Sunday 24 October 2010

Shelling Human Rights


The Fifty-fifth session of the United Nations’ Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) is due to take place in New York, from 22 February til 4 March, 2011. Members of the CSW include the secretly elected IRI, who subjugates women in its national legislation, by subjecting them to the will and authority of men where fathers can consent to the forceful marriage of their nine year-old daughters to men decades their senior; and Pakistan, where women who have been raped are flogged under the charge of ‘false accusation’ because they could not present four male witnesses to corroborate their allegation. Pakistan and the IRI subject women to honour killings so brutal and heinous that it beggars belief how the United Nations (UN) considered it appropriate to have such violators of women’s rights become members of their CSW.

Defenders of humanity should not accept the UN’s deplorable allocation of membership of the CSW to the likes of the IRI. No doubt, there will be global demonstrations taking place during the CSW’s fifty-fifth session; therefore all human rights organizations are strongly encouraged to band together in one loud and unequivocal voice in standing against such an international act of betrayal.

Interestingly, investing in weapons has ranked higher than investing in combating human rights violations. The United States of America is about to engage in a multi-billion dollar arms deal with Saudi Arabia [key human rights abuser] and the UAE, ensuring that such Arab States are ‘militarily modernized’ with numerous war vessels, including ‘Black Hawks’; and THAAD (Terminal High-Altitude Area Defence Missile System), amongst other killing machines. These States are predominantly Sunni Muslim, and the ‘threatening’ nuclear-crazy IRI government purport to be Shiite Muslim. These Sunni States are preparing themselves for something that hopefully will not take place – an internal Islamic crusade between Sunnis and Shiites. Whilst people are being denied their basic rights to gender equality, and freedom of expression, the United States of America is profiting from the provision of ‘killing instruments’ by arming the gross abusers of human rights. Total sales figure – one hundred and twenty three billion dollars, for investing in death and destruction.

The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) operates to provide expertise and support to the different human rights monitoring mechanisms in the United Nations system, such as UN Charter-based bodies, including the Human Rights Council, and bodies created under the international human rights treaties and made up of independent experts mandated to monitor State parties' compliance with their treaty obligations. Most of these bodies receive secretariat support from the Human Rights Council and Treaties Division of the OHCHR. In 2004, the Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights received thirty-three million dollars from the UN annual budget; that’s 1.8% of the UN budget. The one-hundred and twenty-three billion dollars made from the USA/Arabian arms deal could fund OHCHR its ‘annual’ thirty-three million dollars for as long as three thousand, seven hundred and twenty-seven years.

The world has demonstrated its concern over the Iranian nuclear [weapon] issue, as the people in each State are understandably concerned for their own well-being. However, the issue is that the world has not made any noise about the IRI’s gross violations of the human rights of the Iranian people; let us not forget that the IRI is the world’s second worst offender of human rights. The rights of women are severely trampled, not just in Iran, but all over the world. Why haven’t the media and world governments made noise that rivals, if not equals, the noise made over the nuclear issue? If the people of the world are too busy worried about themselves, and are less concerned about the other people – the victims and potential victims of human rights transgression – then what would become of humanity?

As the great Persian poet (Saadi, 1184-circa 1290) once eloquently enlightened his audience:

“The [children] of Adam are limbs of each other, having been created of one essence. When the calamity of time affects one limb, the other limbs cannot remain at rest. If thou hast no sympathy for the troubles of others, thou art unworthy of retaining the name of human”.

4 comments:

  1. At any cost human rights should be saved.It has been breached everywhere in the world.Instead of investing in arms,we can educate people to follow human rights.

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  2. "There can be no friendship where there is no freedom. Friendship loves a free air, and will not be penned up in straight and narrow enclosures. It will speak freely, and act so too; and take nothing ill where no ill is meant; nay, where it is, 'twill easily forgive, and forget too, upon small acknowledgements.
    Friends are true twins in soul; they sympathise in everything.
    One is not happy without the other, nor can either of them be miserable alone. As if they could change bodies, they take in turns in pain as well as in pleasure; relieving one another in their most adverse conditions."
    (William Penn)

    Mehrtash, I believe (and it is my hopeful prayer) that true liberty will be released among all the nations of the world, and that all tyranny for control be captured for good. Because then, the unrestricted freedoms from abuse...the capabilities and power of human rights and compassion ...will abound and surge. :)

    "The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves."
    William Hazlitt (1778 - 1830)

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  3. Dear Freedom Writer,

    Thank you for truly gracing my blog with such a moving, spellbindingly enlightening eloquent comment. You clearly have a lot to offer the world by way of enlightening us, including bringing light to some of those whose souls are lost in darkness.

    It is an honour to have your words of purity posted here.

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  4. Thank you MG - DUBZ for your comments.

    Please forgive me when I express that I do not see the relevance of the Israel/Palestine conflict & Ahmadinejad's visit to Lebanon with the issues contained in this blog post.

    "Islamic Women are given the same rights as Men - morally men and women are equal - Fact fully Men slave, torture, disrespect their freedom - because people of the world allow it to happen"

    Sadly, we both know that this is not true. Also, it is not necessarily the people of the world that are permitting the subjugation of women to take place, but rather the governments of the world. What matters is that more and more people of the world must unite in combating governmental chauvinism and stand up for the equal rights of women.

    The point about KSA and UAE's arms deal is that the very same amount of money could have been spent on enhancing human rights campaigns, instead of investing in war machines of death - as I said, the cost of the deal was sufficient to fund the office of the high commissioner on human rights for 3,727 years! The military of the said countries were only being 'updated', so they were already 'armed' as you worded it.

    As Mary Robinson eloquently maintained: "Today's human rights violations are the cause of tomorrow's conflicts".

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