From a March 20, 2008 resolution:
The Human Rights Council ...
8. Urges States to take actions to prohibit the dissemination, including through political institutions and organizations, of racist and xenophobic ideas and material aimed at any religion or its followers that constitute incitement to racial and religious hatred, hostility or violence;
9. Also urges States to provide, within their respective legal and constitutional systems, adequate protection against acts of hatred, discrimination, intimidation and coercion resulting from the defamation of any religion, to take all possible measures to promote tolerance and respect for all religions and their value systems and to complement legal systems with intellectual and moral strategies to combat religious hatred and intolerance;
10. Emphasizes that respect of religions and their protection from contempt is an essential element conducive for the exercise by all of the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; ...
13. Reaffirms that general comment No. 15 of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, in which the Committee stipulates that the prohibition of the dissemination of all ideas based upon racial superiority or hatred is compatible with the freedom of opinion and expression, is equally applicable to the question of incitement to religious hatred; ...
So prohibiting dissemination of ideas based upon religious superiority "is compatible with the freedom of opinion and expression"; I suppose that would include claims that Islam, Christianity, or whatever else is the one true religion that is correct while others are false. And states are supposed to "prohibit the dissemination ... of ... xenophobic ideas and material aimed at any religion or its followers that constitute incitement to racial and religious ... hostility"; I suppose that would include, for instance, condemnation of Scientology as fraud, or of Catholicism as oppressive, or for that matter of all religion as folly. And here I thought that freedom of thought, conscience and religion included the freedom to think and comment about all ideologies, including religious ones.
Here, by the way, was the voting breakdown:
Those in favour [21] included: Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Cameroon, China, Cuba, Djibouti, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Malaysia, Mali, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Qatar, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, South Africa and Sri Lanka. Those against [10] included: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Romania, Slovenia, Switzerland, Ukraine and United Kingdom. A similar resolution has been passed since 2002. Abstentions (14): Bolivia, Brazil, Gabon, Ghana, Guatemala, India, Japan, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mexico, Peru, Republic of Korea, Uruguay and Zambia.
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They know it's a costless vote for them. They have no intention of abiding by any such agreement. But this gives them a way to stop free speech by Christians and others in western countries.
Or to put it another way, why bother caring?
Funny, I discussed this resolution on a Dutch blog a few days ago, and there the angle was very different. They/we considered less a free speech issue, and more one of "culture war", i.e. muslim countries fighting back after Danish cartoons, Fitna fun, etc. (N.B., the resolution is dated March 20, so before the actual release of Fitna.)
For example, the resolution says in the recitals:
And in the operative part:
But free speech is part of our culture, and not a part of theirs. I don't understand the distinction you're making.
@SG: The distinction is that this was considered less an issue of countries that believe in free speech vs. countries that don't, than an issue between countries that are having issues with domestic and foreign islamists vs. countries that sympathise with such islamists.
For comparison, when there was a proposal last month to finally get rid of the article in our Penal Code that specifically outlaws "he who publishes words or images that are slanderously blasphemous [sorry, I couldn't think of a better translation] or offensive to religious sensibilities", the Christian Democrats were all up in arms and quickly killed the idea, even though no one has been charged with this misdemeanor in decades, much less convicted.
(I think the last person who was charged was a famous writer who wrote something about Jesus Christ coming back to earth and having sex with an ass. When he was acquitted, the even the most anti-free speech bible thumpers got the message that in this day and age it is essentially impossible to convict someone under this article.)
Point is, this seems to be less about faith vs. free speech than about Islam vs. the west.
I'm curious why you're emphasizing "Countries" vs. "States". From my experiences, the field of international law is pretty consistent in its use of the term "states"--or "parties" in the context of treaty signatories. It's been a few years since I last studied international law or one of the specific fields thereunder, but I really can't remember a situation in which the United Nations or other international body would use the term "Countries". "States", "Nations", and "Parties" are far, far more likely.
Is there a contextual reason for your use that I'm just missing?
Ah progress! They must have liberalized considerably in the last thirty or forty years. When I was more familiar with the Kingdom kaffirs weren't even allowed to visit within the city limits.
Let's not forget the Muslim/Hindu situation.
@tcg: That was not my (original) point. I just noticed the difference in which aspect of the story was emphasised.
As for the Countries vs. States issue, I suspect mr. Evan simply has a personal issue with the word "state", possibly because he prefers to use the term for the states of the US. I certainly can't find the word "countries" anywhere in the original document. (Nor would I expect to, since indeed state is the normal term used.)
Considering that anti-Jewish expression is part of the official or semi-official policies of some of these countries.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bias_in_education
Source: memri.org/bin/articles.cgi?Area=sr&ID=SR01202
Source: jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Peace/egpress
@MDJD2B: ...which explains why, reading the whole document, one gets the impression that negative stereotyping (or worse) of jews wasn't foremost on the drafter's minds.
Thus we have the problem of too much democracy in the Human Rights Council - the US is has certain undemocratic structures that keep the government from being able to just steamroll over rights just because the majority doesn't like them. Repressive countries outnumber the truly limited-government ones. Real human rights will not be upheld by the council until either it adopts a limited framework or excludes horrible violators like Egypt from sitting on the council
@Zeno: Given that the US is traditionally screaming more loudly about national sovereignty that just about any other country in the world (Medelllin anyone?), I always find statements like that somewhat hypocritical. No country gets excluded from the Human Rights Council a priori for the very simple reason that that would involve states judging each other's internal human rights records.
And...?
If it's problematic for countries to pass judgments on other countries internal human rights records, then what purpose can the UN Human Rights Council serve?
@SG: The UN Human Rights Council collectively can judge the human rights record of individual states because those states have consented to being so judged by ratifying the appropriate treaties. (including the UN Charter)
For one state to complain about the human rights record of another, on the other hand, is a violation of the latter's sovereignty, except where the complaining state has a legitimate interest (e.g. one of its citizens is involved), where there is a "threat to the peace" or where there is a violation of ius cogens.
In other words, for Mexico to complain about the Medellin ruling would make sense, but if Japan did, it would be told to mind its own business. (Although admittedly this isn't a very good example, because the Medellin case hardly qualifies as a violation of human rights.)
I'm largely ignorant of the HRC process. Is ratification of the UN charter sufficient to render a nation subject to the judgments of the Human Rights Council or are additional steps necessary? What would a nation have to give up in order to longer be a legitimate object of HRC inquiry? If additional steps are required, has Israel done whatever (if any) additional steps are necessary to make it subject to the HRC?
*I just made it up
I suspect you're right about the "countries" issue. I was just curious to see if that's all it is or if there's more to it.
SG: Here's a page on the UN site that lists the relevant UN Agreements on Human Rights.UN Agreements... Click through each to see the actual agreements and signatory parties to each. The HRC was created by the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Israel is a State Party to that Covenant and, as such, is completely vulnerable to the criticism of the HRC. Doesn't justify much of the criticism, but it doesn't make them fully subject to it.
The US, for what it's worth, is a signatory to the covenant but has not ratified it. I'm sure there are numerous online explanations as to why. It's been a few years since I learned such things, and I've forgotten the details and would hate to butcher them. :)
China actually has quite a problem in their western provinces, we just don't hear about it much here. Their methods of dealing with it are a little...less moderate...compared with western Europe for example.
I'm curious why you're emphasizing "Countries" vs. "States".
I am aware that "states" is the appropriate usage. It just smacks of federalism to me - on a level I really do not want to participate in; where the UN is the top of the food chain.
Because they don't want to piss off the muslim states and they don't want to piss off the West either?
The amount by which people are ignorant of and/or willing to ignore the realpolitik that goes into international relations (including, for example, France's opposition to the war in Iraq) is staggering.
And as far as the abstainers go, most Latin American countries traditionally attempt to adhere to strict neutrality on international issues. They don't appreciate Yankee interference and try to extend that same courtesy to others. Of course, if your plan is to abstain anyways, why do they accept a seat...
I'm pretty sure those seats come with a parking spot. You know how much those go for in that part of town? And full-time unrestricted access to a clean men's room? Are you kidding me?
These sound like a forward-thinking bunch of folks, because who can argue with respecting people's beliefs.
Lets look to them when we want to write our laws, let them judge our citizens, and pay taxes... er I mean dues... to them, so they can do much much more of this great work as our benevolent masters!
Whaddya say?
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