amnesty International recently released its annual report for 2005, setting out the human rights conditions of various countries during the preceding year. Much has been written about the outrageous statement made by amnesty’s Secretary General, Irene Kahn, who compared the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay to Soviet gulags. That one sentence, although it undoubtedly had the Muslim and arab world cheering, probably did more damage to what was once a respected human rights organization than anything else in aI’s report. although there can be legitimate criticism levelled at the way the United States detains terror suspects, comparing Guantanomo Bay to gulags where thousands of people died from starvation or forced labour, was not only silly but it trivialized what Soviet citizens went through in Stalin’s gulags. an organization whose head makes such a statement really does not deserve to be taken seriously.
amnesty International, like others on the "progressive left" always hold the United States and Israel to different standards than the rest of the world is. To these people, comparing the United States to the former Soviet Union or George W. Bush to Hitler just seems to come naturally. So let’s take a look, not at how amnesty International views the Great Satan or the Zionist State, but what the human rights organization thinks of Canada.
Canada, as we who live here are constantly told, prides itself on our tolerance and diversity. Unlike those "bastards and morons" to the south, we respect human rights. Not only do we respect them, we make more of them up. as Prime Minister Paul Martin keeps telling us, his government introduced same sex marriage legislation because it was a matter of "human rights". We are nice to everybody including those great humanitarians in Hamas, Hezbollah and the Tamil Tigers. and we’re a pacifist country. We have to Gitmos or abu Ghraibs because we don’t do wars. We’re peacekeepers. So you would think that amnesty International would love Canada, right?
Wrong. Canada came under criticism by the human rights organization in their 2005 report and it is this criticism that should convince even america and Israel haters how out of touch amnesty International really is.
Our foreign policy is not criticized by aI because, well, we don’t really have one. Canada is technically part of the war against terrorism and we have had troops in afghanistan but we don’t like to talk about it. Our foreign policy is dictated by the United Nations so amnesty cannot really find fault with it. But Canada came under fire by aI for our domestic human rights abuses.
The section of the report that deals with Canada mentions the 1995 shooting death by police of native protester Dudley George in Ontario, the 1990 death of native Neil Stonechild who was allegedly dumped in a field by police and froze to death and the detention and torture in Syria of Canadian citizen, Maher arar. as the 2005 report indicates, the deaths of George and Stonechild and the detention and torture of arar are all subjects of judicial inquiries in Canada. Like the United States, Canada is being held, not to a standard of protecting human rights but to a standard of perfection. How can these deaths and torture be considered human rights abuses "by Canada" when Canada had made all of them subject to judicial proceedings? at most, these were abuses by individuals who have been or may be held to be accountable by the government. To say that these acts are human rights abuses in the same manner as a government that kills or arbitrarily detains and tortures its citizens is ludicrous.
amnesty International also reported that Canada is violating human rights by allowing some police officers to use Tasers. aI notes that there have been six deaths as a result of persons being Tasered and while admitting that the use of the weapon is being studied, criticized Canada for not banning its use until the studies are completed. For some strange reason, no mention is made of the fact that police in Canada all have guns and bullets and yes, sometimes use them to kill people.
amnesty International is way past its sell buy date. People must have to be in dire need of tax breaks to continue to donate to this organization.