Emerging From The Same Nest

Well! A new report from Amnesty International. And here's an amazing conclusion they managed to reach: the United Nations Human Rights Council, they bitterly claim, appears to be rather ineffectual. Ineffectual?

Why they do their damnedest to pick out those countries of the world with which the general consensus is that their very presence is anathema. Since the Council seems fairly top-heavy with representative countries whose own human rights records are past dismal, what, truly, does Amnesty International expect?

As far as Israel is concerned, Amnesty International blames the United States and member countries of the European Union of obstructing international justice by their presence on the UN Security Council to ensure that Israel is not held fully accountable for the purported war crimes committed during the defensive strike on Gaza. Right; far as Amnesty is concerned it was a deeply offensive strike.

Countries should obviously remain complacent sitting ducks while they're being bombed.

Seems that the UNHRC and Amnesty International are actually singing from the same hymnal, since the UN human rights body also singles out Israel whenever it can for hollow accusations, irrespective of whether or not their own dreadful records should have them being singled out for deep censure, or whether other countries of the world like North Korea, Syria, Iran, Burma, Sudan, Zimbabwe and Congo have something to answer for.

Sitting high on their pedestal of righteous dudgeon, the rights group, in Amnesty International Report 2010: State of the World's Human Rights points out: "Powerful governments are blocking advances in international justice by standing above the law on human rights, shielding allies from criticism and acting only when politically convenient".

And it seems as far as Amnesty is concerned, 2009 was a "landmark" year.

Their just-issued report documents human rights violations - alleged or proven - in fully 159 countries of the world. Canada rates an entry, in reflection of allegations tossed about by the country's leftists: "Canadian officials failed to protect the rights of indigenous peoples adequately. Concerns persisted about human rights violations associated with national security laws and practises as well as Canadian overseas mining operations".

In Canada's instance, somewhat reflective of Israel's in that sense, getting slammed for national security provisions under the law where those suspected of, arrested for, standing trial for, documented and proven instances of terrorist activities claiming their human rights and/or their protection under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms are being thwarted through the process of apprehension and prosecution.

Amnesty gets some highlighted instances of human rights abuses right, and many more verging on the edge of hysterical denunciation just for the sake of flailing about, accusing everyone. The government of Sri Lanka did indeed target, entice and sequester Sri Lankans in their battle with the Tamil Tigers, and in the process deliberately killed innocent civilians. As did the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam themselves.

Why expect the United Nations to act decisively and with required force of opinion and protective arms in Sri Lanka when it could not move itself to do the same with Rwanda? The United Nations itself has a tedious proven record of inaction and anguished fence-sitting, while wringing its hands with dismay over the bad behaviour of world governments in waging wars, both internal and external.

Why should it be anticipated that the failed predecessor of the current UN human rights body represented an unfortunate anomaly once it was pointed out beyond denial that those who sat on it were themselves abuser states dominating the agenda, and that it would, in its re-invented state, rise above partisan protection of one another against denunciations as human rights violators?

It's a truly sad state of affairs when the international world body that was initiated by the war-time League of Nations to ensure that fairness and justice prevailed on this Globe - that human rights would be recognized as the overriding concern and need for protection of the entire world - would succumb to its current status as a tired, unstable, ineffective institution.

That the critical nature of its offshoots like the Human Rights Council would still be a pretentiously odious sham, and that the once so-highly-respected and effective Amnesty International has somehow lost its way in recognizing and holding to account authentic situations of human rights abuses.