I would be grateful for assistance: Recently there
was somewhere or other an article analyzing the
stances that Amnesty has taken, showing its' marked
preference for pro USA positions. Cheers, Hari Kumar
You might try this:
www.globalpolicy.org/ngos/credib/2003/1306interview.htm
Is Amnesty International Biased? Dennis Bernstein
Dr. Francis Boyle Discuss the Politics of Human
Rights CovertAction June 13, 2002 Editor's Note
It has often been said that Amnesty International's
agenda tends to fit nicely with the political needs of
the United States and Great Britain. Around the world,
supporters of the Nicaraguan people's struggle for
self-determination were outraged by the timing of a
1986 Amnesty report critical of the Sandinista
government, which helped Reagan push another Contra
Aid appropriation through a reluctant congress, at
exactly the moment when the anti-Contra movement was
beginning to get serious political traction. With
regard to South Africa's apartheid regime, AI was
critical of the human rights record of the South
African government. However, as you will see below, AI
never condemned apartheid per se. By the time Amnesty
endorsed the Hill Knowlton nursery tale concerning
Kuwaiti infants pulled from incubators by Iraqi
soldiers, many otherwise sympathetic observers of
Amnesty's work became increasingly alarmed. [This was
the manufactured (false) incident used to start the
first Gulf War -- JW]
More than a decade of grassroots organization within
Amnesty's membership base finally succeeded just two
years ago in moving the organization to take a
position critical of the genocidal sanctions against
the people of Iraq, sanctions which have killed
approximately a million and a half Iraqis, one third
of them children. According to Dr. Boyle, this delay
was political, and it clearly served the interests of
the U.S. and Britain, the two governments on the
Security Council preventing the lifting of the
sanctions. A recent search of the internet shows that
AI Venezuela very quickly took up the U.S. line by
charging President Chavez with crimes against humanity
for the bloodshed during the recent failed coup
attempt against his administration. Amnesty's
performance on the April 2002 massacre at Jenin is
another blot on its frequently laudable record. As our
readers are aware, the United Nations attempted to
investigate the Jenin massacre, but was prevented from
doing so by Sharon and Bush. The announcement on May
3, 2002 by Human Rights Watch of no massacre at
Jenin effectively killed the story, although there
was a lot of argument about what constitutes a
massacre. No such arguments were heard when a suicide
bomber turned a Passover dinner into a tragedy. This
magazine will cover the topic of Human Rights Watch in
a future issue. For this issue, we were fortunate to
be forwarded the transcript of a June 13th [2002]
interview with Dr. Francis A. Boyle, professor of
International Law and former board member of Amnesty
International. What follows is a shortened version of
the transcript...
__
Do you Yahoo!?
Free Pop-Up Blocker - Get it now
http://companion.yahoo.com/
