Jawayria Malik
In recent years, Human Rights violations has become a matter of grave interest especially for the US government. The US congressmen like Dana Rohrabacher, Brad Sherman are nowadays trying to get prominence through highlighting baseless propaganda against Pakistan. But while pointing fingers on other countries on HR violations they forget to look at their own house. It is very important to study history before drawing inferences over a country’s problem that people like Dana Rohrabacher totally ignore. Since the War of Independence in America to date the White Americans have never accepted Blacks as humans. Even Barack Obama staying in power as USA President in past could not alter this violation. To mankind’s utter disappointment, Trump’s America presents most abysmal state of Human Rights in and around the globe.
Following an August report from the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination decrying the camps as “something resembling a massive internment camp,” many have demanded that the United States take action against China. In a rare show of bipartisanship, seventeen American senators signed a letter calling for sanctions against Chinese officials involved in overseeing the camps, invoking the 2016 Global Magnitsky Act meant to punish Human Rights abusers anywhere in the world. In addition to this, recently Trump’s National Security adviser John Bolton announced new sanctions on regimes in Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, declaring that the U.S. would “not reward torturers, murderers, and abusers”. According to a Country Report on Human Rights Practices released by the U.S. Department of State in April 2018, “by focusing on Human Rights practices of other countries, the report has succeeded in covering up worsening Human Rights violations in the United States. The religious freedom in the U.S. has been under attack since President Trump’s travel related policies unfairly target people from Muslim countries in such a way that America’s core value of respect for religious freedom is becoming a laughing stock”.
From the genocidal colonialism of indigenous peoples under the guise of Manifest Destiny to the forced internment of hundreds of thousands of Japanese Americans in World War II, the history of the United States – who styles itself as a “judge of human rights”- is rife with severe Human Rights violations. War crimes committed by US forces are on record in different countries. A few such examples include the US intervention in Korean war in 1950 in defence of south. Refugees were not allowed by the US Army in the guarded area and around 400 South Korean civilians were massacred in the town of Nogeun-ri also known as No Gun Ri by US 7th Cavalry Regiment. On March 16, 1968, the Charlie Company, 11th Brigade entered the village of M? Lai in Vietnam where the troops ended up killing over 300 Vietnamese civilians. Inhuman and abusive treatment of American soldiers with Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib is another extension of Human Rights violations at the hands of the great US. In 2004, released photos showed Iraqi detainees being beaten, abused and sexually assaulted. This fueled Arab and Muslim rage against the US and resulted in mass recruiting of insurgents in Iraq and elsewhere.
United States has repeatedly and aggressively trampled on the Human Rights in other countries, particularly the Middle East. From Aug. 8, 2014 to Dec. 19, 2016, it launched 7,258 air strikes in Iraq and 5,828 in Syria, causing 733 incidents with an estimated number of civilian deaths between 4,568 and 6,127. Similarly, in the wake of 9/11 attacks, the US government has carried out drone strikes in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan, and Libya. Apart from terrorists who were the main target, non-combatant civilians have also been killed in drone strikes primarily due to collateral damage. According to the Long War Journal, drone strikes in Pakistan since 2006 had killed 2,018 militants and hundreds of civilians.
Human Rights violations in Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp also make a brutal case against US. The notorious detention camp of US in Cuba where the inmates have been detained indefinitely without trial and several inmates were allegedly severely tortured. The operations of this camp are considered to be a major breach of Human Rights by Amnesty International. Under Obama administration, the continued existence of Guantanamo Bay, the promotion of mass surveillance programs, the sale of more weapons than any administration in decades, and a sharp uptake in drone strikes outside active war zones speak volumes of US double standards of its standard foreign policy SOPs.
This June, the United States withdrew from the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC), joining Iran, Eritrea, and North Korea as the only countries refusing to participate in the council. As an original architect of the UNHRC, the United States’ withdrawal effectively undermines the Council’s authority. By refusing to operate through the UNHRC and attacking the Council’s legitimacy, Trump degraded the premier international framework devoted to the protection of Human Rights while undermining the United States’ credibility on the issue.
A discriminatory travel ban against Muslims and refugees, the celebration of violence against journalists, the gutting of critical programs like Social Security Disability Insurance, Medicaid, and food assistance, and the lauding of several high-profile Human Rights abusers, are some significant examples of the Trump administration’s lack of respect for human rights. In the backdrop of Trump administration’ infamous policy of criminally prosecuting everyone who crosses the US-Mexico border illegally, separating migrant children from their parents in the process clearly violates basic Human Rights and the 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child. Although these policies have since been dialed back, of the over 2,600 children taken from their parents and guardians, over 200 still remain in government custody.
Moreover, the US’ willful choice to remain silent over the violence and civilian killings in Indian occupied Kashmir speaks volumes of the irresponsible and biased attitude of the US. America fighting terrorism around the world while aiding terrorists in Libya and Syria through its training and equipping programme to remove an unfavorable dictator/ leaders from the region are hypocritically justified acts in the name of ‘National Security’. It is in the larger interest of the mankind if America amend its hypocritical ways to promote peace and harmony across the globe.
