious problems remain” with its overall human rights record, especially in Chechnya.
Further to the east of the former Bamboo and Iron Curtains, the security forces in Indonesia came in for harsh criticism for “shooting numerous civilians” while the government in Jakarata were castigated for its “ineffective” response to the ethnic and religious violence that has swept the outlying islands of the troubled archipelago.
The reports critical comments on both the government of Israel, and Yasser Arafat’s Fateh fraction, will be discussed in detail in Part 2 of this report.
Part 3 will summarize the report’s comments on the Arabic-speaking countries of north Africa, Egypt, Iran, Iraq and the Gulf States.
The 20001 State Department report is not, however, all “gloom and doom”, and it ends on a more optimistic “up-beat” note.
The report sees the ouster of former president Slobodan Miloservic by popular revolt, and his likely immanent arrest, as “a new, more tolerant and democratic era in Yugoslavia.” Ethiopia and Eritrea have also ended their long and pointless two-year-old border war in the Horn of Africa after successful peace talks in Algeria, while Nigeria and Ghana have returned to a fragile democracy.
Closer to America’s backyard, the report echoes President Bush’s comments on his visit to Mexico, the first overseas visit of his presidency, by saying “we welcome the election of Vicente Fox as president of Mexico, the first time in modern history that a member of the opposition party has been elected president.”
In the introduction to the report which was compiled under the former Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, Michael Parmly, Acting Assistant Secretary of State and director of the survey, notes that “ there are rights and freedoms to which every human is entitled no matter where he or she resides. This idea is so powerful and so universal that it gains strength with every passing year.”
The latest US study is sure, however, to spark fury and resentment in many foreign capitals whose governments will complain the “world policeman” is interfering in internal affairs that are none of America’s business.”
The report clearly speaks “strong and loud” for underprivileged people in many countries “who have no voice.” Whether foreign governments will be prepared to listen to the “proxy voices” is quite another thing.
