John Whitehead's Commentary
In the Fight for Human Rights, Where Does America Really Stand?
"A regime that talks most of some value is a regime that consciously or unconsciously denies that value and prevents it from existing."
--Jacques Ellul, The Political Illusion
Americans are confronted with an extreme paradox. While we witness our civil liberties erode on an ever-increasing basis at home, the U.S. government continues to proclaim itself a champion of human rights abroad.
That concern for the rights of the oppressed surfaced in remarks President Bush made last fall before the United Nations General Assembly. In justifying the need to take military action against Iraq, he said,
Iraq continues to commit extremely grave violations of human rights, and...the regime's repression is all pervasive. Tens of thousands of political opponents and ordinary citizens have been subjected to arbitrary arrest and imprisonment, summary execution, and torture by beating and burning, electric shock, starvation, mutilation, and rape.... Liberty for the Iraqi people is a great moral cause, and a great strategic goal.
Thus, as part of the Bush Administration's so-called efforts to liberate the Iraqi people from a barbarous tyrant, the U.S. launched Operation Iraqi Freedom. Fittingly, several weeks later the U.S. State Department issued its annual report detailing a host of additional countries whose human rights records range from poor to abysmal. The list included China, Pakistan, Israel, Palestine, Uzbekistan, Eritrea, Qatar, Kuwait, Colombia, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador and Venezuela.
However, for a country so concerned about the atrocities being committed against the Iraqi people, the State Department report barely caused a ripple among politicians, journalists or the American public. A quick glance at some of the atrocities committed by nations equally culpable--if not more so--as Iraq should cause our national conscience to quake in shame at our hypocrisy.
For example, according to the report, America's ally China has a long list of violations. These include instances of "killings, torture and mistreatment of prisoners, forced confessions, arbitrary arrest and detention, lengthy incommunicado detention and denial of due process." And yet even in the face of China's outright oppression of its own people, the Bush Administration this year decided not to push for a resolution condemning China at this year's U.N. Commission on Human Rights.
In Sudan, government security forces regularly beat, harassed, arrested and detained those opposing the government. Reports have also surfaced of government militias beating refugees, raping women abducted during raids and harassing and detaining individuals on the basis of their religion. Female genital mutilation (FGM) remains a widespread practice. Overall, the Sudanese government continues to severely restrict the freedoms of speech, assembly, association, religion, and movement.
In western Afghanistan, the Herat-based warlord Ismail Khan has stamped out all dissent, muzzled the press and bundled women back into their burqas--relegating them to a state of affairs similar to life under the Taliban. Those who resist face death threats, detention and sometimes even torture.
In Pakistan, another American ally, General Pervez Musharraf has laid down the foundations for a police state, extending his term in office by five years and putting in place a military-dominated National Security Council to oversee civilian government.
In regions across Africa, AIDS and sexual violence have transformed the landscape into one in which women and girls have become targets of gang rape, violent abduction followed by repeated rapes and amputation of breasts and sexual organs.
And last, but far from least, let us not overlook the continued killing of civilians in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the ongoing atrocities committed during wars in Colombia, Chechnya, and the Democratic Republic of Congo or the repressive dictatorships that remain in such places as Burma, China, Iraq, North Korea, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam.
The charge has been made that human rights are dispensable to the U.S. in the name of fighting terrorism. As Human Rights Watch points out,
Despite its declared policy of supporting human rights, Washington in fighting terrorism has refused to be bound by human rights standards. Despite its tradition at home of a government under law, Washington has rejected legal constraints when acting abroad. Despite a constitutional order that is premised on the need to impose checks and balances, Washington seems to want an international order that places no limits on a nation's use of power save its own avowed good intentions. These attitudes jeopardize the campaign against terrorism. They also put at risk the human rights ideal.
Harsh words, indeed, coming from an organization dedicated to acting as a watchdog for human rights worldwide. But are they unjustified in their condemnation?
In his preface to the State Department human rights report, Secretary of State Colin Powell wrote that "[w]e gain little by ignoring human rights abuses or flinching from reporting them... [I]n truth, no country is exempt from scrutiny, and all countries benefit from constant striving to identify their weaknesses and improve their performance in this less-than-perfect world. In a world marching toward democracy and respect for human rights, the United States is a leader, a partner and a contributor."
Are these merely empty words, or is the U.S. really serious about human rights? If we truly intend to be a leader, a partner and a contributor in the fight for human rights, then words are not enough. We must begin to act on what we say, both here at home and abroad. For too long, our foreign policies have turned a blind eye to these human rights atrocities in favor of U.S. economic interests.
If America is to be a champion of human rights on the world stage, we need to be a consistent champion. We must begin by showing a genuine concern for people in general. We must begin by valuing human life.
It's time to stop playing politics with human life. This means that it's time to show the world that we mean what we say--or else we should stop saying it. As a result of our military actions in Iraq, our international credibility has taken a nosedive. In fact, in a Time magazine poll conducted prior to the outbreak of military action in Iraq, 86.9% of the people polled stated that the U.S. posed the greatest danger to world peace--even more so than Iraq or North Korea.
If we're serious about standing up for human rights--as we claimed during the Iraq hostilities--then it's time to act on it. There are hundreds of countries with deplorable human rights records--and millions of oppressed people just waiting for a champion.
After Iraq, what's next in our so-called quest to do the right thing? Will we turn a blind eye to the suffering of the Sudanese? The mutilation of the young African girls? The political persecution of the freedom fighters in Burma and China? The world is watching our next steps.
Constitutional attorney and author John W. Whitehead is founder and president of The Rutherford Institute. He can be contacted at johnw@rutherford.org.
--Jacques Ellul, The Political Illusion
Americans are confronted with an extreme paradox. While we witness our civil liberties erode on an ever-increasing basis at home, the U.S. government continues to proclaim itself a champion of human rights abroad.
That concern for the rights of the oppressed surfaced in remarks President Bush made last fall before the United Nations General Assembly. In justifying the need to take military action against Iraq, he said,
Iraq continues to commit extremely grave violations of human rights, and...the regime's repression is all pervasive. Tens of thousands of political opponents and ordinary citizens have been subjected to arbitrary arrest and imprisonment, summary execution, and torture by beating and burning, electric shock, starvation, mutilation, and rape.... Liberty for the Iraqi people is a great moral cause, and a great strategic goal.
Thus, as part of the Bush Administration's so-called efforts to liberate the Iraqi people from a barbarous tyrant, the U.S. launched Operation Iraqi Freedom. Fittingly, several weeks later the U.S. State Department issued its annual report detailing a host of additional countries whose human rights records range from poor to abysmal. The list included China, Pakistan, Israel, Palestine, Uzbekistan, Eritrea, Qatar, Kuwait, Colombia, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador and Venezuela.
However, for a country so concerned about the atrocities being committed against the Iraqi people, the State Department report barely caused a ripple among politicians, journalists or the American public. A quick glance at some of the atrocities committed by nations equally culpable--if not more so--as Iraq should cause our national conscience to quake in shame at our hypocrisy.
For example, according to the report, America's ally China has a long list of violations. These include instances of "killings, torture and mistreatment of prisoners, forced confessions, arbitrary arrest and detention, lengthy incommunicado detention and denial of due process." And yet even in the face of China's outright oppression of its own people, the Bush Administration this year decided not to push for a resolution condemning China at this year's U.N. Commission on Human Rights.
In Sudan, government security forces regularly beat, harassed, arrested and detained those opposing the government. Reports have also surfaced of government militias beating refugees, raping women abducted during raids and harassing and detaining individuals on the basis of their religion. Female genital mutilation (FGM) remains a widespread practice. Overall, the Sudanese government continues to severely restrict the freedoms of speech, assembly, association, religion, and movement.
In western Afghanistan, the Herat-based warlord Ismail Khan has stamped out all dissent, muzzled the press and bundled women back into their burqas--relegating them to a state of affairs similar to life under the Taliban. Those who resist face death threats, detention and sometimes even torture.
In Pakistan, another American ally, General Pervez Musharraf has laid down the foundations for a police state, extending his term in office by five years and putting in place a military-dominated National Security Council to oversee civilian government.
In regions across Africa, AIDS and sexual violence have transformed the landscape into one in which women and girls have become targets of gang rape, violent abduction followed by repeated rapes and amputation of breasts and sexual organs.
And last, but far from least, let us not overlook the continued killing of civilians in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the ongoing atrocities committed during wars in Colombia, Chechnya, and the Democratic Republic of Congo or the repressive dictatorships that remain in such places as Burma, China, Iraq, North Korea, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam.
The charge has been made that human rights are dispensable to the U.S. in the name of fighting terrorism. As Human Rights Watch points out,
Despite its declared policy of supporting human rights, Washington in fighting terrorism has refused to be bound by human rights standards. Despite its tradition at home of a government under law, Washington has rejected legal constraints when acting abroad. Despite a constitutional order that is premised on the need to impose checks and balances, Washington seems to want an international order that places no limits on a nation's use of power save its own avowed good intentions. These attitudes jeopardize the campaign against terrorism. They also put at risk the human rights ideal.
Harsh words, indeed, coming from an organization dedicated to acting as a watchdog for human rights worldwide. But are they unjustified in their condemnation?
In his preface to the State Department human rights report, Secretary of State Colin Powell wrote that "[w]e gain little by ignoring human rights abuses or flinching from reporting them... [I]n truth, no country is exempt from scrutiny, and all countries benefit from constant striving to identify their weaknesses and improve their performance in this less-than-perfect world. In a world marching toward democracy and respect for human rights, the United States is a leader, a partner and a contributor."
Are these merely empty words, or is the U.S. really serious about human rights? If we truly intend to be a leader, a partner and a contributor in the fight for human rights, then words are not enough. We must begin to act on what we say, both here at home and abroad. For too long, our foreign policies have turned a blind eye to these human rights atrocities in favor of U.S. economic interests.
If America is to be a champion of human rights on the world stage, we need to be a consistent champion. We must begin by showing a genuine concern for people in general. We must begin by valuing human life.
It's time to stop playing politics with human life. This means that it's time to show the world that we mean what we say--or else we should stop saying it. As a result of our military actions in Iraq, our international credibility has taken a nosedive. In fact, in a Time magazine poll conducted prior to the outbreak of military action in Iraq, 86.9% of the people polled stated that the U.S. posed the greatest danger to world peace--even more so than Iraq or North Korea.
If we're serious about standing up for human rights--as we claimed during the Iraq hostilities--then it's time to act on it. There are hundreds of countries with deplorable human rights records--and millions of oppressed people just waiting for a champion.
After Iraq, what's next in our so-called quest to do the right thing? Will we turn a blind eye to the suffering of the Sudanese? The mutilation of the young African girls? The political persecution of the freedom fighters in Burma and China? The world is watching our next steps.
Constitutional attorney and author John W. Whitehead is founder and president of The Rutherford Institute. He can be contacted at johnw@rutherford.org.
ABOUT JOHN W. WHITEHEAD
Constitutional attorney and author John W. Whitehead is founder and president of The Rutherford Institute. His most recent books are the best-selling Battlefield America: The War on the American People, the award-winning A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State, and a debut dystopian fiction novel, The Erik Blair Diaries. Whitehead can be contacted at staff@rutherford.org. Nisha Whitehead is the Executive Director of The Rutherford Institute. Information about The Rutherford Institute is available at www.rutherford.org.
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