Civilisation resumes slow crumblification

It’s certainly not a laughing matter, but you’ve gotta laugh, otherwise you can only weep at the very proposition: Iran has been elected unopposed to a seat on the UN’s Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).

That’s the same Iran which sanctions the stonings, lashings and hangings of women for so-called lapses of ‘modesty’ and ‘morals’.

No gesture of disapproval came during an acclamation vote affirming the Islamic nation's appointment to the 45-nation group... Iran was one of only two nations that put forward candidates to fill two empty seats for the Asian bloc for the 2011-2015 period during a round of “elections” in which no real votes were cast. The other nation was Thailand.

Thus, the expression I used above — ‘elected unopposed’ — should be regarded with significant qualification. Indeed, taking a wider view, Iran’s ‘procedural’ success is not a matter of such earth-shattering urgency as accorded by the UN’s usual detractors, since “Iran has served on the [CSW] for successive terms since 1990.” And among the current CSW membership are countries such as Eritrea, another serial offender against women’s rights.

The US state department takes a (shall we say) philosophical, longer-term view of the problem. The Islamic Republic’s seat on the CSW is “something of a booby prize for Iran,” following the US’s successful lobbying against Iran’s bid for a seat on the UN Human Rights Council.

The United States worked with a broad range of other countries “to make it clear to Iran" that it was not going to win a seat on the Human Rights Council.”

“We're not going to stand up and cheer [at Iran’s CSW membership],” [an anonymous high-ranking official] said. “By the same token, that is less onerous than the Human Rights Council because women in Iran, relative to other countries in the region, actually have greater rights.”

“You don't have women placed in head-to-toe burkas in that country,” the official said. “You have women elected to the legislature in the country... I’m not saying we can take Iran and compare them to the human rights record of any country in the developed world. But in that region, women in Iran have a greater opportunity for education, for business and to participate in politics.”

Well, we might say, that’s okay then ... er ... but why could not the US have “worked with a broad range of other countries” to block Iran from the CSW as well? Because the very idea of a regime such as Iran sitting on a body such as the CSW does strike at one’s sense of the fitness of things.

Australia was an inaugural member in 1947 of the CSW but, with the rest of the Western bloc, seems to have somewhat dropped the ball on defending women’s rights internationally.

Only last month the Attorney-General Robert McLelland launched the Rudd Government’s vaunted Human Rights Framework, which as a ‘key principle’ aims at “enhancing our domestic and international engagement on human rights issues.”

So then, let the international engagement begin, commencing with giving Iran and other serial offenders some curry on their human rights pretensions, including particularly in relation to women’s rights.

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Not only but also

The Lancet may well come in for some heavy criticism in the next day or so for what some will see as a politically inflammatory editorial “blasting” Israel for its actions in Gaza.

It likely will be asked, somewhere, by somebody: Why the obsessive emphasis on Israel, when there are far worse atrocities going on in the world?

Such quizzers may be comforted to know that The Lancet only last week editorialised thus:

As the world watches the terrible events unfolding in Gaza, several other conflict zones around the globe continue to be ignored. Since Israel's air and ground offensive against the Hamas regime in Gaza captured international political and media attention, hundreds of people — 400 in one day alone — have been killed in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and many more lack the medical attention they so desperately need.

Major difficulties in bringing assistance to people affected by conflict is a prominent feature of the top ten most neglected humanitarian disasters, compiled annually by Médecins Sans Frontières. According to the list, massive forced civilian displacements, violence, and unmet medical needs in Somalia, which is top of the list for the third consecutive year, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Iraq, Sudan, and Pakistan are some of the worst humanitarian and medical emergencies in the world.

It is a scar on society that some lives are still deemed more important than others, especially when viewed through a lens distorted by politics, economics, religion, and history...

(The whole document is accessible free upon registration.)

Well, so why all of a sudden are The Lancet editors dumping on Israel?

The explanation could be as simple as that a number with three zeroes after it is inherently impressive. That such a number has been produced by a nation which pines desperately to be accepted as part of “the West” may also have a bearing here.

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Johnny basks in distinguished company

Former Australian Prime Minister John Howard is in Washington to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom from his out-going good buddy President George W Bush.

Mr Howard took the honour along with former British PM Tony Blair and... Colombia’s President Alvaro Uribe...

Medal of Freedom...? Alvaro Uribe...? Medal of Freedom...?

Under President Uribe’s watch, there has been a dramatic increase in reports of extrajudicial killings of civilians by the Colombian Army. And while Uribe’s government has strongly confronted the abusive left-wing guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), Uribe has failed to take a similarly clear stance against equally abusive drug-running paramilitary groups, who have massacred, raped, and forcibly displaced thousands of Colombians in recent decades. Fundamental flaws in a paramilitary demobilization process under Uribe have permitted many of the groups to continue to engage in abuses under new names. The president's verbal attacks on his country’s human rights defenders have been frequent and disturbing. And Uribe has often opposed efforts to break paramilitaries’ influence in the political system, including by making unfounded accusations against the Supreme Court justices who are investigating more than 70 members of the Colombian Congress for links to paramilitaries.

It’s curious that our Mr Howard would want to accept an award so compromised by such a co-recipient. Oh wait...

...

• 25/04/2008 - Colombia: No reduction in assassinations and death threats
• 25/06/2008 - Colombia: Two more trade unionists assassinated
• 29/08/2008 - Colombia: Three trade unionists murdered in August
• 24/09/2008 - Colombia: Several trade unionists receive death threats
• 19/12/2008 - Colombia: Another trade unionist asassinated

...

Hmmmm...

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The Road to Hell . . .

. . . is paved with good intentions:

In November 2007 in Kermanshah [Iran], Makwan Mouloudzadeh, 20, faced the death penalty on false charges of raping several boys seven years before. His accusers retracted their claims. No evidence suggested he had committed any crime under Iranian law.

However, European activists wildly seized on him as another “gay” victim. They organised a mass petition to Ahmadinejad for mercy for “the young Iranian gay”. Their pleas sent an inadvertent message: Makwan was innocent of one capital crime, but Europe believed him guilty of another. On December 5, Makwan Mouloudzadeh, probably neither gay nor a rapist, went to the gallows.

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First Lady gets on the Generals’ case, ASEAN demurs

Whatever other criticisms one may have of the US First Family, one has to applaud the Bushes’ activism on the problem of the evil regime of the Burmese generals.

The First Lady, Laura Bush, has lately called for a global boycott of jewels from Burma.

She says every Burmese stone bought, cut, polished, and sold sustains an illegitimate, repressive regime.

Mrs Bush says Burma’s military rulers have just opened a potentially lucrative gem auction show in the capital seeking much-needed foreign currency amid tightening Western sanctions.

The junta hopes to sell some 5,500 lots of jade, gems and pearls, worth about $US300 million during the 13-day auction.

Mrs Bush’s call pretty much exactly echoes the stance taken by Human Rights Watch on the Burmese gem trade, but good on her for standing up to endorse it.

And good on the US Senate for voting unanimously to urge ASEAN members to suspend Burma from the regional body until the generals show respect for human rights.

And a pox on ASEAN for declining to do so.

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