Africa/Global: Governments betraying human rights standards

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL PRESS RELEASE
AI Index: POL 10/006/2005
25 May 2005

(London) Governments are betraying their promise of a world order
based on human rights and are pursuing a dangerous new agenda, said
Amnesty International today as it launched its annual assessment of
global human rights.

Speaking at the launch of the Amnesty International Report 2005, the
organization's Secretary General Irene Khan said that governments had
failed to show principled leadership and must be held to account.

"Governments are betraying their promises on human rights. A new
agenda is in the making with the language of freedom and justice
being used to pursue policies of fear and insecurity. This includes
cynical attempts to redefine and sanitise torture," said Irene Khan.

This new agenda, combined with the indifference and paralysis of the
international community, failed countless thousands of people in
humanitarian crises and forgotten conflicts throughout 2004.

In Darfur, the Sudanese government generated a human rights
catastrophe and the international community did too little too late
to address the crisis, betraying hundreds of thousands of people.

In Haiti, individuals responsible for serious human rights
violations were allowed to regain positions of power. In the eastern
Democratic Republic of Congo there was no effective response to the
systematic rape of tens of thousands of women, children and even
babies. Despite the holding of elections, Afghanistan slipped into a
downward spiral of lawlessness and instability. Violence was endemic
in Iraq.

At a national level governments betrayed human rights at terrible
cost to ordinary people. Russian soldiers reportedly tortured, raped
and sexually abused Chechen women with impunity. Zimbabwe’s
government manipulated food shortages for political reasons.

The betrayal of human rights by governments was accompanied by
increasingly horrific acts of terrorism as armed groups stooped to
new levels of brutality.

"The televised beheading of captives in Iraq, the taking of over a
thousand people hostage including hundreds of children in a school in
Beslan and the massacre of hundreds of commuters in Madrid shocked
the world. Yet governments are failing to confront their lack of
success in addressing terrorism, persisting with failed but
politically-convenient strategies. Four years after 9/11, the promise
to make the world a safer place remains hollow," said Ms Khan.

The US administration’s attempts to dilute the absolute ban on
torture through new policies and quasi-management speak such as
"environmental manipulation", "stress positions" and "sensory
manipulation", was one of the most damaging assaults on global
values.

Despite the US administration’s repeated use of the language of
justice and freedom there was a huge gap between rhetoric and
reality. This was starkly illustrated by the failure to conduct a
full and independent investigation into the appalling torture and
ill-treatment of detainees by US soldiers in Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison
and the failure to hold senior individuals to account.

"The USA, as the unrivalled political, military and economic
hyper-power, sets the tone for governmental behaviour worldwide. 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 Irene Khan.

Many governments showed a shocking contempt for the rule of law.
Nigeria granted Charles Taylor, former President of Liberia, refugee
status despite his indictment for killings, mutilations and rape.
Israel’s construction of a barrier inside the occupied West Bank
ignored the International Court of Justice opinion that this violated
international human rights and humanitarian law. Arbitrary detentions
and unfair trials took place under security legislation in a number
of countries.

There were also signs of hope in 2004 said Ms Khan.

Legal challenges to the new agenda included US Supreme Court
judgements on Guantánamo detainees and the ruling by the UK Law Lords
on indefinite detention without charge or trial of "terrorist
suspects". Public pressure included the spontaneous turnout of
millions of people in Spain protesting against the Madrid bombings,
popular uprisings in Georgia and Ukraine and the growing debate on
political change in the Middle East.

"Increasingly, the duplicity of governments and the brutality of
armed groups are being challenged - by judicial decisions, popular
resistance, public pressure and UN reform initiatives. The challenge
for the human rights movement is to harness the power of civil
society and push governments to deliver on their human rights
promises," said Irene Khan.

For a full copy of the Amnesty International Report 2005: the state
of the world's human rights please go to:
http://www.amnesty.org/report2005 {http://www.amnesty.org/report2005}