Today, the UN Human Rights Council approved the nomination of Miklos Haraszti as the new Special Rapporteur on Belarus. Good! He's the perfect man for the job, and I was rooting for him. The other candidates included two Russian NGO leaders active at the UN and OSCE competing against each other (?), but I think no Russian, good or bad, should be appointed in this position so that the mandate isn't either owned or disowned by Russia.
Haraszi is from Hungary, which doesn't have any fresh beef with Russia, if you don't count that Soviet invasion in 1956. Hungary itself has backslide on press freedom, as Haraszti himself has had to point out, in his position as the Representative on Media Freedom for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. I have known Haraszti since his days as a dissident samizdat editor in Hungary in the days of the Soviet empire, and he has consistently been an informed and skilled advovcate for free media. To work these multilateral institutions effectively, you have to be seased at being an insider at them, and he has that experience for years at OSCE; you also have to have the passion being an NGO activist gives you -- but I actually tend to favour skilled bureaucrats than NGOs in these jobs, because often I find, there is nothing worse than when an NGO comes to power. They become more secretive and even more bureaucratic than the foreign service officials. I don't think Haraszti suffers from that problem -- while he may have hung with the ratty sweater set in his day, he has held real jobs as a professor, published articles and books and so on.
Now, you would think that a candidate with a solid record as an international civil servant, if you will, for years at OSCE, and from Hungary, would be suitable for Russia. After all, knowing Russian is an asset in this job, and nearly a requirement -- quite frankly, since the Belarusian dictator won't let these type of mandate-holders on to their territory, the job will consist of having to watch the press, talk to NGOs, and try to convince Russia and other post-Soviet allies propping up the dictatorship to do less of that.
Well, you would be wrong if you would think this candidate would be suitable for Russia -- and likely even Yuri Dzhibladze, one Russian NGO advocate who is always approved enough by the Russian government to be on Putin's Presidential Council for Human Rights would not be satisfactory. In fact, they don't even support the mandate.
And here, as if beamed on the sky in lights, is an interesting document that basically says everything there is to say about what's wrong with Russia, and what's wrong with these multilateral institutions like the OSCE and UN and Council of Europe that are increasingly getting paralyzed by Russia.
The press releases below from the UN really highlight the bad faith, the manipulations, the non-compliance, and therefore the paralysis of these bodies -- due to the Kremlin. Bad-faith with the same bad ideas like Venezuela and Cuba are tapped for operations like opposing this basic human rights mandate for Belarus; Cuba is particularly malicious and mendatious in its interventions here as you can see. Venezuela is laughable -- the whole idea of special rapporteurs dealing with human rights problems caused often by governments themselves is that they have to enter countries to examine the situation. If the government under question has a veto on entry, that's not a very independent and effective institution, now, is it?! Yet the Chavez regime insists that it has credibility advocating for "true" human rights and was for "genuine" dialogue and against "double standards". Double standards are in fact what every one of these countries sounding off to protect that lunatic in Minsk are all about!
China -- no surprise there, with their "dialogue" shtick -- which means, let's substitute real human rights progress with endless choreographed, stilted official chat sessions punished by threat of suspension for the slightest discouraging word. Sri Lanka -- now there's a country that got a horrific pass for its massacre of its people at this same body at the UN, discrediting it thoroughly.
So here you can see it, pasted below -- this chorus of unsupportable slams on the West as bias (um, do we really disagree about the state of human rights in Belarus when a parliamentary election doesn't get a single opposition seat, when most of the alternative candidates in the presidential elections wound up being thrown in jail and tortured?!) And the demand for people outside the region as supposedly unbiased with the endless insatiable "geographical distribution" problem at the UN (read: let's have every one of the permanent 5 veto-holders on the UN Security Council in every office that might actually do something in order to hobble its work). That's why we get people without the most commonly used languages of the Eurasian region, say African Francophones, dealing with these habitual massive human rights offenders unevenly -- and avoiding the countries where they actually know something but where they would be blocked by the despots of their continent.
Anything to block real independent monitoring and advocacy and anything to block scrutiny.
When you see the lousy excuses these serial, massive human rights abusers give for not doing anything on Belarus -- the same ones they use, BTW, for not acting on Syria or Iran or Sudan -- you see where the problems are in the world. They are not in Washington. They are not about the Anglo-American club. they aren't about the evil imperialist West. That is, the Soviet-style fellow travellers you still find out there (like Wikileaks' spokesman for the region) and even just "concerned progressives" will claim that the US bangs on Belarus simply because it can, and is silent about worse offenses in Uzbekistan.
True. But look at the setting of the world's human rights bodies, and you get why Washington has to overcompensate. The outrageous, conniving destructiveness here. This mandate won't even get to enter the country. He'll try, he'll write letters, he'll issue some statements of alarm about this or that case of imprisonment or torture or website closure, he'll write a report. And yet, doing his job, doing the most minimal that a UN official can do, he will be denied legitimacy by China, Russia, and others as if he is, oh, sanctioning mass murder in Syria like they are. You know, doing something oh-so-horrible.
In stark relief, you see why it is so hard to get things done, now only at the UN Human Rights Council, but anywhere. While the global leftist circuit might not be terribly interested in Belarus -- they get up their appetite only if they can bash a Western capitalist corporation related to the issue -- they can at least reluctantly concede that Belarus has a low human rights record and Lukashenka, whatever his ardent friendship with his fellow dictators in Iran and Venezuela, is not a force for progress in the world. So they ought to be able to detect with this red-dyed UN press release where the real problems in the world -- those regimes that they never seem to cross the street to go after. But they don't. That's why I want to keep this handy.
See for yourself:
Cuba said it had an objection to the proposals put forward and said that, in the matter of nominations, there was discrimination against Cuba. In the election of the Special Rapporteur on Belarus, fluency in Russian should not have been a criterion of selection, said Cuba and added that there needed to be more consistency in the nominations. It was problematic that a national of the European Union was nominated for the Special Rapporteur on Belarus, because the European Union was a major proponent of the resolution. Cuba was not ready to accept the proposed candidate from Hungary as mandate holder for Belarus.Russia said that it had voted against the Human Rights Council resolution on Belarus which it believed was full of prejudice and excluded Belarus rather than included it in dialogue. Russia did not support anyone as Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus.
China believed in constructive dialogue and was against politicization in the issues of human rights. Most of the members of the Human Rights Council had either voted against or abstained in the vote on establishing the mandate on Belarus. China would not participate in the selection of the Special Rapporteur on this country.
Austria said that the appointment of mandate holders was not an easy task and the Consultative Group did not take it lightly. Since the beginning, several names had been proposed in order to allow flexibility in consultations and there was no reason to challenge the President and the proposals made.
LAURA LASSERRE DUPUY, President of the Human Rights Council said that nominations were not a question of personal choice or regional groups, but followed the rules and eligibility of candidates. Regional affiliation of candidates needed to be taken into account to ensure equality. It was a prerogative of the President to decide among the proposed candidates and she noted the need for objectivity, independence and integrity in carrying out the mandate.
The Council then endorsed the proposed list of candidates for the Special Procedures.
Cuba said that it was the responsibility of the President to appoint the mandate holder and regretted that Cuba was not able to support the candidate for the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Belarus.
Belarus said that in connection with the appointment of a candidate as Special Rapporteur on Belarus, Belarus did not recognize that decision of the Council. Given his past experience, Mr. Haraszti would not be able to carry out his mandate in an objective and impartial fashion. Pursuant to the United Nations Charter, Belarus would continue to ensure the fundamental rights and freedoms and within its jurisdiction, the rights of its own citizens, via the law, and not via the sentiments of the Special Rapporteur. The European Union initiatives in the Human Rights Council were seen as a political campaign of defamation against Belarus.
Venezuela said that it categorically refused the appointment of the Special Rapporteur on Belarus, which was a hostile measure that violated the principle of sovereignty, especially as it was not accepted by the country concerned. The mandate fed political confrontation. Venezuela reaffirmed its historical condemnation and denunciation of this serious threat to the true promotion and protection of human rights. It was absolutely vital for the Council to ensure it appealed for genuine dialogue, without double standards or politicization.
Sri Lanka reiterated its consistent position that action initiated in the promotion and protection of human rights of a country had to have the consent of that country, and be based on the principles of cooperation and genuine dialogue aimed at strengthening the domestic capacity of the country to comply with its human rights obligations for the benefit of its people. Sri Lanka was firmly of the view that the Council should not be seen to encourage debates and resolutions on country-specific situation by virtue of selective processes that ran counter to its founding principles.
Eritrea noted the decision of the Council to refer the situation in Eritrea to the public and reminded the Council to abide by the principles of neutrality and impartiality. The Council had clearly violated the provisions prohibiting politicised action and had not justified its motion to disregard those basic principles and criteria of admissibility. Eritrea therefore rejected the decision of the Council because it was politically motivated and did not accept the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on Eritrea.
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For extra credit, read the kind of factology the Kremlin indulges in -- which is so eerily similar to the "progressive" factology we constantly have in the US on the left around the elections -- and in fact, decades ago, the Kremlin is exactly where the Marxist "scientists" got this method.
The situation on Syria had been exacerbated, the news agencies were using false information and Russia understood that it was difficult to work in such conditions. Russia called on the Commission of Inquiry to act objectively and use verified facts and avoid using information that would intensify the conflict in Syria.
And note that the US is the cheese standing alone on two resolutions, one on "the right to development" and a complicated addition to an existing treaty on combating racism.
The US doesn't recognize the econonic rights implied by "right to development" and prevers to, well, just develop, using the civil and political liberties. I think the millions of people from all over the world who immigrate to the US agree.
And the US won't endorse the flawed "Durban Declaration" which is what you have to do if you endorse anything related to racism these days at the UN -- because that concluding document out of the controversial UN World Conference Against Racism in Durban, South Africa in 2001 (which I attended) singled out Israel alone among all countries and implied it had a state racist policy. I see that this appalling Durbanized notion, fueled by the BDS movement, has succeeded in turning even Tom Friedman, who is implying that Israel might have an "apartheid" system. Gah. This is tendentious thinking masterminded from Cuba and the ANC.
Also problematic around racism work is the persistent attempt by the Organization for Islamic Conference to keep pushing for a global blasphemy law in the form of a resolution on "defamation of religion". Alarmingly, Obama himself has seemed to tacitly agree with this in his recent UN General Assembly speech where he spoke of how the "future should not belong to those who slander the prophet Mohammed." Dear God in heaven, who is going to decide what constitutes slander of religious figures?! the UN? With bad-faith actors like the ones I've exhibited here in this press release?!
The US usually prefers to do, not say, and despite what Obama himself has said, the position at the UN is not to endorse anything that looks like it concedes a notion of blasphemy.
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