RIGHTS: U.S. Report Cites Afghanistan As Main Advance in 2001

By Jim Lobe Reprint | | Print |

Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Mar 5 2002 (IPS) - Afghanistan stood out as the main advance in human rights during 2001, according to the State Department’s annual human rights report, released here Monday.

The 6,000-odd-page report described the collapse of the five-year-old Taliban regime as “a triumph for human rights” and proclaimed that Washington’s “fight against terrorism is part of a larger fight for democracy.”

It faulted some U.S. allies in the “war against terrorism” – including China, Russia, and Uzbekistan – for using the anti-terrorism campaign to justify their own abuses of the rights of ethnic minorities and, in Uzbekistan’s case, of pious Muslims.

The report also suggested that terrorism is caused by the abuse of human rights and by economic deprivation, a link that the U.S. administration has made only rarely and reluctantly.

“(A)long with the need to defend ourselves came the growing awareness that terrorism has been gaining adherents for some time in countries where human rights are denied and civil liberties are repressed,” the report said. “The citizens in many of these countries also lack economic opportunity.”

The 26th of the so-called “Country Reports on Human Rights Practices”, covering 195 countries around the world, comes one year into the administration of President George W. Bush and almost six months after last September’s terrorist attacks in the United States.

There had been much speculation before the document’s release about whether it would be skewed toward the administration’s new priorities, particularly counter-terrorism.

A number of human rights groups expressed concern that the administration might pull its punches on key allies in the campaign and come down much harder against the so-called “axis of evil” – Iraq, Iran and North Korea – and other so-called “rogue states” with which Washington has hostile relations.

Critics appeared relatively satisfied that the Bush administration stuck to the high standards of reporting reached by the State Department under former President Bill Clinton, the first administration whose global outlook was not dominated by the Cold War. The exception to this assessment was Israel, whose abuses of Palestinians – including the use of excessive force and targeted assassinations – were repeatedly put in the context of responding to Palestinian “terrorism”.

“In general, it is very candid and very thorough,” said Tom Malinowski, Washington director for Human Rights Watch, who nonetheless noted some problems with countries, such as Colombia, for which a poor assessment could force immediate and important policy changes.

Similarly, Amnesty International welcomed the reports but noted that in some key cases, “there is a startling disconnect between the violations cited in the report and the Bush administration’s diplomatic relationships with the countries cited.”

“Those who read this report in Riyadh, Moscow, Ankara, or Beijing will have already blunted the sting of criticism with foreknowledge that it is unlikely to be followed by diplomatic pressure,” Amnesty said. “On human rights, the U.S. barks worse than it bites.”

The reports were mandated by Congress in 1976 and introduced by former President Jimmy Carter. They have grown steadily in length and now constitute the world’s single most comprehensive analysis of human rights conditions.

Many foreign governments resent the country reports, saying they illustrate U.S. arrogance toward the rest of the world. Some also argue that, by failing to assess economic and social rights performance, the analyses show an ideological blind spot.

While the country reports avoid comparing the human rights practices of different states, the introduction to the overall document, written by the Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights, Democracy and Labour, often singles out specific nations for praise or blame.

In terms of political and institutional changes in 2001, the introduction pointed to elections in Peru and political and human rights reforms in Bahrain, Qatar, and Oman as the major accomplishments of the year. It also praised elections in Thailand, Bangladesh, and Kosovo.

By contrast, the use of intimidation, violence, and death threats in several other countries’ elections clouded the picture. These included Belarus, where President Aleksandr Lukashenko extended his term of office, and Zimbabwe, in which President Robert Mugabe is running for re-election next weekend.

For peace-making efforts around the world, Lorne Craner, the assistant secretary of state, cited some advances in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Burundi and Macedonia, where NATO helped mediate a peace accord between ethnic Albanians and the Slav-dominated government.

On the other hand, violence increased in Israel and the occupied territories, where the human rights performance of both Israeli troops and the Palestinian Authority was graded as “poor.”

In describing Israeli abuses – which resulted in more than 500 Palestinians killed and thousands injured – the report noted repeatedly that Israel’s actions were carried out in response to terrorist attacks, violent demonstrations, and other clashes. Asked about this Monday, Craner told reporters, “I felt they could use more context.”

At the same time, the report deplored China’s efforts to tag Muslim Uighur activists in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region as terrorist, and Russia’s tactics – including disappearances, summary executions, torture, and extortion – in rooting out Chechen fighters in the Caucasus.

The administration must certify to Congress this week that the government of Colombia has cut its ties to rightwing paramilitaries in order to continue supplying military aid. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have said the evidence does not warrant such a conclusion.

“There is a pretty disturbing effort to inflate the government’s progress in that area,” said Malinowski, who added, “It’s almost as if that report were written by two different people.”

On other issues, the report found the torture of detainees in China, Indonesia, Kenya, Burma, Uzbekistan, Mexico and many other countries “all too frequent,” while it noted that the number of torture cases reported in Turkey last year declined.

On press freedom, the report singled out Zimbabwe and Liberia, as well as many former Soviet states including Russia, for strong criticism, although it noted recent progress in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan.

Religious freedom, it said, also remained elusive during 2001, with Burma, China, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, and Sudan named as “countries of particular concern,” although it also cited crackdowns against Christians in Vietnam, Muslims in Uzbekistan, and non-Muslims in Saudi Arabia as abuses.

It said more trade-union leaders were killed, mostly by paramilitary groups, in Colombia – 171 – than in the rest of the world combined; that Burma continued using forced labour despite international pressure to end the practice; and that Sudan also used forced child labour.