Failures of the UN Human Rights Council

From Anne Bayefsky at National Review Online:

"When the Council was first created a new “universal periodic review” (UPR) mechanism — to permit the examination of human rights in every state starting with current members — was touted as a serious part of its duties. Only real human-rights promoters would want to withstand the heat of three-hour conversations once every five years and so it would act as an incentive to keep the bad guys off. At this Council session they agreed on a timetable to conduct reviews. Guess what? Israel — with a snowball’s chance in hell of ever being on the Council — was among the first to be reviewed. Current members and human-rights enthusiasts Saudi Arabia, China, Cuba, Russia, and Azerbaijan come later. Iran is three years away. And Syria, Sudan, and Zimbabwe are in 2011. If they play their cards right, they can run for office in 2008 and rotate off the Council before the review even gets around to them.

Resolutions adopted Friday included stalwarts from the Council’s discredited predecessor, the Human Rights Commission — “human rights and international solidarity” and “human rights and unilateral coercive measures” — the usual nonsense aimed straight at the West and all values democratic.

There was a dandy resolution on the Durban II racism conference — the newest U.N. forum for anti-semites from around the world being planned for 2009. The resolution calls for the Libyan Chair of the Preparatory Committee to come to New York to present a report in person to the General Assembly. (Distributing the written report is not good enough.) The cost of the visit? $8,400 according to the Secretariat — for a 15-30 minute presentation. In case you were wondering, American taxpayers will pay 22 percent of those costs.

Then there were lots of resolutions on racism — all designed to bring hysterical accusations of Islamophobia and dastardly cartoons to the fore. In line with the sponsors’ genuine concern for religious discrimination, Pakistan objected to “Jewish holidays” being used as a pretext for violating the human rights of Palestinians.

At the insistence of the OIC, a new clause has become de rigueur for the mandate of every investigator on every human rights subject, country-oriented or thematic. The provision imposes a code of conduct which threatens to seriously interfere with their independence,

My personal favorite was the Egyptian-led resolution, entitled “From rhetoric to reality: a global call for concrete action against racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance.” Adopted over the negative votes of all Western and Eastern European democracies, who are totally outnumbered in the Council, it

decides that the future agenda of the Intergovernmental Working Group will focus on the following paramount issues…re-aligning the work and name of the Anti-Discrimination Unit in the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights…and that, henceforth, this Unit shall be known as “The Anti-Racial Discrimination Unit,” and that its operational activities shall focus exclusively on racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, as defined in…the Durban Declaration.

In other words, for anybody who has any idea of talking about anything but Islamophobia, you’re days are numbered.

In the meantime, the day-to-day camaraderie of the UN Human Rights Council proved a comfortable place to express the following sentiments:

Egypt: “…the offensive publication of portraits of the Prophet Mohamed…has highlighted the damage that freedom of speech if left unchecked may lead to, not only hurting the religious feelings of more than a billion people, but also their freedom of religion and their right for respect of their religion.”

Pakistan, on behalf of the OIC: “…terrorist acts carried out by non-state actors, in the name of religion, should be de-linked from religion to ensure freedom of religion for the peaceful followers of that faith.”

Pakistan, on behalf of the OIC: “The international community must address the root causes of terrorism, such as the situations of grave injustice and repression involving Muslims, and conditions of poverty and lack of opportunity, which fuel extremism and terrorism.”

Syria: “Freedom of opinion had been utilized to humiliate Islam and to cause hatred and instigate violence.”

Bangladesh: “…freedom of expression…cannot be absolute nor infinite. It must be exercised with respect and responsibility…”

Iran: “…the right to freedom of expression is not absolute.”

Pakistan, on behalf of the OIC: “Islamophobia is also a crude form of anti-Semitism.”

Algeria: “…there is an upswing in anti-Semitism that now targets Arabs… and Muslims.”"

"Our Dead Are Our Fault"

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Durban II; It Ain't Dick!

In an opinion/essay follow up to Saturday’s post “UN Summit: Boycott Israel” posted by Basti comes this from Anne Bayefsky at NRO, “Durban II; the coming “anti-racist” spectacle.”

“Last Friday in Geneva, the U.N. launched a two-year plan which will culminate in a full-throated anti-American and anti-Israel world conference on racism in 2009. Modeled on the notorious 2001 Durban “anti-racism” conference, Durban II similarly promises to attract terrorist sympathizers and anti-Semites from around the globe. The spectacle of last week’s planning session might be described as the theater of the absurd, except that the check handed to the American taxpayer for 22 percent of the costs was very real.”

The UN has many different offices that work toward “peace” on earth, one of which is the “powerful” Security Council, however, with all the interest groups that help direct government on the planet the Security Council doesn’t hold the propaganda sway that others do.

Consider the “Human Rights Council,” the lead instigator in the revisiting Durban I and serving as the preparatory committee (PredCom) for Durban II:

“At its third session, the Human Rights Council in its resolution 3/2 decided that the Human Rights Council will act as the Preparatory Committee for the Durban Review Conference which shall be open to the participation of all Member States of the United Nations and members of the specialized agencies and also to the participation of observers in accordance with the established practice of the General Assembly. It further decided that at its organizational sessions the Preparatory Committee shall elect, on the basis of equitable geographic representation, a bureau for the Preparatory Committee and that, at the same session, the Preparatory Committee shall decided on all the relevant modalities for the Conference in accordance with established practice of the General Assembly, including deciding on the objectives of the Review Conference, the level at which the Review Conference shall be convened, regional preparatory initiatives, date and venue.”

According to Bayefsky:

“On the first day of the session the PrepCom elected Libya as its chair, Cuba as rapporteur, and Iran as a member of its executive — to plan a conference about human rights.”

The Organization of the Islamic Conference or OIC (for entertainment purposes glance at some of the OIC news on its homepage) holds the majority of seats on the African and Asian regional groups, so it effectively is in charge in the quest to guide the world in recognizing and doing something about human rights.

Some of the PrepCom’s issues it would like to and very likely will include are:

• adopting objectives far beyond the original idea of a “Durban review conference”;
• creating another U.N. committee to prepare for Durban II;
• issuing special participation invitations only to the U.N. investigators (rapporteurs) on racism and Islamophobia, and freedom of religion;
• adopting new rules of procedure especially designed for the Conference;
• introducing vetting for a pre-conference questionnaire that might have asked potentially intrusive questions of states about actual protection from discrimination;
• paying for the Durban II preparations from the U.N.’s regular budget (that is the West); and
• allowing every NGO that participated in Durban I to participate in Durban II unless objections were made in just 14 days.

These are pretty cute when you take a look at them and fall pretty much in line with any UN led initiative including the usual lack of accountability that defines the “austere” body. Rather than pacify, members of this committee are those that enflamed Islamic sensibilities during the “InkQuisition.”

The unrecognized war of civilizations continues with the usual suspects in the UN in the lead.

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Organization of the Islamic Conference Allies in the War on Terror

It’s always a pleasure when Mark Steyn’s work at National Review is available to the general non-subscribing public because it is at that time that I feel the most comfortable quoting and linking to something he has written.

In the July 16^th issue of National Review and available at Steyn Online is “Denial is a river in Washington.” In it he takes the various Western nations governments to task in their overly obsessive PC etiquette in conducting the war on terror. Read it and enjoy, but I am posting from within his essay to the references he makes to the Organization of the Islamic Conference.

Western leaders, including most recently Jacqui Smith, the British Home Secretary under Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who was quoted as saying ‘“Any attempt to identify a murderous ideology with a great faith such as Islam is wrong, and needs to be denied.”’ This is in line with Brown’s disallowing the use of the word “Muslim” in any reference or connection with terrorism, as Steyn quoted from The Daily Express, “The shake-up is part of a fresh attempt to improve community relations and avoid offending Muslims.”

How we are expected to get anywhere in the war on terror is unknowable if we cannot in all seriousness use that which recent history is providing as example I do not know.

One of those groups that work to protect the Muslim identity is the Organization of the Islamic Conference; which in and of itself is very honorable and commendable. This honor is undeserved however when one of the conferences guidelines is to identify various terrorist entities as not terrorist due to their definition of the struggle.

Quoting Steyn with four quotes from the organizations 2002 “Declaration on International Terrorism;” the four that Steyn quotes are:

“5. We reject any attempt to link Islam and Muslims to terrorism as terrorism has no association with any religion, civilization or nationality;”

Fine. Whatever. Religion-of-peace boilerplate.

“10. We reject any attempt to link terrorism to the struggle of the Palestinian people in the exercise of their inalienable right to establish their independent state with Al-Quds Al-Sharif as its capital;”

Er, okay. That gives a pass to Hamas and the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade and whatnot…

“11. We reject any attempt to associate Islamic states or Palestinian and Lebanese resistance with terrorism, which constitutes an impediment to the global struggle against terrorism;”

…and that pretty much absolves Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and everybody else. So are there any actual terrorists operating anywhere today that this “International Declaration” is designed to cover?

“12. We condemn Israel for its escalating…”

Why then do we and our leaders stoop and bow to this group and others like it (C.A.I.R. anyone) as though we have the same intended outcome? We certainly do not want to offend anyone and turn them off from assisting in wiping this current scourge from the earth; but if truth offends it is not the messengers fault.

We, nor can anyone else get to the root of any problem by ignoring the basis of the problem or those involved from the very beginning.

One point of interest that Steyn did not quote was the laughable connection to the U.N. when in regard to the groups currently involved in “national” struggles as opposed to “terrorism:”

“14. We reaffirm our commitment to international action in combating international terrorism undertaken in conformity with the principles of the Charter of United Nations, including the principles of non-intervention in internal affairs and respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as international law and relevant international conventions and instruments;”

Would the conference recognize this “charter” if it hadn’t at first identified that which it refuses to see as terrorist? No it would not since it would not fit within the “charter.”

The OIC is an organization that leadership looks to in the joint effort of combating terrorism, yet the OIC’s bottom line is combating the war on terror, leaving time and space to allow for the possibility of victory in behalf of terrorist organizations. This is very apparent when one reads the Declaration on International Terrorism; and in closing the offering of the conferences “Convention on Combating International Terrorism, which begins:

“Pursuant to the tenets of the tolerant Islamic Sharia which reject all forms of violence and terrorism, and in particular specially those based on extremism and call for protection of human rights, which provisions are paralleled by the principles and rules of international law founded on cooperation between peoples for the establishment of peace;”

Wondering already where they get the gall? Read on…

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