September 2002

OUTGOING U.N. HUMAN RIGHTS CHIEF REPEATS CRITICISMS AGAINST U.S.

As she ends her term as the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson reiterates her condemnation of the policies that the United States implemented after the 11 September terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

By Gustavo Capdevila

Geneva: Mary Robinson ends her term as the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights reiterating her condemnation of the policies that the United States implemented after the 11 September terrorist attacks in New York and Washington.

Robinson noted that following the suicide attacks against the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, numerous countries had introduced reforms in their legislation and legal procedures that were not in line with the basic international standards for human rights.

The US has the duty to establish higher standards because other nations use the loopholes in US legislation to justify their own rights abuses, she said on 10 September, her second-last day as the UN's chief human rights official.

She explained in a press conference delivered in French that it is necessary to criticise Washington's policies first and foremost, because when she censures other countries for their human rights records, 'they say, look at what is happening in the United States.'

Robinson, who served as Ireland's president from 1990 to 1997, ended her tenure as the UN's highest human rights authority on 11 September. Her successor is Brazilian diplomat Sergio Vieira de Mello, who has had a long career within the UN apparatus.

In early 2001, Robinson conceded to UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan's request to remain in the four-year post for an extra year.

Although she had subsequently expressed willingness to serve even longer, in March this year she announced that she would step down, citing the fact that the US government was opposed to a further extension of her term.

Robinson's stances on the Israel-Palestine conflict, the World Conference against Racism (held in 2001 in the South African city of Durban), and the US treatment of prisoners from the Taliban and Al Qaeda imprisoned at its base in Guantanamo, Cuba, caused friction in her relations with Washington.

She said on 10 September in Geneva, at her last official press conference, that the 'root cause' of the human rights problem in Palestinian territories lies in the Israeli occupation of those areas.

Robinson also repeated her condemnations of continued suicide attacks against Israeli civilians, while expressing satisfaction that the possibility of a Palestinian state has found a place on the agenda of the international community.

At the Conference against Racism last year, the US and Israel walked out of the deliberations because the draft of the final declaration contained statements about Zionism that the two delegations objected to.

The references to Zionism were eliminated from the final text, but Robinson was unable to convince the US and Israeli diplomats to back the declaration.

The outgoing UN official said that she is encouraged by the existence of critical voices within the US and other industrialised countries about the human rights policies of the governments.

In her 10 September statement, Robinson recommended a new report by the Lawyers' Committee for Human Rights, an independent US-based organisation that highlights the contradictions that exist between the laws and security measures dictated by Washington after 11 September 2001, and the country's fundamental values.

Michael Posner, executive director of the Lawyers' Committee, said that the 'mode of operations' of the George W Bush administration since the attacks on the Twin Towers in New York and on the Pentagon in Washington are 'at odds with core American and international human rights principles'.

The Lawyers' Committee report, released in early September, is an 'incredibly strong' criticism of the US and describes quite a serious situation, said Robinson, who will move to New York in October to work on the project known as the Ethical Globalisation Initiative.

But beyond the criticisms, she applauded the strength of the US democracy, the fact that society and Congress question the Bush administration's policies, and the independence of the judiciary.

The Ethical Globalisation Initiative is run by two US non-governmental organisations, the Aspen Institute and the State of the World Forum, and also by the Switzerland-based International Council on Human Rights Policy.

Robinson described the project as an attempt to incorporate the legal framework of human rights into the international debate on globalisation.

'Human rights is not about words and especially not about rhetoric,' she said, commenting that there is too much of both in the globalisation debate. There is 'too little substance' to what we need in order to work for fair globalisation.

The initiative's goal is to foment protection and promotion of human rights at the local level because 'we are not placing enough attention on helping developing countries to build their own national protection systems for human rights', Robinson added.

Her own efforts, she said, will be focused on Africa, where she hopes to bring government and civil society organisations together to work on reinforcing respect for human rights.

The alliance created by the African governments, known as the New Economic Partnership for African Development, says in its founding document that the continent's leaders give priority to strengthening administration of justice and rules of law, as well as the validity of human rights, noted Robinson.

The outgoing UN official said that she 'will be drawing from that document' in her future work. - Third World Network Features/IPS

About the writer: Gustavo Capdevila is a correspondent for Inter Press Service, with whose permission the above article has been reprinted.

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