Top China paper slams Clinton's democracy comments

Reuters – 07/12/2012

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's top newspaper slammed U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday for comments she made lauding democracy and implicitly criticizing restrictions in China, saying those Asian countries that ape U.S. democracy were doomed to fail.

Earlier this week, Clinton held up Mongolia's sometimes messy politics as a democratic model for Asia. While she did not directly name China, her comments appeared aimed partly at Beijing.

In China's first response to her remarks, ruling Communist Party mouthpiece the People's Daily said Clinton was acting as a "preacher for human rights" by praising certain countries to obliquely attack China.

"Who is the United States to haughtily appraise Asia's democratic position?" the newspaper said in a commentary.

Groups Want Stronger Asean Declaration of Human Rights

ASEAN countries' foreign ministers join their hands during a photo session at the 45th Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Foreign Ministers' Plus three Meeting in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Tuesday, July 10, 2012. (Photo: AP)

Cops beating a child during the forced eviction of Borei Keila: Human rights in Cambodia under Hun Xen?

Tuesday, 10 July 2012
Sok Khemara, VOA Khmer | Washington, DC

“Asean member states, as members of the United Nations, have to comply with those minimum standards.”

As Cambodia prepares to host a major regional security meeting in Phnom Penh this week, local and international rights group say the country should use its presidency of Asean this year to push for a declaration of human rights that is up to international standards.

Asean members have already drafted a human rights declaration that it expects to approve later this year, but built into it are limitations that rights advocates say need changed.

Asean officials have not allowed members of civil society to officially review their draft declaration, but according to a draft obtained by VOA Khmer, basic rights and freedoms are subject to a number of exceptions.

These include “the just requirements of national security, public order, public health, public safety, public morality, as well as the general welfare of the peoples in a democratic society,” according to the draft.

These limitations create the potential for justifying human rights abuses, rights advocates say.

Hun Xen signed the land concession deals, now he is signing another order to suspend himself from doing it: What else is new?

Cambodian leader puts new land deals on hold


May 7, 2012
Associated Press

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia - Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Sen on Monday temporarily suspended new land concessions to private companies in an effort to ease political pressure over an issue that has triggered social unrest and occasional violence.

The timing of Hun Sen's action seemed to reflect his usual political astuteness, coming less than two weeks after the slaying of a prominent local environmentalist investigating illegal logging turned the spotlight on shady practices involving government land. The April 26 shooting death of Chut Wutty by a military policeman near where a Chinese company is building a hydropower project drew worldwide condemnation.

Monday's directive also came during a visit of a special United Nations envoy on human rights, Surya P. Subedi, who stated that he plans during his weeklong mission to examine the situation of land concessions and "their impact on the human rights of local communities."

Land concessions have been the focus of allegations of land-grabbing by big businessmen tied to corrupt officials and triggered violent clashes when residents were forcefully evicted.

Australia: Calls To Promote Human Rights In Southeast Asia

April 16, 2012
Eurasia Review

Australia should make human rights a priority in developing closer ties with Southeast Asian countries, Human Rights Watch said today in a letter to Australia’s new foreign minister, Bob Carr. On a recent trip to Cambodia, Singapore, and Vietnam, Carr focused on the importance of Southeast Asian countries as friends and trading partners, but said little about the rights of people in the region.

“Trade alone is not enough for the people of Southeast Asia who are being denied their basic freedoms,” said Elaine Pearson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “As a longstanding successful democracy, Australia is uniquely poised to talk frankly with the region’s leaders about addressing specific human rights concerns.”

The letter discusses human rights issues in Burma, Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam where pressure from Australia could advance human rights protections.

Human Rights (explained)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbul3hxYGNU

Speak Truth To Power (Courage Without Borders) Series in KI-Media - Samuel Kofi Woods (Liberia) "Political Rights"

http://www.box.net/shared/ycrm1f23d7xyz4pvy563

Speak Truth To Power Series in KI-Media - Natasa Kandic (Serbia) “Human Rights in Time of War”

Speak Truth To Power Series in KI-Media - Natasa Kandic (Serbia) “Human Rights in Time of War”
http://www.scribd.com/fullscreen/61348629?access_key=key-1gk6mh2uef658alp2i2h

Speak Truth To Power in KI-Media Series - Gabor Gombos (Hungary) “Mental Disability Rights”

Speak Truth To Power in KI-Media Series - Gabor Gombos (Hungary) “Mental Disability Rights”
http://www.scribd.com/fullscreen/61281172?access_key=key-15bow5qwrn49ju63ptg5

Speak Truth to Power Series in KI-Media - Guillaume Ngefa Atondoko (Congo) “Political Rights”

Speak Truth to Power Series in KI-Media - Guillaume Ngefa Atondoko (Congo) “Political Rights”
http://www.scribd.com/fullscreen/60967049?access_key=key-nxlncbr4mwv5hkj1pvx

Press release from the Cambodian Human Rights Portal - Sithi passes 100,000 hits

Dear all

The Cambodian Human Rights Portal Project team is delighted to announce that the portal (www.sithi.org) has recorded its 100,000 visitor.

We would like to thank you all for your support and hope that you continue to use the portal in the promotion and protection of human rights in Cambodia.

Please see attached in Khmer and English a press release marking this event.

Thank you and kind regards

--

Sithi Team

Tel: +855 23 72 69 01

Fax: +855 23 72 69 02

Nº798, Street 99, Beoung Trabek,

Khan Chamkar Mon, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

Reports reveal failure of South Asian governments to protect human rights

10 December 2010
OneWorld South Asia

New reports on 11 Asian nations were released by the Asian Human Rights Commission on the International Human Rights Day. The reports expose that governments, particularly in South Asia, are sadly lacking in efforts to protect people's civil, economic, social and cultural rights.

For the Human Rights Day in 2010 the Asian Human Rights Commission presents the reports on the state of human rights in eleven countries in Asia; Bangladesh, Burma, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines, Thailand, South Korea and Sri Lanka. The general picture that emerges is one of the failures of the states to carry out their obligations for the protection of people.

Serious defects are evident in the area of the judiciary. Judicial functions appear to be adversely affected by the absence of judicial independence as well as structural problems which deny the judiciary a place in terms of the doctrine of separation of powers. Judicial power itself is often restricted by constitutional and legislative limitations. Added to this is the problem of inadequate budgetary allocations for the administration of justice. This in turn affects the areas of the training of the judiciary as well as the availability of adequate numbers of judges to ensure the proper functioning of the justice system.

Extraordinary delays often affect the possibility of fair trial. Lack of witness protection prevents many persons from obtaining justice. In achieving a higher degree of protection for human rights the problems relating to the judiciary require much greater attention in terms of the contextual problems that exist in the particular circumstances of many Asian countries.

Impunity is often guaranteed in serious violations of human rights by the prevention of proper inquiries into such violations. Inquiries are prevented, often due to political reasons. Development of the structural framework needed to guarantee credible inquiries into all violations of human rights is prevented by limitations in legislative measures as well as due to failures to ensure proper administrative measures.

Torture replaces proper investigations into crime in most Asian countries. There is widespread torture at the police stations and torture remains the modus operandi that has been quite accepted by the governments. Despite of the ratification of the United Nations conventions, particularly the Convention against Torture, Cruel and Inhuman Treatment or Punishment, the measures for implementation are seriously lacking. While there are some discussions of bringing legislation to make torture a criminal offense no speedy action is taking to ensure such legislation. Even where legislation is available such laws are often ignored due to the lack of adequate arrangements to ensure investigations into torture and to ensure criminal and disciplinary action against the abusers. The governments in the region and the United Nations' agencies dealing with human rights need to scrutinise this issue carefully and find credible solutions to prevent the widespread use of torture that exists now.

The absence of protection affects not only civil rights but also economic, social and cultural rights. Large scale poverty still exists in Asia. Starvation and malnutrition is often reported. However, there are no speedy mechanisms to deal with such situations. The problems of food and water are caused, not by the absence of resources but are due to administrative failures that allow for neglect. The Millennium Development goals do not appear to have been given adequate attention in the countries of the region.

The poorer sections often complain of problems of arbitrary deprivations of their limited possessions including their places of habitat. Land grabbing and displacement is a problem that is heard from many countries in the region. Adequate legal mechanisms do not appear to exist to safeguard the basic rights of people relating to their lands and adequate protection against arbitrary measures that lead to impoverishment.

All forms of violence committed against women, communities and minorities due to discrimination based on gender, caste, race and religion are practiced in many parts of Asia. In these societies, women have to face the constant threats of sexual harassment, rape, domestic violence, acid throwing, dowry deaths, honour killings and forced marriages. The discriminatory practices in existing legislation, no proper investigation mechanisms and the failures of the judicial system have resulted in the impunity of perpetrators.

Arbitrary deprivation of civil and political rights as well as economic, social and cultural rights is often the cause of the graver forms of human rights abuses such as forced migrations which also often leads to trafficking of women and children. While the reports on all these issues are many there does not appear to be any visible attempts to resolve these long standing problems.

All throughout Asia there are clear signs of the people being more aware of their rights and they are making great efforts to improve the enjoyment of their rights. The hope for a better future lies in these initiatives by the people themselves. However, the government response to these initiatives is wholly inadequate. The governments should make greater efforts to improve the protection mechanisms for civil rights and economic, social and cultural rights.

Mu Sochua character on stage in Turkey ... while the real Mu Sochua saw her rights being trampled by the Hun Xen's regime

Mu Sochua (Photo: The Phnom Penh Post)

In the play, titled 'Yedi' (Seven), journalist Ece Temelkuran will play Nigerian democracy defender Hafsat Abiola, while the lawyer of assassinated Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, Fethiye Çetin, will play North Irish activist Inez McCormack.

Seven famous women take stage for women’s rights in Turkey

Sunday, September 19, 2010
ARAM EKİN DURAN
Hurriyet Daily News
ISTANBUL - Referans

Füsun Demirel plays Mu Sochua, who was co-nominated in 2005 for the Nobel Peace Prize for her work against sex trafficking of women in Cambodia and neighboring Thailand.

Seven women take the stage to draw attention to human rights. The theater play 'Seven' will make its Turkish premiere at Istanbul's Muammer Karaca Theater on Thursday. The play is based on interviews with seven women’s rights activists from seven different countries, and has been staged in the world since 2007

In the play, titled 'Yedi' (Seven), journalist Ece Temelkuran will play Nigerian democracy defender Hafsat Abiola, while the lawyer of assassinated Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, Fethiye Çetin, will play North Irish activist Inez McCormack.

Seven human rights-sensitive women will take to the theater stage to raise awareness of the issues via the stories of seven women who struggled for human rights in society.

In the play, titled “Yedi” (Seven), journalist-writer Ece Temelkuran will play Nigerian democracy defender Hafsat Abiola, while the lawyer of assassinated Armenian journalist Hırant Dink, Fethiye Çetin, will play North Irish activist Inez McCormack, who was also played by Meryl Streep last year. Other women in the play are Turkish artists Lale Mansur, Füsün Demirel, Zeynep Eronat, Belçim Bilgin Erdoğan and Şevval Sam.

The play will make its Turkish premiere Thursday at 8 p.m. at the Muammer Karaca Theater. Entrance to the play is free.

Swedish national theater Riksteatern’s producer Figen Solmaz said the play, which is supported by the Swedish Institute and the Swedish Consulate General, would be staged within the framework of a conference on human trafficking and women’s rights that will be held in Istanbul.

“This play has been staged all around the world for a few years and we wanted Turkish people to see it, too. This is why we have chosen seven women who are sensitive to democracy and human rights,” Solmaz said.

She said the seven women, famous among Turkish people, agreed with the project and gave great support to it. “Turkey is perceived by Western countries as an underdeveloped country in terms of women’s rights. The best side of this play is that it shows that women’s rights is not only a problem for underdeveloped countries, but also is a common problem for all women in the world.”

Hillary Clinton, Meryl Streep played in the US

“Seven,” which is based on interviews made with seven women activists from seven different countries, has been staged around the world since 2007. Hillary Clinton presented the play in the U.S. and famous actress Meryl Streep played the role of Northern Irish activist Inez McCormack. The play has been performed by the Swedish Riksteatern Theater in more than 40 venues since 2009.

Activists in the play

Fethiye Çetin plays Inez McCormack, who is an activist for women’s and human rights, labor, and social justice and a former president of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions. McCormack played a critical role in the 1998 Good Friday Peace Accords and continues to advocate for equal rights and fair labor practices for women and minorities.

Belçim Bilgin Erdoğan plays Muktharan Mai, who was gang raped by four men and forced to walk home almost naked. Instead of taking the traditional Pakistani women’s route of committing suicide, Mai brought her rapists to justice, built schools to improve the condition of women, and became an advocate for education in her country.

Şevval Sam plays Farida Azizi, who became an activist fighting against marginalization of women under Taliban rule in her native country. Because of threats on her life, she gained asylum and now lives in the United States with her two children and works on women's rights and peace building in Afghanistan.

Füsun Demirel plays Mu Sochua, who was co-nominated in 2005 for the Nobel Peace Prize for her work against sex trafficking of women in Cambodia and neighboring Thailand.

Ece Temelkuran plays Hafsat Abiola, an advocate for human rights and democracy following the murder of her activist parents. She founded the Kudirat Initiative for Democracy, which provides skills training and leadership opportunities for young women across Nigeria.

Zeynep Eronat plays Marina Pisklakova-Parker, who founded one of the first hotlines for victims of domestic violence in Russia, which has since grown into the Center ANNA, part of a coalition that has provided crisis and counseling services for 100,000 Russian women.

Lale Mansur plays Annabella De Leon, who has been a congresswoman since 1995 and has received death threats because of her fight against corruption and for the rights of the poor, particularly women and indigenous peoples.

"I've Been to the Mountaintop" - Martin Luther King Jr.

We, too, are living in an exciting era, on the cusp of change. The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delineated sweepingly the long arc of freedom history, and with searing, soaring details, articulated Black American freedom struggle of the 1960s. Re-reading this through Cambodian lenses this September 2010, parallels and resonances abound for us - the echoes of excuses (private or public), of oppression, of violent tactics, of deceit but also the resounding triumphant parallels of determined spirits, enduring principles of freedom, justice, peace, unity and hope in the knowledge that the long arc of moral history bends toward justice.

I hope every Cambodian will read this, particularly the Cambodian officials, the arm-chair critics, the naysayers and the anti-change stalwarts. May all of us be transformed by the renewing of our minds.

(For those of you who are not so strong in English but more fluent in another language, you can read a translated version among 60 languages of this speech at www.thearyseng.com by clicking on the flag at the bottom right-hand corner.) -- Theary Seng, Phnom Penh, 15 Sept. 2010

Delivered 3 April 1968, Mason Temple (Church of God in Christ Headquarters), Memphis, Tennessee

Thank you very kindly, my friends. As I listened to Ralph Abernathy and his eloquent and generous introduction and then thought about myself, I wondered who he was talking about. It's always good to have your closest friend and associate to say something good about you. And Ralph Abernathy is the best friend that I have in the world. I'm delighted to see each of you here tonight in spite of a storm warning. You reveal that you are determined to go on anyhow.

Something is happening in Memphis; something is happening in our world. And you know, if I were standing at the beginning of time, with the possibility of taking a kind of general and panoramic view of the whole of human history up to now, and the Almighty said to me, "Martin Luther King, which age would you like to live in?" I would take my mental flight by Egypt and I would watch God's children in their magnificent trek from the dark dungeons of Egypt through, or rather across the Red Sea, through the wilderness on toward the promised land. And in spite of its magnificence, I wouldn't stop there.

I would move on by Greece and take my mind to Mount Olympus. And I would see Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Euripides and Aristophanes assembled around the Parthenon. And I would watch them around the Parthenon as they discussed the great and eternal issues of reality. But I wouldn't stop there.

I would go on, even to the great heyday of the Roman Empire. And I would see developments around there, through various emperors and leaders. But I wouldn't stop there.

I would even come up to the day of the Renaissance, and get a quick picture of all that the Renaissance did for the cultural and aesthetic life of man. But I wouldn't stop there.

I would even go by the way that the man for whom I am named had his habitat. And I would watch Martin Luther as he tacked his ninety-five theses on the door at the church of Wittenberg. But I wouldn't stop there.

I would come on up even to 1863, and watch a vacillating President by the name of Abraham Lincoln finally come to the conclusion that he had to sign the Emancipation Proclamation. But I wouldn't stop there.

I would even come up to the early thirties, and see a man grappling with the problems of the bankruptcy of his nation. And come with an eloquent cry that we have nothing to fear but "fear itself." But I wouldn't stop there.

Strangely enough, I would turn to the Almighty, and say, "If you allow me to live just a few years in the second half of the 20th century, I will be happy."

Now that's a strange statement to make, because the world is all messed up. The nation is sick. Trouble is in the land; confusion all around. That's a strange statement. But I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough can you see the stars. And I see God working in this period of the twentieth century in a way that men, in some strange way, are responding.

Something is happening in our world. The masses of people are rising up. And wherever they are assembled today, whether they are in Johannesburg, South Africa; Nairobi, Kenya; Accra, Ghana; New York City; Atlanta, Georgia; Jackson, Mississippi; or Memphis, Tennessee -- the cry is always the same: "We want to be free."

And another reason that I'm happy to live in this period is that we have been forced to a point where we are going to have to grapple with the problems that men have been trying to grapple with through history, but the demands didn't force them to do it. Survival demands that we grapple with them. Men, for years now, have been talking about war and peace. But now, no longer can they just talk about it. It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world; it's nonviolence or nonexistence. That is where we are today.

And also in the human rights revolution, if something isn't done, and done in a hurry, to bring the colored peoples of the world out of their long years of poverty, their long years of hurt and neglect, the whole world is doomed. Now, I'm just happy that God has allowed me to live in this period to see what is unfolding. And I'm happy that He's allowed me to be in Memphis.

I can remember -- I can remember when Negroes were just going around as Ralph has said, so often, scratching where they didn't itch, and laughing when they were not tickled. But that day is all over. We mean business now, and we are determined to gain our rightful place in God's world.

And that's all this whole thing is about. We aren't engaged in any negative protest and in any negative arguments with anybody. We are saying that we are determined to be men. We are determined to be people. We are saying -- We are saying that we are God's children. And that we are God's children, we don't have to live like we are forced to live.

Now, what does all of this mean in this great period of history? It means that we've got to stay together. We've got to stay together and maintain unity. You know, whenever Pharaoh wanted to prolong the period of slavery in Egypt, he had a favorite, favorite formula for doing it. What was that? He kept the slaves fighting among themselves. But whenever the slaves get together, something happens in Pharaoh's court, and he cannot hold the slaves in slavery. When the slaves get together, that's the beginning of getting out of slavery. Now let us maintain unity.

Secondly, let us keep the issues where they are. The issue is injustice. The issue is the refusal of Memphis to be fair and honest in its dealings with its public servants, who happen to be sanitation workers. Now, we've got to keep attention on that. That's always the problem with a little violence. You know what happened the other day, and the press dealt only with the window-breaking. I read the articles. They very seldom got around to mentioning the fact that one thousand, three hundred sanitation workers are on strike, and that Memphis is not being fair to them, and that Mayor Loeb is in dire need of a doctor. They didn't get around to that.

Now we're going to march again, and we've got to march again, in order to put the issue where it is supposed to be -- and force everybody to see that there are thirteen hundred of God's children here suffering, sometimes going hungry, going through dark and dreary nights wondering how this thing is going to come out. That's the issue. And we've got to say to the nation: We know how it's coming out. For when people get caught up with that which is right and they are willing to sacrifice for it, there is no stopping point short of victory.

We aren't going to let any mace stop us. We are masters in our nonviolent movement in disarming police forces; they don't know what to do. I've seen them so often. I remember in Birmingham, Alabama, when we were in that majestic struggle there, we would move out of the 16th Street Baptist Church day after day; by the hundreds we would move out. And Bull Connor would tell them to send the dogs forth, and they did come; but we just went before the dogs singing, "Ain't gonna let nobody turn me around."

Bull Connor next would say, "Turn the fire hoses on." And as I said to you the other night, Bull Connor didn't know history. He knew a kind of physics that somehow didn't relate to the transphysics that we knew about. And that was the fact that there was a certain kind of fire that no water could put out. And we went before the fire hoses; we had known water. If we were Baptist or some other denominations, we had been immersed. If we were Methodist, and some others, we had been sprinkled, but we knew water. That couldn't stop us.

And we just went on before the dogs and we would look at them; and we'd go on before the water hoses and we would look at it, and we'd just go on singing "Over my head I see freedom in the air." And then we would be thrown in the paddy wagons, and sometimes we were stacked in there like sardines in a can. And they would throw us in, and old Bull would say, "Take 'em off," and they did; and we would just go in the paddy wagon singing, "We Shall Overcome." And every now and then we'd get in jail, and we'd see the jailers looking through the windows being moved by our prayers, and being moved by our words and our songs. And there was a power there which Bull Connor couldn't adjust to; and so we ended up transforming Bull into a steer, and we won our struggle in Birmingham. Now we've got to go on in Memphis just like that. I call upon you to be with us when we go out Monday.

Now about injunctions: We have an injunction and we're going into court tomorrow morning to fight this illegal, unconstitutional injunction. All we say to America is, "Be true to what you said on paper." If I lived in China or even Russia, or any totalitarian country, maybe I could understand some of these illegal injunctions. Maybe I could understand the denial of certain basic First Amendment privileges, because they hadn't committed themselves to that over there. But somewhere I read of the freedom of assembly. Somewhere I read of the freedom of speech. Somewhere I read of the freedom of press. Somewhere I read that the greatness of America is the right to protest for right. And so just as I say, we aren't going to let dogs or water hoses turn us around, we aren't going to let any injunction turn us around. We are going on.

We need all of you. And you know what's beautiful to me is to see all of these ministers of the Gospel. It's a marvelous picture. Who is it that is supposed to articulate the longings and aspirations of the people more than the preacher? Somehow the preacher must have a kind of fire shut up in his bones. And whenever injustice is around he tell it. Somehow the preacher must be an Amos, and saith, "When God speaks who can but prophesy?" Again with Amos, "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream." Somehow the preacher must say with Jesus, "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me," and he's anointed me to deal with the problems of the poor."

And I want to commend the preachers, under the leadership of these noble men: James Lawson, one who has been in this struggle for many years; he's been to jail for struggling; he's been kicked out of Vanderbilt University for this struggle, but he's still going on, fighting for the rights of his people. Reverend Ralph Jackson, Billy Kiles; I could just go right on down the list, but time will not permit. But I want to thank all of them. And I want you to thank them, because so often, preachers aren't concerned about anything but themselves. And I'm always happy to see a relevant ministry.

It's all right to talk about "long white robes over yonder," in all of its symbolism. But ultimately people want some suits and dresses and shoes to wear down here! It's all right to talk about "streets flowing with milk and honey," but God has commanded us to be concerned about the slums down here, and his children who can't eat three square meals a day. It's all right to talk about the new Jerusalem, but one day, God's preacher must talk about the new New York, the new Atlanta, the new Philadelphia, the new Los Angeles, the new Memphis, Tennessee. This is what we have to do.

Now the other thing we'll have to do is this: Always anchor our external direct action with the power of economic withdrawal. Now, we are poor people. Individually, we are poor when you compare us with white society in America. We are poor. Never stop and forget that collectively -- that means all of us together -- collectively we are richer than all the nations in the world, with the exception of nine. Did you ever think about that? After you leave the United States, Soviet Russia, Great Britain, West Germany, France, and I could name the others, the American Negro collectively is richer than most nations of the world. We have an annual income of more than thirty billion dollars a year, which is more than all of the exports of the United States, and more than the national budget of Canada. Did you know that? That's power right there, if we know how to pool it.

We don't have to argue with anybody. We don't have to curse and go around acting bad with our words. We don't need any bricks and bottles. We don't need any Molotov cocktails. We just need to go around to these stores, and to these massive industries in our country, and say, "God sent us by here, to say to you that you're not treating his children right. And we've come by here to ask you to make the first item on your agenda fair treatment, where God's children are concerned. Now, if you are not prepared to do that, we do have an agenda that we must follow. And our agenda calls for withdrawing economic support from you."

And so, as a result of this, we are asking you tonight, to go out and tell your neighbors not to buy Coca-Cola in Memphis. Go by and tell them not to buy Sealtest milk. Tell them not to buy -- what is the other bread? -- Wonder Bread. And what is the other bread company, Jesse? Tell them not to buy Hart's bread. As Jesse Jackson has said, up to now, only the garbage men have been feeling pain; now we must kind of redistribute the pain. We are choosing these companies because they haven't been fair in their hiring policies; and we are choosing them because they can begin the process of saying they are going to support the needs and the rights of these men who are on strike. And then they can move on town -- downtown and tell Mayor Loeb to do what is right.

But not only that, we've got to strengthen black institutions. I call upon you to take your money out of the banks downtown and deposit your money in Tri-State Bank. We want a "bank-in" movement in Memphis. Go by the savings and loan association. I'm not asking you something that we don't do ourselves at SCLC. Judge Hooks and others will tell you that we have an account here in the savings and loan association from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. We are telling you to follow what we are doing. Put your money there. You have six or seven black insurance companies here in the city of Memphis. Take out your insurance there. We want to have an "insurance-in."

Now these are some practical things that we can do. We begin the process of building a greater economic base. And at the same time, we are putting pressure where it really hurts. I ask you to follow through here.

Now, let me say as I move to my conclusion that we've got to give ourselves to this struggle until the end. Nothing would be more tragic than to stop at this point in Memphis. We've got to see it through. And when we have our march, you need to be there. If it means leaving work, if it means leaving school -- be there. Be concerned about your brother. You may not be on strike. But either we go up together, or we go down together.

Let us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness. One day a man came to Jesus, and he wanted to raise some questions about some vital matters of life. At points he wanted to trick Jesus, and show him that he knew a little more than Jesus knew and throw him off base....

Now that question could have easily ended up in a philosophical and theological debate. But Jesus immediately pulled that question from mid-air, and placed it on a dangerous curve between Jerusalem and Jericho. And he talked about a certain man, who fell among thieves. You remember that a Levite and a priest passed by on the other side. They didn't stop to help him. And finally a man of another race came by. He got down from his beast, decided not to be compassionate by proxy. But he got down with him, administered first aid, and helped the man in need. Jesus ended up saying, this was the good man, this was the great man, because he had the capacity to project the "I" into the "thou," and to be concerned about his brother.

Now you know, we use our imagination a great deal to try to determine why the priest and the Levite didn't stop. At times we say they were busy going to a church meeting, an ecclesiastical gathering, and they had to get on down to Jerusalem so they wouldn't be late for their meeting. At other times we would speculate that there was a religious law that "One who was engaged in religious ceremonials was not to touch a human body twenty-four hours before the ceremony." And every now and then we begin to wonder whether maybe they were not going down to Jerusalem -- or down to Jericho, rather to organize a "Jericho Road Improvement Association." That's a possibility. Maybe they felt that it was better to deal with the problem from the causal root, rather than to get bogged down with an individual effect.

But I'm going to tell you what my imagination tells me. It's possible that those men were afraid. You see, the Jericho road is a dangerous road. I remember when Mrs. King and I were first in Jerusalem. We rented a car and drove from Jerusalem down to Jericho. And as soon as we got on that road, I said to my wife, "I can see why Jesus used this as the setting for his parable." It's a winding, meandering road. It's really conducive for ambushing. You start out in Jerusalem, which is about 1200 miles -- or rather 1200 feet above sea level. And by the time you get down to Jericho, fifteen or twenty minutes later, you're about 2200 feet below sea level. That's a dangerous road. In the days of Jesus it came to be known as the "Bloody Pass." And you know, it's possible that the priest and the Levite looked over that man on the ground and wondered if the robbers were still around. Or it's possible that they felt that the man on the ground was merely faking. And he was acting like he had been robbed and hurt, in order to seize them over there, lure them there for quick and easy seizure. And so the first question that the priest asked -- the first question that the Levite asked was, "If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?" But then the Good Samaritan came by. And he reversed the question: "If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?"

That's the question before you tonight. Not, "If I stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to my job. Not, "If I stop to help the sanitation workers what will happen to all of the hours that I usually spend in my office every day and every week as a pastor?" The question is not, "If I stop to help this man in need, what will happen to me?" The question is, "If I do not stop to help the sanitation workers, what will happen to them?" That's the question.

Let us rise up tonight with a greater readiness. Let us stand with a greater determination. And let us move on in these powerful days, these days of challenge to make America what it ought to be. We have an opportunity to make America a better nation. And I want to thank God, once more, for allowing me to be here with you.

You know, several years ago, I was in New York City autographing the first book that I had written. And while sitting there autographing books, a demented black woman came up. The only question I heard from her was, "Are you Martin Luther King?" And I was looking down writing, and I said, "Yes." And the next minute I felt something beating on my chest. Before I knew it I had been stabbed by this demented woman. I was rushed to Harlem Hospital. It was a dark Saturday afternoon. And that blade had gone through, and the X-rays revealed that the tip of the blade was on the edge of my aorta, the main artery. And once that's punctured, your drowned in your own blood -- that's the end of you.

It came out in the New York Times the next morning, that if I had merely sneezed, I would have died. Well, about four days later, they allowed me, after the operation, after my chest had been opened, and the blade had been taken out, to move around in the wheel chair in the hospital. They allowed me to read some of the mail that came in, and from all over the states and the world, kind letters came in. I read a few, but one of them I will never forget. I had received one from the President and the Vice-President. I've forgotten what those telegrams said. I'd received a visit and a letter from the Governor of New York, but I've forgotten what that letter said. But there was another letter that came from a little girl, a young girl who was a student at the White Plains High School. And I looked at that letter, and I'll never forget it. It said simply,

Dear Dr. King,

I am a ninth-grade student at the White Plains High School."

And she said,

While it should not matter, I would like to mention that I'm a white girl. I read in the paper of your misfortune, and of your suffering. And I read that if you had sneezed, you would have died. And I'm simply writing you to say that I'm so happy that you didn't sneeze.

And I want to say tonight -- I want to say tonight that I too am happy that I didn't sneeze. Because if I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1960, when students all over the South started sitting-in at lunch counters. And I knew that as they were sitting in, they were really standing up for the best in the American dream, and taking the whole nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the Founding Fathers in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1961, when we decided to take a ride for freedom and ended segregation in inter-state travel.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1962, when Negroes in Albany, Georgia, decided to straighten their backs up. And whenever men and women straighten their backs up, they are going somewhere, because a man can't ride your back unless it is bent.

If I had sneezed -- If I had sneezed I wouldn't have been here in 1963, when the black people of Birmingham, Alabama, aroused the conscience of this nation, and brought into being the Civil Rights Bill.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have had a chance later that year, in August, to try to tell America about a dream that I had had.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been down in Selma, Alabama, to see the great Movement there.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been in Memphis to see a community rally around those brothers and sisters who are suffering.

I'm so happy that I didn't sneeze.

And they were telling me --. Now, it doesn't matter, now. It really doesn't matter what happens now. I left Atlanta this morning, and as we got started on the plane, there were six of us. The pilot said over the public address system, "We are sorry for the delay, but we have Dr. Martin Luther King on the plane. And to be sure that all of the bags were checked, and to be sure that nothing would be wrong with on the plane, we had to check out everything carefully. And we've had the plane protected and guarded all night."

And then I got into Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers?

Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop.

And I don't mind.

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!

And so I'm happy, tonight.

I'm not worried about anything.

I'm not fearing any man!

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!!

Will Obama push for democracy?

July 7, 2010
By A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
Pacific Daily News (Guam)

Words can be tricky things, as two convoluted comments, quoted here, remind us. One is attributed to State Department spokesman Robert McCloskey: "I know that you believe you understand what you think I said, but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant." The other is former chairman of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan: "I guess I should warn you, if I turn out to be particularly clear, you've probably misunderstood what I've said."

Clarity would seem to be more evident in the 52-page "National Security Strategy" released on May 27 by the Obama team, outlining U.S. goals and actions in the world.

"To achieve the world that we seek, the U.S. must apply our strategic approach in pursuit of four enduring national interests" which are "inextricably linked" -- security (of the U.S., its citizens, its allies and partners), prosperity (a prosperous American economy), values (respect for universal values at home and abroad), international order (let nations pursue their interests, especially when they diverge).

Robert Kagan, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, wrote an op-ed piece in the June 29 Washington Post in which he listed five recent, noteworthy foreign policy actions taken by President Obama.

Highest on the list was Obama's nomination of Gen. David Patraeus as commander in Afghanistan. It signaled "Obama's determination to succeed in Afghanistan" and warned of the "never realistic" July 2011 departure of U.S. troops.

Second, the U.N. Security Council resolution on Iran, though "mild, badly watered down by China and Russia," won't stop Iran from getting a bomb, but does increase pressure on Tehran. Third was Obama's handling of the U.S. base in Okinawa: "firm but engaged," and Tokyo's reaffirmed commitment to a U.S. alliance. Fourth, a free-trade agreement with South Korea represents the "first actual evidence" that the U.S. "is back" in Asia -- "If Congress can be persuaded to pass the agreement"!

Last, Obama's public "Reset Fact Sheet" shows Washington's "serious disagreements" with Moscow over Georgia." It calls for the end to Russian "occupation" of Abkhazia and South Ossetia."

What happened to Obama and democracy and human rights?

In the May 31 "A worldview that's light on human rights," the Post's deputy editorial page editor, Jackson Diehl, asked, "What sort of international order does Barack Obama seek?" He quoted Obama's introduction to the NSS, where he spoke about "the challenges of our times: countering violent extremism and insurgency; stopping the spread of nuclear weapons and securing nuclear materials; combating a changing climate and sustaining global growth; helping countries feed themselves and care for their sick; resolving and preventing conflict, while also healing its wounds."

"That's a big agenda," Diehl wrote, "But isn't something missing? ... Nowhere in that long sentence ... does Obama suggest that the international 'engagement' he proposes should serve to combat tyranny or oppression, or promote democracy. In that sense, ... human rights come second."

Obama has said the U.S. must shape a world order relying as much on the persuasiveness of its diplomacy as the might of its military; Secretary of State Hillary Clinton describes U.S. leadership as "building the coalitions that can produce results against those shared challenges ... providing incentives for states who are part of the solution, whether they recognize it or not, enabling them and encouraging them to live up to responsibilities that even a decade ago they would never have thought were theirs, and disincentives for those who do not."

The section on "values" affirms "certain values are universal" -- freedom to speak one's mind, to assemble without fear, to worship as one pleases, and to choose one's own leaders -- and states the U.S. "will work to promote them worldwide." Autocratic rulers "have repressed basic human rights and democratic practices in the name of economic development and national unity," but the "U.S. supports those who seek to exercise universal rights around the world."

Obama's introduction to the NSS states: "In all that we do, we will advocate for and advance the basic rights upon which our Nation was founded. ... We promote these values by living them, including our commitment to the rule of law. We will strengthen international norms that protect these rights and create space and support for those who resist repression."

Walter Shapiro of USA TODAY found the foreign policy buzz word "engagement" "brandished 42 separate times in 52 pages." He wrote: "Engagement is the active participation of the US in relationships beyond out borders ... the opposite of a self-imposed isolation that denies us the ability to shape outcomes."

For Foreign Policy's Will Inboden, "While the NSS rightfully devotes more rhetorical attention to the promotion of human rights and democracy, it unfortunately puts too much emphasis on the U.S. example alone" and "What (international reformers) want is active (U.S.) advocacy and support -- even when that support might cause friction in diplomatic engagement with their own governments."

Critics say there are certain rights and policies the U.S. should support unconditionally, regardless of how many other nations in the world oppose them. One stated that President Obama needs to back up his political rhetoric with support for political rights reform.

A. Gaffar Peang-Meth, Ph.D., is retired from the University of Guam, where he taught political science for 13 years. Write him at peangmeth@yahoo.com.

Could this Be the Turning Point?

Sunday, May 09, 2010
Op-Ed By Jayakhmer
Originally posted at http://modernprogressivekhmer.blogspot.com/

As he observed America’s point of departure Elexis De Tocqueville wrote, “America is the only country in which we can watch the natural quiet growth of society and where it is possible to be exact about the influence of the point of departure on the future of a state.”

The recent China’s announcement of its military assistance to Cambodia could be construed as offset to the U.S. suspension of its military aid to Cambodia under its Excess Defense Articles program to protest Cambodia’s deportation of 20 Uighur refugees to China.

Although there is no sign of major shift in U.S. policy for Cambodia, diplomatic spats between the two nations could trigger a change of direction for Cambodia as it allows itself to be influenced by world’s dominant powers- the U.S. and China.

According to an article of June 2, 2009, Xinhua News Agency, U.S. Ambassador Carol Rodley’s statement of Cambodia's corruption causing the loss of 500 million U.S. dollars in revenue prompted this response from Cambodia’s Foreign Ministry, "The Royal Government of Cambodia absolutely refutes the politically motivated and unsubstantiated allegation made by the United States diplomat in contradiction of the good relations between Cambodia and the United States government"

Prior to this, Cambodian government has been active in asking the U.S. to write of its debt that amounts more than 300 million U.S. dollars. The response to this request is pending.

Could this be the turning point?

Cambodia’s fragile democracy is in its infancy. It could grow into either direction. The direction in which a political system is built upon the respect for human dignity, human rights, and political and economic freedom ; or the direction in which a political system is built upon heavy government controls with the disregard for human dignity, human rights, and limited political and economic freedom.

The danger is the line between these two spheres is increasingly obscured by the latter’s success. For example, the U.S. seems to diminish its world’s influence as it tries to deal with its financial crises while China seems to be able to continue its expansion especially in Asia and Africa.

The relationship between U.S. and China is complicated by their economic dependencies. The U.S. depends on China as one of its main creditors while China depends on the U.S. for its economic expansion. On June 8, 2009, Newsweek reported that of the U.S. foreign debts of $ 3.3 trillion, China’s share was $767.9 billion. China holds roughly $2.5 trillion in foreign assets.

One cannot make too much out of the recent China’s announcement of military assistance to Cambodia as any shift in Sino-Cambodian relation. As far as one can remember, China always has relationship with Cambodia that can be traced to the date of the Khmer Empire. The most notable one was China was an important partner with the government of Democratic Kampuchea (1975-1979). China retaliated against Vietnam for its invasion of Cambodia in 1979. And China has been a personal friend to the former King of Cambodia, Norodom Sihanouk. This relationship allows the former king to travel back and forth to and from China almost at will.

As Cambodia flirts with different dominant regional powers for its survival, it could become a spoiled child growing up with many parents and in many households. As such, it could sway toward China who has been silent on important issues that are rudimental for Cambodia’s long term strength and growth such as corruptions, human rights, and democracy. It should be noted that China was also silent about Cambodia’s genocidal regime during which approximately 1.7 million Cambodian lost their lives.

Asian Development Bank (ADB) predicts a modest of 4.5% GDP growth this year. During this growing pain, Cambodia should impose a self discipline by focusing in cleaning up corruptions, creating functional institutions, and especially creating opportunity to educate its future generations.

While it is natural for Cambodia to focus on agricultural sector, there are tremendous opportunities to get into renewable energy sector. Start paying attention to environmental issues now by making sure that Cambodia’s remaining natural resources such as rain forest and other natural resources are protected and wisely utilized will pay great dividends in the future.

Cambodia has all the resources to be independent and to stand on its feet without depending on foreign donations if it has the will to fix its corruption problems.

UN rights representative calls for press information law

Christophe Peschoux (Photo: The Phnom Penh Post)

Wednesday, 05 May 2010
Khouth Sophak Chakrya and Cameron Wells
The Phnom Penh Post

THE local representative of the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights on Tuesday called on the government to draft and pass a law that would grant journalists greater access to official information.

During a conference at the National Institute of Education marking World Press Freedom Day, which was Monday, Christophe Peschoux said such an act would complement the recently passed Anticorruption Law, and that it would assist civil society groups in their efforts to “hold public officials accountable for the use of public resources”.

“How can a doctor treat a patient if he or she does not have accurate information about his or her health?” Peschoux said. “And how can a journalist perform his duty to inform the public about an issue if he does not have accurate information?”

Nou Sovathero, a secretary of state at the Ministry of Information, reiterated comments made Monday by Information Minister Khieu Kanharith, emphasising that the government supports journalists. He contrasted Cambodia’s stance towards journalists with that of Thailand, which he described as repressive.

“Currently, the government supports the information sector, while the Thai government has banned electronic media such as radio, television and websites that serve the policies of the group of Red Shirt protesters,” Nou Sovathero said.

Ou Virak, president of the Cambodian Centre for Human Rights, said after Tuesday’s conference that the type of law called for by Peschoux and other rights workers is not likely to come to pass, and that the government would perhaps instead simply appoint spokespeople for all government ministries.

The government will “have a spokesperson for all ministers, and those spokesmen will give information for the ministries”, he said. “That will happen. That is what the government means by freedom of information.”

The Downfall of Human Rights

Feb 19, 2010
By Joshua Kurlantzick
NEWSWEEK magazine

Growing aid from China makes it easier for lesser autocracies to dismiss Western pressure on human rights. In December, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, who has ruled for three decades and stands accused of creating a climate of fear for political opponents, praised China for building roads and bridges with "no complicated conditions."

Touring Asia in November, Barack Obama hit all the usual presidential themes, including free trade, investment, and strategic alliances, except for one: human rights. During a scripted press conference in Beijing, Obama barely mentioned it. In Shanghai he offered only mild criticism of China's Internet blocks, saying he was a "big supporter of noncensorship." Obama's nonstatements amount to a clear break from nearly three decades of U.S. policy. From its engagement with the brutal Burmese junta to its decision to avoid the Dalai Lama when he first visited Washington during Obama's tenure to its silence over the initial outbreak of protests in Iran, Obama's administration has taken a much quieter approach to rights advocacy than his predecessors George W. Bush and Bill Clinton. "Conceding to China upfront doesn't buy you better cooperation further down the track," says Sophie Richardson of Human Rights Watch.

Obama's waffling was hardly unique. Across Europe, Asia, and Latin America, many democracies have abandoned global human-rights advocacy, trotting it out only for occasional speeches or events like International Human Rights Day. With the prominent exception of Canada, the developed world has fallen mum. Earlier this year European nations handed the chairmanship of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, one of the major organizations tasked with promoting human rights in Eurasia, to Kazakhstan, a country accused by human-rights groups of arbitrary arrest, detention, and torture. In Japan, Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has promised a new dialogue with North Korea, rather than pressuring Pyongyang to first release alleged Japanese abductees. In contrast to predecessors such as Junichiro Koizumi, Hatoyama prefers a soft approach to China as well, calling for far closer ties while all but ignoring the growing climate of repression under the government of Hu Jintao. The Australian government, once known for stinging critiques of China, Burma, and other autocratic regimes, now collaborates with Indonesia and other neighbors to prevent refugees from Sri Lanka and elsewhere from entering the country, instead detaining the migrants in a Guantánamo-like camp on remote Christmas Island. Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has refrained from criticizing China, even for the arrest of an Australian mining executive on what many observers see as a trumped-up spying charge. In France, President Nicolas Sarkozy has failed to deliver on his campaign promise to champion human rights and end the country's old ties to African dictators. Instead of the "new relationship" with Africa that Sarkozy promised, his government has backed the new ruler of Gabon, Ali Bongo Ondimba, despite widespread claims of fraud in his election, and offered a state welcome to Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz, the general who launched a coup in Mauritania. Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, the cofounder of Médecins Sans Frontières, a unique kind of human-rights organization, admitted in an interview, "There is a permanent contradiction between human rights and the foreign policy of a state."

In the developing world, too, young democracies that once seemed ready to stand up for human rights have beat a retreat. After apartheid ended, many activists had high hopes for South Africa's ruling African National Congress, which had benefited from a global pressure movement when it was fighting white rule. Yet the ANC has used its influence at the United Nations to protect not only the brutal regime in Zimbabwe—where South Africa has security and economic interests—but tyrants as far afield as Burma. In December, Thailand, which during the Vietnam War era sheltered tens of thousands of Indochinese refugees, forced some 3,000 Hmong back to Laos, where they could face persecution. Cambodia deported a group of Uighurs back to China, despite the fact that Uighurs previously returned to China have been executed.

The age of global human-rights advocacy has collapsed, giving way to an era of realism unseen since the time of Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon. In the West, the failure of George W. Bush's moralizing style of democracy promotion, combined with the pragmatism inspired by the global financial crisis, has made leaders far more reticent to assert a high profile on rights issues. In private, Obama officials say that they deliberately took a humbler tone because of the global rejection of Bush's claim that he was fighting in Iraq to advance the cause of democratic rights. But such a strategy, initially appreciated by countries tired of Bush, can go too far. "The administration wanted to send the message that the U.S. is listening to the world again, that they are the anti-Bush," says one former senior State Department official, who did not want to be quoted by name criticizing his old colleagues too harshly. "Rather than saying, 'OK, we have made some mistakes, but we are correcting them, and that doesn't mean we are going to ignore what's going on in Russia, or China, or Iran,' instead they've just gone silent."

And in hard times, human-rights advocacy starts to look like a luxury, particularly when some of the countries whose cooperation is critical to rebuilding the global economy, such as China and oil-rich Kazakhstan, also rank among the worst human-rights abusers. In the flush early 2000s, Tony Blair could afford to make improving governance in Africa a British government priority, but his successor, Gordon Brown, spends most of his time trying to fix Britain's debt morass. In the U.S., the Obama administration's domestic agenda makes it leery of alienating potential partners abroad. As Hillary Clinton said during her first visit to China as secretary of state, "Our pressing on those issues [human rights] can't interfere with the global economic crisis."

The changing global balance of power may now prevent human rights from ever gaining the international attention it did in the 1990s and early 2000s. At that time, leaders and techno-evangelists argued that new technologies would give human-rights campaigners an edge over repressive governments. President Clinton warned Beijing that controlling the Internet would prove as tough as "trying to nail Jell-O to a wall." Well, consider the Jell-O nailed: even though Twitter, Facebook, and other tools have helped Iranian protesters bring their stories to the world, authoritarian governments have figured out how to monitor and block the Internet and other new tools. China's "Great Firewall" is now so extensive that many Chinese Internet users have no idea how much information they are actually missing out on, and countries such as Saudi Arabia and Vietnam have brought in Chinese Internet specialists to learn how to build their own Great Firewalls. And in a tough business climate, few Western technology companies—or Western governments—seem willing to stand up to this Internet censorship. Google's public condemnation of Beijing's alleged hacking drew headlines, but another story got far less notice: no other Silicon Valley giant publicly supported Google's stance.

Many current world leaders also happen to have strongly realist instincts, low-key demeanors, and little inclination to push the cause. Brown, Hatoyama, and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh do not have the idealistic instincts and charisma of a Blair or Koizumi. While Bill Clinton's dynamism helped him make a strong case for human rights in places such as Vietnam and China—the likes of the dour Brown cannot follow that act. In the office of the U.N. secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon is no Kofi Annan. He cuts a retiring pose, meekly leaving Burma last July after the regime refused to allow Ban to meet opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. The one leader who has the popularity and flair to press the case for human rights does not have the inclination. Obama's desire to be a consensus builder, even when dealing with brutal governments, also pushes him toward nonconfrontation. He seems to think he can find common ground with anyone, even Sudan's Omar al-Bashir and North Korea's Kim Jong Il. As the historian Walter Russell Mead notes in a lengthy essay in Foreign Policy magazine, the president falls into the Jeffersonian tradition of American leaders, in that he wants to "reduce America's costs and risks overseas by limiting U.S. commitments." He believes "that the United States can best spread democracy and support peace by becoming an example of democracy at home." In contrast, the heirs of Woodrow Wilson, such as John F. Kennedy, Paul Wolfowitz, and, in many ways, Bill Clinton, believed that promoting democratic values abroad helps global stability.

In most democracies, the public has also become far less interested in global human rights. In 2005 crowds around the world attended the Live 8 concerts designed to increase support for aid to Africa; though aid is not solely a human-rights issue, the concerts were a sign of the rich world's international engagement. Don't expect to see any Live 9. With unemployment skyrocketing, the residents of democracies have turned inward, fighting against immigration, rethinking free trade—and paying far less attention to what happens in Iran or Sudan or North Korea. One poll by the Pew Research Center, released in December, found that 49 percent of Americans believe that the U.S. should "mind its own business" internationally, leaving other nations to work out their problems themselves. That was the highest percentage of Americans expressing isolationist sentiment in four decades.

Today the lack of interest in human rights has been virtually institutionalized in Washington and other capitals. A decade ago, policymakers could move up the ladder within bureaucracies like the U.S. State Department, the British Foreign Office, or Germany's Foreign Ministry by focusing on human rights, but today advocating for global freedom will get you nowhere. In many Western democracies, increasingly partisan politicians apply far greater scrutiny to every detail of diplomats' records, and human-rights work requires aggressive, often controversial statements and actions—just the types of activities that could get a promotion blocked by elected legislators. When Britain's ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, criticized that regime's abuses (and Britain's tolerance of them), he was recalled to London and removed from his post. Britain's relationship with Uzbekistan was deemed critical to the war on terror, and Murray's bosses apparently thought he was freelancing too much with his opinions. As a result, government bureaus that focus on human rights often have become dumping grounds for the weakest diplomats and places "where Foreign Service officers don't want to serve," according to one former staffer in that bureau.

Other structural changes bode poorly for human-rights advocacy. While the major democracies dominated the world stage in the 1990s, today autocracies like Russia and China have found that economic success can co-opt the middle class, normally the main source of support for human rights. In China, the government has boosted salaries for opinion leaders like professors, opened up membership in the Communist Party to entrepreneurs, and taken other steps to ensure that the regime's success enriches the middle class as well. This strategy works: in polls conducted by the Pew research organization, Chinese respondents had a higher level of satisfaction with conditions in their country than almost any other people in the world. Now the autocracies are effectively exporting this model. Growing aid from China makes it easier for lesser autocracies to dismiss Western pressure on human rights. In December, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, who has ruled for three decades and stands accused of creating a climate of fear for political opponents, praised China for building roads and bridges with "no complicated conditions."

China and Russia have started to twist the concept of human rights in ways that gut its meaning. In a paper issued in June, Freedom House notes that Chinese President Hu Jintao's report to the 17th Party Congress in 2007 used the words "democracy" and "democratic" some 60 times, without ever explaining how China qualifies as a democracy. "Russia and China are working to muddy the waters abroad as well," wrote Freedom House. Indeed, the Kremlin backs organizations operating in Central Asia and the Caucasus that mimic Western groups like Amnesty International or America's National Endowment for Democracy, but work to promote Putin-style "managed democracy," essentially authoritarianism with a thin veneer of social freedoms. Similarly, China now runs training programs for as many as 15,000 foreign officials annually, including many legal specialists and local authorities, who learn how China has managed to open its economy without allowing real political liberalization.

It's possible that the old idealism will return, just as Jimmy Carter followed Gerald Ford and Richard Nixon. The yearning for freedom remains, and after a slow start, Obama's administration has begun making human-rights advocacy a higher priority, finally meeting with the Dalai Lama, stepping up its criticism of Zimbabwe and Iran, appointing a special envoy for human rights in North Korea, more aggressively condemning Internet censorship in China, and taking China to task for its alleged attacks on Google. But the fact is that the past year has been one of the toughest in decades for prominent dissidents. Freedom House's report "Freedom in the World," released in January, revealed a global decline in political freedoms and civil liberties for the fourth year in a row, the longest drop in the almost 40 years that the survey has been produced. The decline stems from repressive governments cracking down harder, and leading democracies apparently "losing their will" to speak out in response. A recent string of major dissident cases—including China's rounding up signers of the Charter 08 call for rule of law, and sentencing activist Liu Xiaobo to 11 years in jail, as well as crackdowns in Vietnam and Central Asia—has received what Chris Walker of Freedom House considers "astonishingly little attention and support from the democracies."

It's only going to get tougher. The global recession may give way to a long period of slow growth, particularly in the leading democracies. If China can stymie democracy today, how much more influential will it be when its economy is the world's largest? Though Obama may be focusing more on rights now, the president's power is decreasing after his first, honeymoon year in office, and has taken a hit from the recent loss of the Democrats' super-majority in the Senate. New and potential future leaders in other major democracies—Jacob Zuma, David Cameron—haven't demonstrated much interest in international human-rights advocacy. And realism and isolationism, once ingrained, can be hard to shake off. In the past, it has required cataclysmic historic events to spark idealism, like the fall of the Berlin Wall or the 9/11 attacks, to shake Western populations out of their torpor.

Kurlantzick is a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Joseph Cao's visit to Vietnam: A thorny issue for Hanoi?

Vietnamese-American lawmaker pushes rights

Wednesday, January 13, 2010
AFP

WASHINGTON — The only Vietnamese-American member of Congress said Wednesday he urged Hanoi's communist government to improve human rights on a quiet, restricted visit back to his nation of birth.

Representative Anh "Joseph" Cao, the son of a South Vietnamese army officer who fled to the United States when he was eight, paid his first trip back since 2001 as part of a trip to Asia during the holiday recess.

Cao, a longtime advocate for human rights who was joined by two fellow congressmen, said he agreed not to meet with dissidents, hold news conferences or issue press releases as a condition to enter Vietnam.

"The Vietnamese government did not want to issue a visa because they felt that my visit potentially could be, I guess you could say, explosive," Cao told a conference call after returning to Washington.

"In order to get the visa I had to quietly go into Vietnam and to leave quietly," Cao said.

But Cao said he raised specific concerns, including Vietnam's imprisonment of Internet activists whose blogs have rattled the government.

"I directly addressed to them the issues of human rights violations," Cao said.

Cao said he received no specific assurances on any case. But Cao said his discussions with Vietnamese unaffiliated with the government -- including his sister -- offered reason for hope.

"They all said that conditions in Vietnam have greatly improved. People are allowed to operate their businesses and allowed to worship freely, as long as obviously they don't speak out against the government," Cao said.

Cao said the primary goal of visiting Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia was to study ways to help clear up unexploded ordnance dropped by US forces that have killed thousands since the end of the Vietnam War.

He said the US contribution of 3.6 million dollars a year to Laos was only a quarter of what that nation needed.

Cao became the first Vietnamese-born member of the US Congress in 2008 when the then little-known immigration lawyer pulled off an election upset against a corruption-tainted veteran of the Democratic Party.

Cao, who represents a predominantly Democratic and African-American district, has since proven a maverick. The former seminarian was the only Republican House member to support President Barack Obama's drive to bring health care to millions of uninsured Americans.

Cambodia committed to democracy, human rights ... and spinning the truth?

Ouch Borith (center): The CPP's master of spin? (Photo: CPP)

Cambodia committed to democracy, human rights with rule of law: official

PHNOM PENH, Aug. 11 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia is more than ever committed to human rights promotion and protection approach with its organic laws, said a government statement released on Tuesday by the Foreign Ministry's spokesman.

The statement was made after Ouch Borith, secretary of state for Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, on Friday exchanged views on the issues of human rights with European Union's delegation led by the British Ambassador Andrew Mace, who is representing Sweden in their presidency of the EU.

During the meeting, Ouch Borith underlined that "Cambodia is more than ever committed to human rights promotion and protection approach with its organic laws."

At the same time, Ouch Borith stressed that Cambodia's democracy is based on the fundamental rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

"While individual rights, freedom of expression and a culture of debates are taking deeper roots in Cambodia, we must recognize that the exercise of these rights and freedoms in any democratic society must be within the rule of law," he said

EU's meeting with the government follows a Phnom Penh Municipal Court ruling on Aug. 4 that found opposition Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) lawmaker Mu Sochua guilty of defaming Prime Minister Hun Sen and ordered her to pay about 4,100 U.S. dollars in fines and compensation.

The EU expressed "concern over a number of instances in which criminal charges of defamation and disinformation have been used against representatives of civil society, the media and the political opposition," according to the report of the Cambodia Daily.

"Laws and regulations concerning defamation and disinformation exist worldwide, particularly in developed countries, to protect and guarantee the right to dignity of everyone," Ouch Borith said.

"The verdicts by the Cambodian Court on the recent defamation and disinformation cases are in compliance with the existing laws in relation to these offences," he added.

Admitting "the country still faces many challenges," Ouch Borith reassured the delegation of the EU that "Cambodia is firmly committed to ensuring that the country embraces the principles of democracy and human rights with the rule of law."