Segacs's World I Know

Posts Tagged ‘amnesty international’

Believe it or not, other newsworthy things happened in the world yesterday and today. You’d never know it from watching the local news, of course, which has been covering Dawson nonstop since yesterday afternoon. But here are a few things that happened in the world outside our little corner:

• Sadaam’s judge doesn’t think he was a dictator. So what was he, then? A democratically-elected leader? A royal monarch? The winner of the first season of Iraqi Idol?
• The new Palestinian “unity” government appears likely to get its funding back from Europe, though the U.S. isn’t on board.
• Amnesty said Hezbollah committed war crimes, in what Charles Johnson over at LGF dubbed a flying pig moment. I’m shocked too. Amnesty gets so much more money and support when it’s directing its wrath at Israel.
• In a big sign of normalcy returning to the country, Israel’s getting its international soccer games back.
• Germany ordained its first rabbis since 1942. See that big middle finger in the air, you neo-Nazi assholes?
• Speaking of Jews and Europe, Pajamas Media is all over this under-reported story about the defamation trial that just begun in France against three Jewish citizens who questioned the French Channel 2 network for its coverage of the Mohammed Al-Dura affair.
• The Pope has pissed off Muslims, it seems, by making some statements that, regardless of their intent, will surely be taken way out of context. This could be a thing.
• Bibi said that Ahmadinejad is “more dangerous than Hitler”. You’d think such a normally-competent debater would’ve heard of Godwin’s Law, no?
• And in other news, Stephen Colbert’s bridge in Hungary looks like it isn’t going to happen, despite his large margin of victory in the online naming poll, due to the tiny problem of his failing to meet one of the qualifications – being dead. Whoops! (By the way, Budapest rocks!)

Okay, I think that about does it for the ten-second catch-up. Or, as the BUZZ puts it, some “temporary relief from ignorance”.

Amnesty International just keeps sabotaging its own mission again and again. The latest episode is today’s report on human rights, which blasts countries around the world for violations, singling out – you guessed it – the United States:

Amnesty singles out the United States for shirking its responsibility to set a better global example for human rights protection.

“The U.S.A., as the unrivalled political, military and economic hyper-power sets the tone for governmental behaviour worldwide,” said Secretary General Irene Khan in the foreword to Amnesty’s annual report.

The report calls the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay — which holds some 540 prisoners from about 40 countries — “the gulag of our times.” Detainees were being held there, some for more than three years, without access to legal representation.

Pictures of abuse of Iraqi detainees at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison are also cited in the report. Amnesty says the photos were never adequately investigated.

“When the most powerful country in the world thumbs its nose at the rule of law and human rights, it grants a licence to others to commit abuse with impunity,” said Khan.

The report talks about violations by the worst offenders, including North Korea, Zimbabwe and China. But these are mentioned in the same breath as free, democratic countries like the United States and Australia… and of course, Israel.

Amnesty claims that human rights should be universal, and the same standards ought to apply to everyone. Its mission states clearly that:

AI’s vision is of a world in which every person enjoys all of the human rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights standards.

Sure, equal and consistent standards, right? Except when they’re countries they dislike, such as the U.S. and Israel. Then, the standards are different.

Anyone who can call Guantanamo Bay the “gulag of our times” with a straight face, while essentially ignoring the true gulags of our times in places like North Korea, has squandered all credibility. Amnesty International lost theirs a long time ago.

Update: As if that wasn’t bad enough, Lynn has more on Amnesty’s seemingly incurable obsession with targeting Israel.

Hypocrites International (a.k.a. Amnesty International) is dismissing a British report about human rights abuses in Iraq as propaganda and – get this – “selective attention to human rights”.

“This selective attention to human rights is nothing but a cold and calculated manipulation of the work of human rights activists,” said Irene Khan, Amnesty International’s secretary general.

Yes, this is the same Amnesty International who selectively targets Israel for what it perceives as human rights abuses, while turning a blind eye to those committed in most of the Arab world. Are you laughing yet?

The following quote is from a Letter to the Link by a member of Amnesty International at Concordia:

You can’t fight all causes at the same time; you have to make choices. For example, I am an anthropology student. I believe in the equal value and richness of all cultures, but I cannot be an expert on all of them. I have to pick.

In fairness, this author claims to have chosen West Africa and the Caribbean as her areas of expertise – but then, most of her letters to the Link seem to pick on Israel. In a discussion thread about that letter, the same author posted the following comment:

Please don’t get me wrong, I condemn HRs violations equally on both sides each time they happens but since HRs violations against Palestinians happen more often than against Israelis, I personally condemn the Israeli military, in particular, not Jews, more often then Palestinian suicide bombers! Palestinians impact on Israel is also much less significant than the other way around, assuming they had a state anyway. Also, my little finger told me that when Palestinians rights will be respected, suicide bombers will cease to react that way because they will have no more cause to fight.

Obviously, this is one individual and she does not represent all of Amnesty International. But it can be enlightening to see how some of these people think. It is unbelievable that criticism of Israel is fine by Amnesty International, but criticism of a totalitarian dictatorship such as Iraq, with a madman like Saddam Hussein at the helm, is “propaganda”.

Just to put things into perspective, imagine for ten seconds that Israel were a Muslim country, and Palestinians and Iraqis were a Jewish. (Yes, I know, that sounds absurd, but just pretend for the sake of argument.) What do you think all the so-called “human rights activists” at Amnesty International would be doing? My bet is that they would be lobbying daily for war against Iraq, while defending Israel’s legitimate right to self-defence and mounting an international campaign against suicide bombings and terror attacks!

Makes you think, doesn’t it?