LONDON The human rights situation in Iraq is being invoked with unusual
frequency by some Western political leaders to justify military action. This selective
attention to human rights is nothing but a cold and calculated manipulation of
the work of human rights activists.
These same governments turned a blind eye to Amnesty International's reports
of widespread human rights violations in Iraq before the Gulf War. They remained
silent when thousands of unarmed Kurdish civilians were killed in Halabja in 1988.
Not only have the people of Iraq continued to suffer at the hands of the government
- torture, extrajudicial execution, "disappearances," arbitrary detention
and unfair trial - they have also borne the brunt of the United Nations sanctions
regime since 1990. Sanctions have jeopardized the right to food, health, education
and, in many cases, life of hundreds of thousands of individuals, many of them
children.
There are claims that the Iraqi government is deliberately manipulating the
sanctions regime for propaganda purposes - but that does not absolve the UN Security
Council from its share of the responsibility for failing to heed the calls to
lift all sanctions provisions that result in grave violations of the rights of
the Iraqi population. As the Security Council deliberates on the use of military
force, it must consider not only the security and political consequences of its
action but also the inevitable human rights and humanitarian toll of war: civilians
who will be killed by bombing or internal fighting, children who will die because
sanctions make access to basic necessities and humanitarian assistance even harder.
Concern for the lives and security of the Iraqi people is sorely missing from
the debate, not to mention the knock-on effects on the human rights of the people
of neighboring countries. As the keeper of international peace and security, the
Security Council has responsibility under the UN Charter to seek a solution through
peaceful means first. It must remind its most powerful member that force is the
last resort and only to be applied in full compliance with international law.
Have we really reached that point of imminent danger which leaves no other choice?
The United Nations was created to preserve peace and promote human rights,
not to encourage war.
The writer is secretary-general of Amnesty
International. She contributed this comment to the International Herald Tribune.
Copyright © 2002 the International Herald Tribune
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