Showing posts with label human rights. Show all posts
Showing posts with label human rights. Show all posts

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

America's Human Rights Records?

Far and away, America's human rights record is the world's worst. No other nation approaches its unprincipled history. Earlier crimes against humanity were largely internal
and regional. Twentieth century ones went global. New
millennium ones elevated atrocities and other human rights abuses to an unprecedented level. It keeps rising. America is guilty of virtually every crime imaginable and then some.Former dovish US diplomat, advisor, and father of Soviet containment George Kennan explained what reflects America's post-WWII foreign and domestic policy. His February 1948 "Memo PPS23" said:"(W)e have 50% of the world's wealth but only 6.3% of its population. (It makes us) the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships (to let us) maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national society.""To do so we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and daydreaming; and our
attention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives.We need not deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world benefaction....""We should dispense with the aspiration to 'be liked' or to be regarded as the repository of a high-minded international altruism.""We should (stop talking about) unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the living standards, and democratization.""The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are hampered by idealistic slogans (ideas and practices), the better."Ravaging one nation after another followed. America today wages multiple direct and proxy wars. US military bases infest the world. CIA elements operate everywhere. US special forces perform various military related services globally.

Wherever they show up, they're killers, not protectors.Domestically, America is more battleground than homeland. FBI, CIA, NSA, FEMA,Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Border Patrol, and other federal agencies work jointly with state and local authorities against the interests of most US residents.
Anyone can be arrested, charged, prosecuted, and imprisoned for any reason or none at all. By presidential diktat, any US citizen at home or abroad can be murdered. Others can be arrested and detained indefinitely uncharged in military prisons. Innocence is no defense. State terrorism is policy at home and abroad. That's how police states operate. Freedom, human rights, and other democratic values are non-starters. Supporting what's right is hazardous. Challenging Washington's right to dominate globally risks persecution or death. America is unfit and unsafe to live in. For the past 13 years, China's State Council Information Office published comprehensive reports on US human rights. Its most recent is titled "The Human Rights Record of the United States in 2011." It said America's State Department publishes annual human rights reports for over 190 countries. It turns a blind eye to its own appalling record. China explains what Washington and supportive media suppress. Its latest May 2012 report reveals America's "true human rights situation….and urges the United States to confront its own actions." Six topics are covered:
(1) life, property and personal security;
(2) civil and political rights;
(3) economic, social and cultural rights;
(4) racial discrimination;
(5) women's and children's rights; and
(6) human rights violations abroad.

China's report reveals "a small yet illustrative fraction of the United States' dismal record on its own human rights situation." America's "tarnished human rights record has left it in no state - whether on a moral, political or legal basis - to act as the world's human rights justice, to place itself above other countries and release the Country Reports on Human Rights Practices year after year (that) accuse and blame other countries." At the same time, it absolves itself through silence, duplicity, and/or bald-faced lies. According to the State Department: "The protection of fundamental human rights was a foundation stone in the establishment of the United States over 200 years ago." "Since then, a central goal of U.S. foreign policy has been the promotion of respect for human rights, as embodied in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights." "The United States understands that the existence of human rights helps secure the peace, deter aggression, promote the rule of law, combat crime and corruption, strengthen democracies, and prevent humanitarian crises." China's report advised Washington to clean up its own act at home, stop interfering in the internal affairs of other countries, and "cease using double standards on human rights" to advance its own imperial agenda.

Beijing accused Washington of "severe" human and civil rights violations. At the same time, it claims Americans live in the "land of the free." Why then were around 1,000 peaceful Occupy Wall Street protesters arrested in the early weeks of their campaign? Police brutality was brutal and unconscionable. It continues to reflect despotism, not democracy. America furthers "international disorder." It tramples on the rights of global citizens and its own. It operates the world's largest domestic gulag. It's also one of the most repressive. Press freedom is a figure of speech. Dominant media sources produce propaganda and other forms of managed news and information. Truth is a scarce commodity. Constitutional freedoms are denied. Money power runs America. Predatory capitalism benefits at the expense of most others. Congress is infested with millionaires. Complicit with corporate crooks, they harm ordinary people and wage war on humanity. America's 1% benefits at the expense of most others. Social America is eroding en-route to disappearing altogether. Resisters face harsh crackdowns. Poverty is at record levels. So is homelessness, hunger, and overall deprivation. Racism is institutionalized. Basic needs go unmet. Praying to the wrong God is called terrorism. 

Numerous other human rights abuses reveal a nation unfit to live in. America's human rights record is appalling. Political prisoners fill its gulag. Dissent is criminalized. Police state laws target resisters. Torture is official policy. So is permanent war on the world. Peace, stability and security are four-letter words. Elections are farcical. Duopoly power controls them. Ordinary people have no say. State Department charges against other nations are mostly uncorroborated. China uses data from the US Justice Department (DOJ), FBI, other US agencies, state ones, think tanks, as well as domestic and international media. They reveal a far different America than Washington or scoundrel media reflect. Dark truths are exposed to the light of day. They're in plain sight for anyone to see. On October 19, RIA Novosti headlined "US Takes Flak Over Human Rights Record," saying: Russia's Foreign Ministry denounced America's human rights record. It cited "maltreatment of children, breach of privacy, police brutality, secret jails and freedom of expression issues." Russia's lower house State Duma got the report. On October 22, it'll hold hearings onhuman rights. A "Duma source privy to the document" told RIA Novosti that "hundreds of thousands of children in the United States are mistreated…."In 2010 alone, around 1,600 deaths resulted. Special attention was given to how adopted Russian children are treated. Citing US NGOs, Russia's Foreign Ministry said "about one police officer in 100 has been involved in criminal abuses, including sexual harassment, indecent behavior or molest." America has the largest domestic gulag. Numerous secret prisons operate abroad. Internal spying is out-of-control. Privacy is routinely violated. Last December, another Russian report criticized America's human rights record. On December 28, Russia Today (rt.com) headlined "US violating human rights at home and abroad: Russian report," saying: Russia's Foreign Ministry discussed numerous US domestic and foreign human rights abuses. On the pretext of fighting terrorism alone, fundamental rights are denied. "The situation in the United States….is far from the ideals proclaimed in Washington," the report said. "The incumbent administration continues to apply most of the methods of controlling society and interfering in the private lives of the American people that were adopted….under George Bush on the pretext of combating terror." Russia also condemned "the ex territorial application of US legislation (that) seriously harms Russian-US relations." "It leads to violations of the basic rights and freedoms of Russians, including arbitrary arrests and abductions from third countries, cruel treatment, criminal prosecution on the basis of evidence given by false agents and doubtful evidence." 

Washington-led NATO was accused of appalling human rights abuses. Civilian casualties it's responsible for "provide a portrait of" military recklessness and lawlessness. Crimes of war and against humanity define its operations. Eyewitnesses provide damning evidence. Democracy at home is hypocrisy, not real. It exists in name only. Fundamental freedoms are absent or endangered. Speaking truth to power is hazardous. The state of America at home and abroad is appalling. Indisputable evidence reveals a record reflecting tyranny. Conditions aren't improving. They're worsening en route to institutionalizing total police state control. It's fast approaching. No one is safe anymore for good reason. Humanity is at risk. America's  agenda reflects unchallenged dominance no matter the cost. Truth is the most dangerous disinfectant. Suppressing it is policy. Propaganda wars precede hot ones. Human rights and civil liberties are denied for
our own good. Patriotism means going along or else. Humanity may not survive unless policies this out-of-control are stopped. Awareness enough to do it is sorely lacking. Hopefully something will change before it's too late.

And we were still smarting from the secessionist threats of Texas!

Friday, September 7, 2012

Teenage girl faces public flogging for pre-marital sex


A court in the Maldives has ordered a public flogging for a 16-year-old girl who confessed to having pre-marital sex, in a ruling that Tuesday triggered widespread criticism from rights groups.

The unnamed teenager was convicted on her confession under sharia law after her family complained she had sex with a 29-year-old man in July.

The man was given 10 years in jail during a court hearing on the remote Raa atoll on Sunday.

A court official said the girl could refuse the flogging and would then instead be subjected only to eight months house arrest. Should she agree, the lashing will be carried out when she reaches the age of 18.

"In most cases, the offenders would accept the lashing as part of penance," the official, who declined to be named, said.

The ruling came 10 months after UN human rights chief Navi Pillay urged the Maldives to stop publicly flogging women for having extra-marital or pre-marital sex.

Pillay noted during a visit that the Maldives had progressed in safeguarding the rights of its 330,000 Sunni Muslims, but more needed to be done to protect women.

Flogging, carried out with a cane, is normally handed down as a punishment by village chiefs who also act as local judges.

Rights activists slammed the judgment and called for it to be overturned.

"Degrading and inhuman punishments should find no place in a democracy," said Aruna Kashyap, women's rights researcher for Asia at Human Rights Watch.

"Maldives should immediately halt the execution of the punishment and take action to amend its discriminatory laws."

Suhas Chakma, director of the Asian Centre for Human Rights, said the sentence reflected the government's intention to consolidate its support among sharia law followers, in the face of serious political opposition.

"This could be used by the government to say they're committed to Islam," he said. "Courts are not independent in the Maldives so the government will have a hand."

He said the lashes were also a breach of the UN Convention against Torture.

There were mixed reactions in comments posted on the local news website Minivan News.

"This is ridiculous, and hypocritical," said one reader, identified as Mariyam.

"How many people over the age of 18 are having sex outside of marriage every day in this country. Why not flog them. And why not flog the 29-year-old man. If the girl has to face public humiliation why not the man."

Another, identified as Dhivehi Hanguraama, volunteered to administer the lashing.

"I myself would volunteer to whip this creature, as would any of self-respecting, esteemed, members of the ulama (religious scholars)."

Police said they began their probe after receiving a complaint from the girl's family.

"We investigated and forwarded our findings to the prosecutor general. The man was convicted of having sex with a minor," police spokesman Hassan Haneef said.

Official sources said the girl had been tried under sharia law which prohibits girls between the ages of 13 and 18 having pre-marital sex. Sex with a girl under the age of 13 is considered rape.

She was convicted on the basis of her confession.

Her lover, on the other hand, was tried under common law and convicted of having sex with a minor, an offence punishable with a sentence of up to 15 years in prison.

The pair had intercourse on the Raa atoll, about 125 miles north of the capital island Male.

There was no immediate comment from the Maldivian government, which includes the ultra conservative Adhaalath Party, whose supporters follow a strict brand of Wahhabi Islam.

The country's first democratically elected president, the Western-educated Mohamed Nasheed, resigned in February saying he was forced out in a coup backed by Islamic extremists along with elements of the police and the armed forces.

However, a Commonwealth investigation declared last week that the transfer of power was constitutional and ruled out a coup.

Nasheed's fall was followed by the Taliban-style destruction of pre-Islamic era Buddhist statues at the country's main museum.

Original article © Agence France Presse 2012