It’s all about ‘Human Rights’. It’s all about praise and blame. Well, more
blame than praise, for only tokenism is reserved for the latter as in ‘You’ve
done this and that’ followed by a thundering ‘BUT….’ Ladies and Gentlemen, we are talking about
resolutions on Sri Lanka tabled and to be tabled at the Geneva sessions of the
United Nations Human Rights Commission.
‘The Island’ correctly asks editorially whether it is ‘on’ or ‘against’,
implying that it is probably the latter.
The United States of America led a bunch of EU countries in
a knuckle-rap resolution in March 2012.
Previously, Switzerland, a country which believes every country should
be like Switzerland, regardless of wide differences in history and context,
similarly moved on (against) Sri Lanka in a previous session. India backed the
US position last year. This year, senior
US officials state that a follow-up resolution, marked ‘procedural’, is to be
tabled in Geneva.
These are said to be ‘friendly’ countries. That ‘friendship’ they articulate by ‘keeping
Sri Lanka informed’. That’s like
declaring war on a country and claiming that the we-informed-you part of the
declaration amounts to ‘friendship’.
When Country A tables ‘on’ Country B and Country B objects, then there
is clear disagreement. ‘Friendship’ is
thereafter not a valid descriptive.
Country A can say ‘this is in your best interest’ but that would be
infuriatingly supercilious.
Sri Lanka is not an issue-free country. Sri Lanka, however, is managing its various
tumors far better than countries with far greater wealth in terms of handling
post-conflict problems. If ‘human
rights’ is the (inflated) issue, then there are countries that have the right
to point finger on account of track records that are of the eyebrow raising
kind but nothing more, and there are countries that need an immediate and long
mirror-check. The USA and India for
example, but not excluding Switzerland for its horrendous record of religious
intolerance and of course the xenophobic and Islamphobic countries of Europe.
In Sri Lanka’s case there are allegations which are moreover
made by people of highly dubious integrity.
If one were to take Israel, there are proven facts. Same with the USA. Now the USA is Israel’s ally and friend to
the point where it is not clear who writes whose agenda. That ‘friendship’ allows Isreal to give UNHRC
the proverbial finger, with the full blessings of the USA.
The USA for its part should be first friend to itself and
turn the rights-abuse searchlight inwards.
Rev. Jesse Jackson said in Geneva on the sidelines of last year’s
sessions that the owner of the Drones are criminals against humanity. That
statement had to be squeezed out from him of course for the good US Citizen was
until that point playing what appeared to be a Washington brief, castigating all
and sundry except the President of the USA.
‘Drone attacks’ are policy executions.
Innocent people die. And drone
attacks are but one of many crimes against humanity perpetrated by the USA.
And so the circus comes to Geneva again. The same set of acrobats and clowns will do
their routine numbers. Resolutions will
be passed. Will it help Sri Lanka,
though? Well, considering the political
preferences of the local support staff of such moves and their histories of
complicity in moves to destabilize Sri Lanka including the whitewashing of
terrorists who perpetrated monumental crimes against humanity, few would be
impressed. What it might do is to harden
the hardliners and give them the moral high ground: ‘We have treated the
enemies of the state as though they are the most innocent and most wronged in
the country, and this is the reward?
Well, flower-that!’
The problem for Sri Lankans is that it also gives the regime
the moral high ground simply on account of preposterousness and the fact that
the US talking human rights is made for gut-wrenching guffaws. It makes it that much more harder for those
who truly want more accountability and transparency, constitutional reform that
institutes more robust checks and balances, and better governance overall. And if this is what ‘friends’ do, then it is better to give Geneva a news-miss and go to see the Dharmasoka-Devananda Big Match in Ambalangoda.
1 comments:
How strange that Israel and Sri Lanka seem to find themselves in the same corner as far as the UN and UNHCR are concerned?
No doubt our diplomats are now in close consultation with their Israeli counterparts on israel's latest strategy....
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