Look Who's Talking: the US Condemning Human Rights in China
China suspended talks with the US on human rights issues after an announcement that the US will seek a UN Human Rights Commission resolution condemning China's human rights abuses. The US stated that areas of concern included extrajudicial killings, torture, repression of religious and political groups, and arrests of internet dissidents and HIV/Aids activists, reported BBC (China halts rights talks with US). The announcement came after the EU was preparing to consider lifting an arms embargo on China. The US, which has its own embargo in place, is opposed to the EU relaxing its measures.
It is well known that China has a horrible human rights record: remember the Tiananmen Square or Tibet, but why this sudden activity on the part of US? After decades of proliferating economic relations between China and the US, the US is in a bind: thousands of US jobs have relocated to China and the US trade deficit with China has been looming.
That fact that somebody is trying to make China speed up its democratic reforms is commendable but when the call comes from a country applying a double standard, the "true" agenda is being questioned. Over the last 4 years, the US has moved away from being a model for human rights. The Bush administration, using the war on terror as an excuse, has suspended so many civil liberties of its own citizens that some experts say, it will take the courts decades to reinstate civil rights of the pre-9/11 era. Interestingly, an independent US commission is looking into the actions of the US administration related to the 9/11 attacks. The commission was set up in response to allegations of Richard A. Clarke, ex-White House counter-terrorism aide, who accused Bush of ignoring terrorism prior to 9/11. (Watch BBC's interview with Clarke in US officials face 9/11 inquiry).
I wonder what will the commission conclude...