{"id":3734,"date":"2003-04-04T14:46:33","date_gmt":"2003-04-04T19:46:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/?p=3734"},"modified":"2003-04-04T14:46:33","modified_gmt":"2003-04-04T19:46:33","slug":"meanwhile_back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/04\/04\/meanwhile_back.html","title":{"rendered":"Meanwhile, back at the slave block …"},"content":{"rendered":"

A rhetorical question<\/a>:<\/p>\n

How should the United States and the international community respond to a brutal, despotic regime in an Arab country, one with clear ties to international terrorism? And what if this regime, located in one of the world’s most volatile regions, has honed its ruthlessly survivalist instincts for years, and in the process developed weapons of mass destruction? And what if the regime possesses great oil wealth, rendering its moral character invisible to those bent on further exploitation of promising oil reserves and the pursuit of petrodollars? And if this regime is also a threat to its neighbors, reneges on various internationally brokered commitments, and regularly attacks its own citizens in ways that violate the Geneva conventions, how should we respond?
\nThese questions seem worth asking at the present moment since they have been answered in such starkly different fashion for Iraq and Sudan.<\/p>\n

Seems the UN is about to upgrade the Khartoum regime from a “country with special problems” to a place which needs no UN special rapporteur for human rights. No more regular reports for the world press about the slave trade, the denial of humanitarian aid to those pesky 3 million folks inhabiting the oil-rich south of the country, or additions to the the 2 million dead over the last 20 years of civil war.<\/p>\n

Certainly the US deserves some blame here. It seems to be pretty badly distracted with Iraq, and neglectful of past condemnations of Sudan.<\/p>\n

But the oh-so-humanitarian EU is the active villain here, with France (and those lovable zanies at TotalFinaElf, who have major oil concessions lying fallow in the south) abetted by Libya (an ally of the Khartoum regime) currently chairing the UN Commission on Human Rights. <\/p>\n

Sure the UNCHR did vote to cite Sudan for human rights violations — but left out any censure for the slave trade, or the attacks on religious freedoms — including forcible conversions of Christians to Islam and bombings of Christian religious sites. The US condemned the vote, but only to the extent of forcing a counted vote and then abstaining.<\/p>\n

Indeed, through the oddities of the way politics work in the UN, the resolution passed with 28 in favor, zero against, 25 abstentions.<\/p>\n

The ambassador of Pakistan, speaking on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, claimed that the move by the United States to call for a vote was “a clear politicization and misuse of the commission for obvious foreign policy purposes that have nothing to do with genuine human right concerns.”<\/p>\n

Right. And if it were Christians bombing Moslems? I’ll betcha Pakistan would be outraged (and never note that the US got still got involved in such a situation, in Kosovo).<\/p>\n

(via Ghost of a Flea<\/a>, which has a number of other links on the Sudan)<\/small><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A rhetorical question: How should the United States and the international community respond to a brutal, despotic regime in an Arab country, one with clear ties to international terrorism? And…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-geopolitical-brouhaha"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":387,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/04\/24\/sanctioning_san.html","url_meta":{"origin":3734,"position":0},"title":"Sanctioning sanctions","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 24-Apr-03 10:22am","format":false,"excerpt":"So back when Iraq invaded Kuwait, the UN passed economic sanctions on Iraq. And when Gulf War I was over, the sanctions regime was continued, contingent on Iraq's adherence to...","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3763,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/04\/01\/belaboring_the.html","url_meta":{"origin":3734,"position":1},"title":"Belaboring the obvious","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 1-Apr-03 10:33am","format":false,"excerpt":"It's all about oil. Economic interests, as well as jealousy of power, color the picture. According to the International Herald Tribune, French interests have signed with Iraq drilling contracts worth...","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3885,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/03\/18\/as_long_as_were.html","url_meta":{"origin":3734,"position":2},"title":"As long as we’re ragging on Old Europe today …","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 18-Mar-03 2:22pm","format":false,"excerpt":"... you should check out this article, which discusses the horrific situation in the Sudan. For the past 20 years, the regime in Khartoum has bombed, starved, and enslaved black...","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3927,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/03\/08\/those_who_forge.html","url_meta":{"origin":3734,"position":3},"title":"Those who forget the past","author":"***Dave","date":"Sat 8-Mar-03 10:12pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Many thanks to Blaster for reminding me of this particularly inane question during the President's press conference: Mr. President, millions of Americans can recall a time when leaders from both...","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":160976,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2026\/02\/09\/us-government-building-big-new-memory-hole-for-the-state-department.html","url_meta":{"origin":3734,"position":4},"title":"US Government Building Big New Memory Hole for the State Department","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 9-Feb-26 11:14am","format":false,"excerpt":"\"It'll be the most beautiful, greatest, deepest memory hole, maybe ever.\"","rel":"","context":"In "Censorship"","block_context":{"text":"Censorship","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/politics-law\/censorship"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2882,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/09\/09\/those_who_forge.html","url_meta":{"origin":3734,"position":5},"title":"Those who forget the past …","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 9-Sep-02 3:49pm","format":false,"excerpt":"... could find it coming up again and again anyway. THE PRESIDENT mulls a strike against Iraq, which he calls an \"outlaw nation\" in league with an \"unholy axis of...","rel":"","context":"In "Geopolitical Brouhaha"","block_context":{"text":"Geopolitical Brouhaha","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/geopolitical-brouhaha"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3734\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}