The UN, Human Rights, Terrorism And True Victims

April 22, 2002

The Editor,
The Boston Herald
Boston.

Dear Editor,

HUMAN RIGHTS AND DIPLOMATIC POLITICS--TRUE VICTIMS

I wish to commend your newspaper on the issue of modern day slavery in Sudan perpetrated by the Moslem majority in the north on the predominantly Black African minority Christians and traditional religious worshipers in the south ("JP minister: Helping free slaves in Sudan an inspiring mission"-- article and "Today's slaves at issue"-- editorial, dated April 16th and 20th, 2002 respectively.

Through your many editorials and articles over the years, your Paper has consistently exposed the hypocrisy of many human rights activist groups including the United Nations Human Rights Commission itself. The United Nations Security Council is yet to pass a resolution to condemn the Government of Sudan on the issue of slavery and appoint a monitoring team to ensure that this shameful practice is discontinued. Ironically, Sudan is a current member of the United Nations Human Rights Commission. The U.N. Human Rights Commission selectively cite International Law and Geneva Conventions are often only when alleged breaches of Human Rights are committed by any of the "should know better" democratic governments. The Western Democracies commonly cited are United States and Israel who are easier to blame countries as scapegoats. It does not matter which of their respective two Parties in each country is in powerl It is just anti-Americanism and anti-Israel politics at the U.N., pure and simple. The use of the U.S. vetoes at the U.N. Security Council are at times used to expose the U.N’s hypocrisy, bias and moral bankruptcy. At times also, Israel is betrayed by her strongest ally which is Israel to keep the diplomatic blame game alive. These two United Nations' member countries are therefore more often than not targeted for the alleged breaches on the issues of self-determination, religious plurality, and commitment of war crimes. Those terrorist groups and oppressive Governments who deliberately target civilians in conflicts for the many breaches of the basic human rights principles under the United Nations Charter are absolved..

Oppressive military, theocratic, party or monarchy dictatorships are therefore allowed to burry their Human Rights abuses while same governments shamefully accuse the United Nations of being bias and applying double standard against them. In some circumstances the blatant bias of the United Nations Security Council Resolutions are vetoed by the United States in defense of its only democratic ally in the Middle East which is the State of Israel. However many are allowed to pass through abstentions in the Security Council by United States when the U. S. Administration is caught between the moral defense of Israel and economic interest of its dependence on Middle East oil. Many other bias Resolutions are at times moved to the General Assembly to be approved by majority vote counts of member countries to avoid the U.S. veto in the Security Council.. Some are also either later repealed or their implementation stalled due to conflicting interests of members countries. The mockery of many of these Resolutions, however, become very clear when the United Nations' true double standard of absolving the dictatorship regimes is exposed with the actual historical facts and events on the ground.

The United Nations Security Council just passed unanimous resolution to send a monitoring team to Jenine Refugee Camp in the West Bank to investigate what crimes were committed in Israel's war against the Hamas terrorist group in the West Bank and suicide bombings of Israeli civilians. This Resolution could not stand on its own merit and test of fairness to be implemented. It was consequently rejected by both the Palestinians and the Israelis and now abandoned but left its indelible mark on the many other previous stains of its anti-Israel bias at the United Nations. The various charges of massacre of hundreds of innocent Palestinian civilians and bull-dozing of homes had no factual truth on the ground in the combat between Israel Defense Force and Palestinian Militants in bomb-making houses, some with booby-traps, detonating to kill anybody who dared to enter them. News reporters and the International Red Cross staff could not go into the Camp during the period of the fighting even though the Israel Defense Force had been charged for preventing them in visiting the area of the gun battle. Ordinary civilians had already been ordered to leave the area by the Israelis to avoid civilian casualties. The so-called forces of resistance had decided to stay to fight a gun battle with the Israeli soldiers. Who uses what level of force to be excessive or acceptable in such a combat is a judgement by the international community and Human Rights groups by ignoring the basic objective of win or lose in any armed conflict . More often than not, this bias against the State of Israel is always used to weaken the resolve of Israel’s self-defensive war against terrorism. This in turn limits the capacity of democratic States to defend and protect their civilians, promote freedom as well as preventing the loss of innocent civilians lives against groups and States determined to use violence to pursue their cause.

There is higher presence of news reporters, peace and Human Rights activists as well as members of the International Red Cross staff per capita concentration in Israel and the disputed territories of West Bank and Gaza than anywhere in the world. Furthermore, millions of dollars of international assistance are sent annually to the West bank and Gaza over the many years of the Arab-Israeli conflict with most of the assistance directed to finance the same militants involved in terrorism for the purchase of weapons. These external groups are united and engaged in various forms of humanitarian and self-righteous campaign of moral propaganda war against the State of Israel. At times they expose their own blatant lies and contradictions below the level oh human intelligence and borders on the lines of Anti-Semitism with the complicity of the so-called international community. Unfortunately, the desired interest to protect and defend the Human Rights for those waging terror and suicide bombings against innocent Israeli civilians and their own civilian population at parties, shopping malls, motorways, and restaurants ambiguous. This also limits the world's attention, its human and financial resources to help thousands if not millions of other victims of human atrocities in many other parts of the world.

Consequently, this misplaced diplomatic approach raises the demands and appeasement for those engaged in violence for their political and religious objectives. This in turn help to focus more attention on the terrorist as they wage their propaganda, while increasing their resources in the form of assistance and creating further incentives for more terrorism. This is the mockery of diplomatic politics in the pursuance of Human Rights agenda and the elusive commitment to alleviate world poverty and human misery in the 21st Century. Posterity is yet to pass its judgment for any lessons we wish to draw from these events as we continue to be blind-folded by ignoring these evil forces of terrorism.

The causes of freedom, Human Rights and justice cannot therefore be pursued through the lens of diplomatic expedience. Voting blocks in the form of regional, organizational or religious blocks make it convenient for activists to concentrate their actions along the lines of priorities of interests of those voting blocks. These priorities often disregard the plight of actual victims of Human Rights abuses, poverty and human misery as those Governments and groups who are directly responsible are absolved by the defaulting silence on their human rights abuses and killings of innocent civilians. This is the fate of the slave victims of the Black Africans in southern Sudan and other victims of human atrocities of the violent conflicts in many parts of Africa. Their conditions are often raised at diplomatic Summits, Conference Halls and Peace Conferences often attended by the same perpetrators as heads of States or rebel groups with no references or accountability for their breaches of International Law as they hypocritically accuse the democratic Governments of breaching the rules for which they are directly responsible.

Meanwhile, the same diplomatic politics continues to be pursued in an elusive global peace based on Human Rights protection and the application of International Law in the Middle East and in the Balkans while the very groups and Governments disrespecting these rights and International law continue to blame the international community for the violent conflicts they perpetrate upon themselves. Many known terrorist groups and Governments sponsoring them are still untouchable and some are even being prodded to join the democratic Governments for peace conferences and negotiations for the resolutions of ever evasive peace process in the Middle East. This blind-folding of our eyes at the sight of evil is not enough. The protracted Arab-Israeli conflict has always been the result of the fatal romantic attraction to the exploration of the ways to appease the evil in a clothing of beautiful bride. Diplomatic politics in the Middle East is yet to draw the lines between human progress in peace and democracy as opposed to terrorism, oppression, and human misery under Oppressive Regimes and Terrorist Groups. This has been the paradox of the conflict of civilizations. Which side will prevail will depend on the nature of coalition forces as well as drawing hard and thin lines between universal principles of human freedom as opposed to terror and oppressive systems of governance. In any conflict where this hard thin line is not drawn, the conflict is unduly protracted. Peaceful resolutions are interpreted differently by two different systems of human principles of law and order, trust and mistrust, love and hate, leadership responsibility and mismanagement, collective and absolute powers. When these factors are ignored, each can be a cannon of a fatal bullet to any peace agreement.

Human intelligence and people of good will, however, continue to explore the nature of diplomatic politics and Human Rights activism which in turn creates political tension straining the democratic process in other wise freedom-minded countries. This human desire for peace and justice arises out of the convictions of good human principles. However, these good human principles are confused with our respect for relative morality,and respect for other cultures, Religions and other systems of governance. This is based on our belief in the hope that over time, principles of good governance will be respected by those who rule by terror, oppression, and disregard for human progress. Empirical evidence brought about by the improvement in mass information exchange and technology is however increasing the human knowledge on some of these illusive assumptions of human progress. Free access to historical, political, economic, cultural and religious documentaries which draw clear lines between rhetoric and reality in the diplomatic politics and Human Rights activism as well as differences between effective and ineffective systems of governance are easily available to expose the dangers of bad governance and leadership. The failure of the diplomatic politics and Human Rights activism is our reluctance to emphasize and highlight on common moral principles. We have instead created a moral equivalence in deciding the good and the evil based on relative or comparative moral judgment for the good and bad governance, democracy and dictatorship, terror and self-defense, true oppressors and the oppressed, as well as true victims of human misery and politicized victims.

Support or excuses for hate and violence as a result of being victims of oppression and the so-called occupation in an unresolved Arab-Israeli conflict of wars whilst the voices of actual victims of poverty and human misery are silenced undermines our human civilization and global peace. The diplomatic political strategy of calming or pacifying the groups and Governments which use hate and threats of violence to back their demands and political objectives has been tried for over 60 years since the partitioning of the British Mandate of Palestine between the Arabs and the Jews in 1947. After each major war the granting of concessions and appeasement have been provided to the Arabs The latter has been using propaganda of lies, exaggerations and contradictions as tools to back their ultimate intentions to destroy the State of Israel which the international community still refuses to perceive as real intentions. The moral basis to use violence to pursue their cause by both the terrorist groups and Governments in the Middle East are never confronted in the international community. They are either completely ignored or even supported and encouraged. Ignorance is therefore no more an excuse as these diplomatic failures and their consequences are now very clear. Passing UN Resolutions to justify the hate-mongering politics in the Arab world has been counter-productive. The status-quo of Resolutions, Human Rights reports and diplomatic strategies have not being working in the Middle East. More innocent lives in hundreds of thousands are being lost in wars and factional conflicts in many other parts of the world year after year. No lessons are being drawn from the past and present for the success in defeating human evil of terrorism and building progressive societies in global peace for better future.

Almost 8 months after the highest fatality of innocent civilians by terrorist attack on U.S. soil on September 11, 2001, most of the terrorist groups like the al Qaeda, Hezbullah, Islamic Jihad, Abu Sayyaf and many others including their financial networks like Barakaat are still in operation in many countries with the same Governments harboring and sponsoring them. The September 11 terrorist attack was a wake up call on the international community's avowed commitment to rid the world of terrorism. Prior to this tragic incident, many similar ones but on smaller scales had been happening from the 70's through the 80's and 90's and now there is still the potential to carry these terrorist activities far into the 21st Century. Meanwhile, diplomatic politics and the international community are bugged down on the definition of terrorism, the root cause, who are the perpetrators and who are the victims. International conferences and regional blocks of countries are therefore without consensus on the diplomatic squabbles on the following issues:

1. The acceptable international laws applying to the dismantling of the terrorist
groups when terrorism itself cannot be defined universally and no U.N. Security
Council Resolution has never been passed to condemn or identify the acts of
terrorism and thoseknown groups of perpetrators or their State Government
sponsors and supporter.

2. The acceptable degree level of military force which can be used to
dismantle these groups and their bases, as well forcing them to comply
with the universal human rights as enshrined in the United Nations' Universal
Human Rights Charter.

3. The unachievable objective of eradication of poverty while attributing it
as the root cause of terrorism. This makes combating terrorism an illusionary
dream.

4. Removing oppressive and sponsors of terrorist groups whilst these Governments
are in the coalition to fight the terrorism.

5. Building democratic institutions in those areas where terrorist groups operate
with same countries being suspicious of outside influence to modernize their societies.

6. Using unilateral or bilateral initiative and the conflicting responses of various
Governments due to their conflicting national, political and economic interests
of the groups countries in the United Nations.

These above gray areas are the indecisive areas of diplomacy where real-politik undermines our resolve to eradicate terrorism. The terrorist groups and the oppressive Governments have well-educated
intellectuals who exploit these inherent contradictions. Their sympathizers also base their actions and derived self-righteous moral authority to support them politically, religiously and financially based on these diplomatic loop holes..

The present application of International Law, respect for Human Rights, criticisms and condemnations which are reserved for democratic Governments and their civilians, the very victims, through guilt compound the hate which emboldens the perpetrators of terrorism. The are the very groups and Governments who do not respect these same very basic human principles. Democratic and emerging democratic Governments and their democratically minded Non-Governmental Organizations are not made to preach the virtues of freedom, liberty and pursue of happiness in tranquility. These voices are reduced to sound bites or pushed on the sidelines of thick lines of rhetoric from the vocal voices of victimhood to embolden their determination to pursue their violent struggle to destroy our civilization. At the same time the voices of actual victims of oppression and human misery are equally silenced in most of the oppressed societies. The diplomatic language of hate and pursuance of political and religious goals through violence therefore become very clear and vocal for those who wish to see the evil in the eyes. Free loving people at one stage or the other are therefore either forced to confront this evil risking their lives on the streets of the capital in many of these countries, again with no support from the very Human Rights groups or more democratic countries.. Thus creating the cycle of violence or be intimidated into submission to evil.

Alternatively, therefore, the lessons of good governance, pursuing peace through peaceful negotiations, leadership responsibility and political stability are the only means to an end for peace, economic progress, as well as social and political justice. Human development indicators of countries and societies reflect on countries with success stories and those are the ones embarking on their internal pursuance of common sense of governance without internal contradictions of pursuing peace and justice while sponsoring terrorist groups, waging wars and oppressing its citizens. These are the obvious lessons some progressive non-governmental organizations have learnt and are applying them at the grass-root levels of many countries in Africa and Latin America. Whether the cup is half-full or half empty is a matter of whose voice is being heard whether it is out of rural town in the jungle of Africa or the politicized Gaza Strip in the Middle East.

Felix Amankona Diawuoh
Executive Director -Boston Chapter
The Free Africa Foundation,
Milton. MA 02186
(617) 698-2730
April 22, 2002