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Tariq Khattak.
0300-9599007 and 0333-9599007
Tariqgulkhattak@gmail.com
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PRESS RELEASE
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KCEU Raises the AFSPA with
the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights
Geneva, Thursday, 31 May 2012 - Continuing its work, KCEU met yesterday at the lunch of the OHCHR Report 2011, the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mrs. Navanethem Pillay. Barrister A. Majid Tramboo, the Chairman of the Kashmir Centre EU discussed and pushed for the High Commissioner to raise the issues of ratifying the Convention Against Torture, failing to ratify the Convention for the Protection of All Person from Disappearance, a lack of responses to human rights cases submitted by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), restricting the internet, failing to protect human rights defenders, failing to protect journalists, and failing to abolish the death penalty, and the unmarked and mass graves with the Indian Government as put forward during the UPR of India.
The High Commissioner stressed on the importance of the Non-Governmental Organizations contributions on the promotion and protection of the human rights universally, and continued need of the NGO community to remain in close contact with her offices.
The High Commissioner added that- "As I review our work in 2011, I am filled with a sense of pride. But this pride is tempered by realism as I look towards the future and consider the growing gap between the expectations of and mandates given to the Office and the limited recourses available. This gap has been recognized by Member States, who gave us a slight increase from the UN regular budget, despite a Secretariat-wide reduction for the 2012-2013 biennium. Nevertheless, the human rights programme, as implemented by my Office, accounts for less than three per cent of the regular budget of the Secretariat."
Following the lunch, Barrister Tramboo interacted with Mrs. Pillay and brought up the serious issues of human rights in India, particularly in Indian Held Kashmir. He drew the attention of the High Commissioner towards the Indian draconian laws particularly to the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which extends overwhelming impunity to the armed forces and paramilitary forces for perpetrating gross human rights violations, especially in the Indian Held Kashmir.
Barrister Tramboo expressed his utter disappointment to exempt perpetrators from the responsibility and to go unpunished under this law. He cited a very recent case which was brought before the Supreme Court of India, known as Pratihbal case in which the Indian Boarder Security forces personnel had killed 5 innocent Kashmiris in a fake encounter but enjoyed the impunity under the AFSPA. The Supreme Court regrettably upheld that impunity.
Barrister Tramboo also raised the issue of having adopted 169 recommendations by the Working Group of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) on India, which clearly recommend India to repeal AFSPA and ratify the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and its Optional Protocol; the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and the Statute of the International Criminal Court. India has been asked to implement the recommendations of the Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders, which calls upon India, among other recommendations, to hold an independent and impartial investigation on unmarked and mass graves which exist in Indian Held Kashmir.
The High Commissioner listened to Barrister Tramboo patiently and assured him that her team in the Rule of Law, Equality and Non-Discrimination Branch, will look into this matter and carefully study the recommendations of the Working Group.
Barrister Tramboo thanked the High Commissioner and hoped to work with her office on this matter closely.
The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mrs. Navanethem Pillay
with the Chairman of the Kashmir Centre EU, Barrister A. Majid Tramboo.
-END-
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Obama's God complex Yvonne Ridley The fatal shooting of black teenager Trayvon Martin shocked a nation, inspired tens of thousands to march for justice and even prompted the US President to declare, "If I had a son, he would look like Trayvon". It took nearly six weeks for George Zimmerman, the Florida man accused of killing the teenager, to be arrested and charged with second-degree murder after enormous pressure from the public. Zimmerman - the captain of a Neighbourhood Watch group - pursued Trayvon because he said that he thought he was acting "suspicious" and "up to no good". And that is exactly the same excuse used by President Barack Obama as he justifies ticking off names on a "kill list" for drone attacks. While Obama called on federal, state and local authorities to work together as part of the investigation into the killing of Trayvon, just who is going to investigate the President for his extra-judicial killings? He is a man out of control, and while his predecessor justified his actions with a catch-all "God told me to do it", this president thinks he is God, making decisions about who should live and who should die. If he was the head of a banana republic the UN Security Council would be meeting as I write to bring about regime change, with the International Criminal Court on standby with a writ to charge Obama with war crimes. But the USA is not a banana republic - not yet, anyway - and Obama is the head of a superpower and supposed to be the most powerful man in the world; the man who in 2009 went to Cairo and convinced us all that he was going to engage positively with the Muslim world from the Middle East to Asia. Looking back at that historic day all I can visualise is a fox being heralded and saluted by his victims as he walks up the ramp into the chicken coop. We don't know how many people Barack Obama has ordered to be killed, but according to the New York Times he has "placed himself at the helm of a top secret 'nominations' process to designate terrorists for kill or capture, of which the capture part has become largely theoretical". There is huge hypocrisy in the media and from the so-called liberal left when it comes to this particular White House incumbent. The tame journalists who make up the Washington press pack ignore the fact that several times a month around 100 members of the government's sprawling national security apparatus gather, by secure video teleconference, to discuss who should live and who should die. This murderous secret nomination process was the invention of the Democrat Obama Administration, just as the Democrat Bill Clinton Administration brought kidnap and extraordinary rendition flights to the world. Republicans must look on enviously at how the Democrats get away with breaking international laws and conventions without being challenged. It is almost beyond belief that this kill list has been sanctioned by a man who won the Nobel Peace Prize and ran his US Presidential campaign on a human rights platform. Remember Obama's declaration that he wanted to close down Guantanamo, end torture, stop secret renditions and raise the bar in fairness and justice? He clearly doesn't. In Yemen, Somalia and Pakistan, Obama's killing machines are not even clinical or always on target; thousands of innocent men, women and children have been taken out by his drone attacks. Their blood is on the US President's hands, and even his own people are sickened by the hypocrisy and double standards coming out of the White House. America's outgoing Ambassador to Pakistan, Cameron Munter, a man with more backbone and guts than his predecessor, has revealed that he regards the drone strike-driven policy of his government unacceptable. Rather tellingly, he has complained to colleagues that "he didn't realise his main job was to kill people". This was revealed in another article published this week in the New York Times, one of the few US media titles finally to adopt a critical stance over Obama's foreign policies. I can only assume that Obama's killing spree has gone largely unchecked by ordinary Americans because they haven't a clue what this president is doing in their name. This is sad, because Americans do care about justice and fair play; they showed this when they rallied and demonstrated after the killing of black teenager Trayvon Martin by a man who thought he was "up to no good". Trayvon's killer will now stand trial for his actions and his fate will be decided by a judge and jury looking at openly presented evidence. That is real justice, not the shoot and kill version which is coming to define Obama's presidency. Many of us who cheered when the first non-white president moved into the White House were hoping for a new era of peace and justice, but we have been conned. The true Barack Obama is an out of control psychopathic killer with a loaded God complex, and he's running America. This makes him the most dangerous man in the world as well as the most powerful. And that should make every right-minded person in America and beyond shudder with disbelief. * Yvonne Ridley is a patron of the London-based human rights NGO, Cageprisoners |