Cebo.org is a collegial approach to information sharing between ethics-based
organizations with NGO status at the United Nations. Please contact member parties regarding the
positions of their respective organizations on matters expressed in this online journal.
Posted 10:59 PM
by Mary
Related Articles
New draft on Iran given UN council members
Top News
Olmert claims victory in Israeli election
Two foreign troops, rebels die in Afghan clash
US agrees to release Abu Ghraib pictures
VIDEO: Likud, Hamas react to Israeli polls
VIDEO: Caspar Weinberger dies at age 88
PICTURES: Protest against moves to tighten U.S. immigration laws
PICTURES: Spanish Royals in Paris
MORE
By Evelyn Leopold
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Western powers softened a draft U.N. Security Council statement on Tuesday on reining in Iran's nuclear ambitions in hopes of reaching a deal with Russia and China before all their foreign ministers meet this week.
Still, the new draft, obtained by Reuters, retains calls on Tehran to suspend uranium-enrichment efforts, a process that can produce fuel necessary for making a nuclear bomb.
The text deletes language on several specific demands. Instead it refers only to the number of the resolution that contained them and was adopted by the International Atomic Energy Agency board in Vienna, the U.N. nuclear watchdog.
Britain and France, authors of the draft backed by the United States, distributed the document, their third revision, to the full 15-nation U.N. Security Council for discussion on Wednesday, three weeks after talks began.
Posted 10:08 PM
by Mary
ublished on Thursday, March 16, 2006 by the Independent / UK
Embargoes on Global Arms Trade Have Been Total Failure, Says UN
by Kim Sengupta
All United Nations arms embargoes have been breached with impunity, with only a handful of the weapons traffickers responsible for the trade in death ever facing prosecution, according to a report.
Despite the UN naming hundreds of companies - including those in Britain - for allegedly violating embargoes imposed on countries engaged in bloody conflicts and repression, the system for bringing them to book has abjectly failed.
The report, by leading human rights groups, presented to the UN Security Council today, asks for urgent measures to control the proliferation, including agreement on an international arms trade treaty.
The call for reform is backed in a letter by, among others, the Nobel laureates Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Jody Williams and Oscar Arias; the former UN high commissioner for human rights Mary Robinson; the actors Helen Mirren, Christopher Ecclestone and Tony Robinson; the author and activist Arundhati Roy; Lt-Gen Romeo Dellaire, who led UN forces during the Rwanda genocide, and the Albert Schweitzer Institute.
"Today, millions of people around the world are living in fear of armed violence," the letter says. "They have good reason to be afraid. Most victims of armed violence are not uniformed soldiers, nor even fighters, but ordinary men, women and children.
"In 2006, the world can make the first step towards bringing the arms trade under control, by starting negotiations on an international arms trade treaty.
"What we are calling for is not revolutionary. It simply consolidates countries' existing and emerging obligations under international law into a universal standard for arms sales. But it has the power to save hundreds of thousands of lives."
The dossier, by Oxfam International, Amnesty International and International Action Network on Small Arms describes how companies and individuals have been involved in illicit transactions in weapons.
Four UK companies were named in UN embargo reports in the past 10 years. None are known to have faced prosecution by the British government.
The proposed treaty has the backing of 45 countries, including the UK and other members of the EU as well as Britain's Defence Manufacturers Association. However, the US, Russia and China, responsible for a large percentage of world arms exports, are yet to give support.
The report, UN Arms Embargo: An overview of the last 10 years, points out that, despite UN mandatory arms embargoes being legally binding, many member states have not made their violation a criminal offence.
UN teams policing the embargoes are given "woefully inadequate resources and time" to pursue wealthy companies with influential vested interests. There are also numerous examples of corrupt officials covering up arms transfers with the use of faked documentation.
Campaigners say the structure of embargoes and sanctions needs to be overhauled. Between 1990 and 2001, only eight of 57 conflicts, in some of the poorest countries on Earth, led to UN action and then only after widespread human rights abuse and bloodshed.
The dossier uses the example of a Serbian company, Temex, which, according to the UN, delivered nearly 210 tons of arms and ammunition to Liberia in 2002. It included "five million rounds of ammunition; 5,160 guns, 2,500 hand grenades, 6,500 mines and 350 missile launchers.
"These shipments include enough bullets to kill the entire population of Liberia ... and enough to keep an armed group of 10,000 fighters supplied for a whole year," it says.
Posted 9:03 AM
by Mary
By NICK WADHAMS
Associated Press Writer
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - U.S.-led coalition forces and Iraq's authorities may be violating international law by arbitrarily detaining thousands of people, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a report published Tuesday.
The report, which studied the situation in Iraq over the last three months, said Iraq's prison system remains a major concern and lamented that an investigation into allegations of torture in Iraqi Interior Ministry jails had not yet been made public as promised.
Annan's criticism of Multinational Forces and the Iraqi authorities in responding to violence was among the strongest he has made, although many of his claims were not new. He said the detainment of thousands of Iraqis ``constitutes de facto arbitrary detention.''
``The extent of such practices is not consistent with provisions of international law governing internment on imperative reasons of security,'' the report said.
While Annan praised Iraq's December elections, he also noted a rise in sectarian strife and said attacks against places of worship were higher than ever. Baghdad's Forensic Institute alone received 787 bodies, 479 of which had gunshot wounds, since early December.
``Repeated bombings against civilians, mosques and more recently against churches are creating fear, animosity and feelings of revenge,'' Annan wrote.
Annan also demanded that Iraqi and coalition forces release the results of an investigation into allegations of torture at an Interior Ministry detention center in Baghdad's Jadiriyah district. He said the results were supposed to have been published at the end of November.
The results of a separate inquiry into detention conditions in Iraq have also not been published, he said.
The U.S. Mission to the United Nations refused comment on the report.
But a human rights report by the State Department, planned for release Wednesday, was expected to address some of those claims, including allegations of abuses by Iraqi authorities in their prisons.
Among other human rights concerns, the United Nations is also investigating allegations against coalition forces and Iraqi authorities of ``restrictions of freedom of movement, excessive use of force, mistreatment and theft during raids of private homes, evictions and demolitions of houses.''
Annan repeated his strong concern about a Feb. 22 bombing that destroyed the golden dome atop a Shiite shrine in the mainly Sunni city of Samarra. The attack set off two weeks of sectarian revenge attacks, mainly targeting Sunni mosques, clerics and neighborhoods.
Posted 9:07 PM
by Mary
March 5, 2006
Op-Ed Contributors
Principles Defeat Politics at the U.N.
By JIMMY CARTER, ÓSCAR ARIAS, KIM DAE JUNG, SHIRIN EBADI and DESMOND TUTU
IN the global struggle for the advancement of human rights, the United Nations has reached a defining moment. The president of the General Assembly, Jan Eliasson of Sweden, has led five months of negotiations to develop a proposal to reform the United Nations Commission on Human Rights. Although the commission has accomplished many things, including the adoption of human rights standards, treaties and fact-finding mechanisms that measure the performance of governments, it has become more of a political battleground than a meaningful force for protecting victims of human rights violations, and it must be reformed.
Last year, Secretary General Kofi Annan boldly proposed that the United Nations replace the commission with a new more elevated and effective body. His visionary proposal started a very creative process through which governments have thoroughly examined and debated the features of a new body that a large majority could embrace. Mr. Eliasson has now produced a draft resolution with many positive elements that has gained the support of the vast majority of the membership of the United Nations.
Some have asserted that the proposal is just a weak compromise. We challenge this claim.
The new council creates new expectations that members will uphold the highest standards in the promotion and protection of human rights, fully cooperate with the council, and undergo additional scrutiny through a peer review. Most significantly, a member that commits gross and systematic violations of human rights can be suspended from the body.
The council includes a new requirement that members be approved by a majority of the General Assembly — or 96 countries — rather than simply being appointed by their regional groups. With these new procedures and the articulation for the first time of standards for membership, we believe the new body will be led by countries with a greater commitment to human rights.
Instead of having one highly politicized meeting per year, the council will meet throughout the year so that it can address urgent human rights issues in a timely way. This will create a more regularized, constructive and professional process. The politics and double standards of the existing commission will be redressed by providing for periodic review of the human rights records of all 191 members, including the most powerful.
In addition, the proposal ensures robust participation by human rights organizations and activists in the deliberations and secures the system of special rapporteurs and other fact-finding mechanisms — the best feature of the commission.
The draft before United Nations members represents a very significant and meaningful improvement over the existing commission, and to reopen negotiations would put at risk these gains and give those who would prefer a weaker system another opportunity to do mischief. This risks reintroducing very damaging proposals, like giving politically motivated member states control and oversight of the high commissioner for human rights, now an independent office and important voice for victims; new restrictions on special rapporteurs, nongovernmental organizations and news media; elimination or new high thresholds for passing country resolutions, and so forth.
Our aim must be to build a solid foundation for protecting human rights and coming to the aid of victims within the only truly global organization of governments on the planet. Mr. Eliasson has found a way forward that can bring everyone on board. Nearly 60 years after the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, he has finally brought us to where we can begin to put principles over politics for the betterment of all.
Jimmy Carter, Óscar Arias, Kim Dae Jung, Shirin Ebadi and Desmond Tutu are Nobel Peace Prize laureates.
Posted 12:05 PM
by Mary
The DPI/NGO Section held its regular weekly NGO briefing on 2 March 2006,
which looked at the Role of the Media in Advancing Cross-Cultural
Understanding.
H.E. Juan Antonio Yáńez-Barnuevo, Permanent Representative of Spain to the
United Nations; H.E. Baki Ilkin, Permanent Representative of Turkey to the
United Nations; Prof. Tomaz Mastnak, Director, Office of the Alliance of
Civilizations; Ahmed Younis, National Director, Muslim Public Affairs
Council; Sr. Joan Kirby, Temple of Understanding, and Chair, NGO/DPI
Executive Committee; Aberrahim Foukara, United Nations Bureau Chief, Al
Jazeera; and Martin Burcharth, US Correspondent, Information (Danish
newspaper), discussed the Alliance of Civilizations and how the media
contributed to promoting mutual understanding between different cultures
and beliefs.
Ambassador Yáńez-Barnuevo described the establishment of the Alliance of
Civilizations and how the Spanish and Turkish Governments co-sponsored the
initiative, which was launched by the Secretary-General in July 2005. He
briefly outlined the composition of the High-level Group for Alliance of
Civilizations which was expected to prepare a report that would include an
analysis of the problem as well as recommendations for actions to be taken
in order to solve the problem. Ambassador Yáńez-Barnuevo stressed that the
High-level Group was to address deep-rooted perceptions, not immediate
events.
Ambassador Ilkin started by saying that the issue was not new and that
there had been efforts to try and address it before. He said that the
High-level Group would look at best practices and try to complement the
work that had already been done. Ambassador Ilkin stressed that the second
phase of their work would be much more important, namely the implementation
of the recommendations put forward in the report by the High-level Group.
Prof. Mastnak talked about the meeting of the High-level Group, which took
place in Doha, Qatar last weekend. This was the second meeting of the
High-level Group. The UN Secretary-General also participated in the
meeting, which looked at questions of youth, immigrant populations,
education and media. Also high on the agenda was the cartoon controversy,
which was understood as a crisis that the Alliance needed to deal with.
Prof. Mastnak also referred to the joint statement that was issued at the
meeting by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, the Secretary
General of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, the
Secretary-General of the League of Arab States, the First Deputy Prime
Minister, Foreign Minister of Qatar, the Foreign Minister of Spain and
Foreign Minister of Turkey. (Hard copies of the statement and other
relevant information material were available at the briefing.)
Ahmed Younis talked about how in his opinion the recent cartoon controversy
was affecting the majority of moderate Muslims in the US. He said that the
Muslims did not want the Danish Government to curb freedom of speech, but
that they expected the Government to exercise its own freedom of speech and
respond to the controversy. He said that the unfortunate reality of the
controversy was that the conversation was dominated by extremists on both
sides. Most Muslims were not represented by them.
Joan Kirby stressed the need for dialogue and education and how important
it was to have inter-religious understanding and cooperation between the
diverse groups. She highlighted another initiative, namely the Tri-Party
Forum which brings together the UN system agencies, UN Member States and
the Committee of Religious NGOs at the UN to create innovative partnerships
across traditional boundaries to seek together new forms of effective, just
and global cooperation. She also expressed interest to cooperate with the
Alliance of Civilizations.
Aberrahim Foukara started by saying that the media worked in mysterious
ways. Sometimes they contributed to cross-cultural understanding and other
times they caused damage. He illustrated that point by giving several
examples of positive and negative media coverage in terms of its cultural
sensitivity. Mr. Foukara acknowledged the fact that it was difficult for
the media to step back and stressed that every so often they did contribute
to the positive dialogue among civilizations.
Martin Burcharth said that the media had an incredible role to play in
advancing cross-cultural understanding and there was a lot to be learned
from the recent cartoon controversy. He felt that the cartoons were not
about freedom of speech but about one newspaper testing the reaction of the
Muslim community in Denmark to being publicly ridiculed. He also said that
libel and defamation were clearly against the law in Denmark. While the
Danish Muslim community exercised their right to peaceful protest, the
cartoons were published around the world and the controversy took its own
turn.
The panel discussion was followed by a question-and-answer session.
A question was raised about whether some countries with large Muslim
populations used the cartoon controversy to re-direct attention away from
internal problems. In response to the question, Ambassador Yáńez-Barnuevo
said that the Alliance of Civilizations preceded the cartoon controversy.
He stressed that the Alliance was established to deal with a deeply-rooted
misperceptions and divides. The cartoons were only a symptom of the much
bigger issue at hand; in Prof. Mastnak’s words there was a whole “reservoir
of resentments”.
In a separate ad hoc briefing Rachel Groux, Counsellor, Office of the
President of the General Assembly, outlined the Human Rights Council
proposal as submitted by the President of the General Assembly last week.
She described the main differences between the current Commission on Human
Rights and the proposed Human Rights Council, including membership (six
less seats, total of 47; elected by absolute majority in the GA) and
expectations arising from the membership, term limitations (2 term maximum,
followed by an unspecified pause), meetings (regular throughout the year),
reporting structure (GA instead of ECOSOC), universal periodic review and
possibility of suspension. In response to a question about where the
process of establishing the Council stood at the moment, Ms. Groux
responded by saying that the President of the General Assembly was
collecting feedback from the Member States. She added that hopefully more
will be known by 13 March when the Commission begins its meeting.
