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Showing posts with label United Nations Human Rights Council. Show all posts
Showing posts with label United Nations Human Rights Council. Show all posts

Monday 9 July 2012

American drone strikes slammed!

Strong criticisms have emerged against the use of drones for killing people in several countries.

THE use of drones by one state to kill people in other countries is fast emerging as an international human rights issue of serious public concern.

This was evident in the recent session (June 18-July 6) of the Human Rights Council in Geneva, both in the official meetings and in NGO seminars.

The use of drones, or pilotless aircraft operated by remote control, by the government in one country to strike at persons and other targets in other countries, has been increasingly used by the United States in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen and Somalia.

Instead of following clear legal standards, the practice of drone attacks has become a vaguely defined and unaccountable “licence to kill”, according to a 2010 report of a UN human rights special rapporteur.

According to an article in The Guardian, the American Civil Liberties Union estimates that as many as 4,000 people have been killed in US drone strikes since 2002. Of those, a significant proportion were civilians.

The numbers killed have escalated significantly since Barack Obama became president.

Recent criticisms and concerns raised by officials, experts and governments about the use of drones include the high numbers of deaths and casualties of innocent civilians; possible violation of sovereignty and international human rights laws; lack of information, transparency and accountability; their being counter-productive; and the indirect encouragement to other countries to similarly use drone attacks.

The UN High Commissioner on Human Rights Navi Pillay in her overall report to the Human Rights Council on June 18 said that during her recent visit to Pakistan she expressed serious concern over the continuing use of armed drones for targeted attacks particularly because it was unclear that all persons targeted were combatants or directly participating in hostilities.

She added that the “UN secretary-general has expressed concern about the lack of transparency on the circumstances in which drones are used, noting that these attacks raise questions about compliance with distinction and proportionality.”

She reminded the US of their international obligation to take all necessary precautions to ensure that attacks comply with international law and urged them to conduct investigations that are transparent, credible and independent, and provide victims with effective remedies.

On June 26, Pakistan’s ambassador Zamir Akram told the council that his country was directly affected by the indiscriminate use of drones, and at least a thousand civilians, including women and children, have been killed in drone attacks.

“The government of Pakistan has maintained consistently that drone attacks are not only counter-productive but a violation of international law and Pakistan’s sovereignty,” said Akram, adding that Pakistan’s Parliament has called for an immediate end to these attacks.

“Regrettably this call has not been heeded. The drone attacks continue in violation of the UN Charter, international human rights and international humanitarian law. The international human rights machinery must clearly reject attempts to justify these actions.”

At the council on June 16, Christof Heyns, the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, called for more transparency and accountability from the US, according to a IPS news report.

He urged that a framework be developed and adhered to, and pressed for accurate records of civilian deaths. “I think we’re in for very dangerous precedents that can be used by countries on all sides,” he said.

At an event organised by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Heyns said the US drone attacks would encourage other states to flout human rights standards and suggested that some drone strikes may even be war crimes, according to a report in the London-based Guardian.

Criticisms are also coming from US groups and a former president. “The US has cobbled together its own legal framework for targeted killing, with standards that are far less stringent than the law allows,” Hina Shamsi, a director of the ACLU told the council on June 20, according to IPS.

Shamsi also took issue with the lack of transparency of military programmes based on what she called “a secret legal criteria, entirely secret evidence, and a secret process”.

“The international community’s concern about the US targeted killing programme is continuing to grow because of the unlawfully broad authority our government asserts to kill ‘suspected terrorists’ far from any battlefield, without meaningful transparency or accountability,” Shamsi told IPS.

The lack of a legal framework allows for drone strikes to be implemented at will, in non-conflict zones and on the basis of loosely defined terrorist threats, without permission from the host nation, added the IPS article.

“In essence, drones cancel out national sovereignty,” Tom Engelhardt, co-author of Terminator Planet: The First History of Drone Warfare, 2001-2050, told IPS. “The rules of the game are one country’s sovereignty trumps that of another.”

Former US President, Jimmy Carter, writing in the New York Times (June 24), noted that the use of US drone attacks “continues in areas of Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen that are not in any war zone. We don’t know how many hundreds of innocent civilians have been killed in these attacks, each one approved by the highest authorities in Washington. This would have been unthinkable in previous times.

“These policies clearly affect American foreign policy. Top intelligence and military officials as well as rights defenders in targeted areas affirm that the great escalation in drone attacks has turned aggrieved families toward terrorist organisations, aroused civilian populations against us ... As concerned citizens we must persuade Washington to reverse course and regain moral leadership according to international human rights norms.”

Drones were originally developed to gather intelligence.

More than 40 countries have this technology and some have or are seeking drones that can shoot laser-guided missiles, according to a pioneering 2010 report by the then UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Philip Alston.

They enable targeted killings with no risk to the personnel of the state carrying them out and can be operated remotely from the home state.

GLOBAL TRENDS By MARTIN KHOR


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Sunday 27 May 2012

China issues 2011 US human rights record

 


US human rights report is full of distortion & false accusations

China has hit back at the US State Department’s controversial annual human rights report, saying it is full of distortion and false accusations. China says the US should stop pointing its finger at human rights situations in other countries and regions, a notorious practice of interfering in their internal affairs. In a further response, China has released its own report into the US’s Human Rights Record last year.

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China’s report says the US is again pointing a finger at the human rights situation in nearly 200 countries and regions, including China. However, the US turns a blind eye to its own terrible rights situation and seldom mentions it in its controversial annual report. China’s report urges the US to face up to its own human rights violations.

China’s report says the United States has real strength in human, financial and material resources to exert effective control over violent crimes. However, its society suffers chronically from such crimes, and its people’s lives, properties and personal security lack proper protection. The US also has a high incidence of gun related crime.

The report says the violation of people’s civil and political rights by the government is severe. US citizens’ rights and freedom were seriously violated during the "Occupy Wall Street" movement, with tens of thousands of protesters arrested. While advocating media and Internet freedom, the US in fact imposes fairly strict restrictions on the media and cyberspace. The US regards itself as the "beacon of democracy". However, its democracy is largely based on money.

China’s report says the US is the world’s richest country, but Americans’ economic, social and cultural rights are going from bad to worse. Unemployment remains high and the gap between the rich and the poor is continuing to widen. It also notes the number of people classed as poor in the US has hit a record high. More than 46 million Americans were in poverty in 2010, 2.6 million more than a year earlier. The number of American people without health insurance has increased progressively each year.

The report also says racial discrimination is deep-seated in the US. Minority groups regularly confront discrimination at work. They also face inequality in education. Racial discrimination is evident in law enforcement and judicial systems, racial hate crimes are frequent, and immigrants’ rights and interests are not guaranteed.

The rights of women and children rights are suffering. Gender discrimination against women exists widely in the US, and women in the country often experience sexual assault and violence. The report also says many children in the US live in poverty. Violence against children is severe.

The report points out the US has a notorious record of international human rights violations, imposing illegal medical tests on people in other countries. The US-led wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have caused large numbers of civilian casualties. The report also says the US continues to violate the living and development rights of Cubans.

The report says the US has taken human rights as a political instrument to defame other nations in its own strategic interest. While illustrating a dismal record of the US on its own human rights, China’s report says the US is not justified in posing as the world’s fighter for human justice. It uses double standards in evaluating human rights conditions in other countries. China reiterates its stance of opposing foreign intervention in its internal affairs under the pretext of human rights.