State covenants with human beings never to permit torture, slavery

Liberty observes Human Rights Week

Excerpt, minor edit by Carolyn Bennett

Liberty on Human Rights

Human rights belong to every member of the human family regardless of sex, race, nationality, socio-economic group, political opinion, sexual orientation or any other status.

Human rights are universal. They apply to all people simply on the basis of being human.

Human rights are inalienable.

They cannot be taken away simply because we do not like the person seeking to exercise their rights. They can only be limited in certain tightly defined circumstances, and some rights, such as the prohibition on torture and slavery, can never be limited.

Human rights are indivisible.

You cannot pick and choose which rights you want to honor. Many rights depend on each other to be meaningful – so, for example, the right to fair trial would be meaningless without the prohibition on discrimination, and the right to free speech must go hand in hand with the right to assemble peacefully.

Human rights are owed by the State to the people – this means public bodies must respect your human rights and the Government must ensure there are laws in place so that other people respect your human rights too. For example, the right to life requires not only that the actions of those working on behalf of the State do not lead to your death, but that laws are also in place to protect you from the actions of others that might want to do you harm.

U.S. diplomat
Eleanor Roosevelt
UDHR 1948

Human rights were first recognized internationally by the Universal Declaration on Human Rights in 1948.

This was quickly followed by the adoption two years later of the European Convention on Human Rights. In 1998 the Human Rights Act was passed making the human rights in the European Convention on Human Rights directly enforceable in the United Kingdom. It entered into force on October 2, 2000. The UK is also a party to a number of other international instruments that seek to protect and promote other human rights.

At Liberty UK

Liberty 

Founded in 1934, Liberty (also known as the National Council for Civil Liberties) is a cross-party, non-party membership organization at the heart of the movement for fundamental rights and freedoms in Britain. Liberty promotes “the values of individual human dignity, equal treatment and fairness as the foundations of a democratic society.  Through public campaigning, test case litigation, parliamentary lobbying, policy analysis and providing free advice and information, Liberty campaigns to protect basic rights and freedoms through the courts, in Parliament and in the wider community.

Sources and notes

At
Liberty website

HUMAN RIGHTS

Right to Life

Right to Respect For Private Life

Prohibition of Torture or Degrading Treatment

Protection against Slavery

Right to Liberty and Freedom

Right to a Fair Trial

Freedom of Thought, Religion and Belief

Freedom of Assembly

Free Speech

Right to Marry

No Discrimination

Protection of Property

Right to Free Elections

Right to an Education

No Punishment without Law

HUMAN RIGHTS ACT

Article 3 of the First Protocol: Right to free elections

Article 2 of the First Protocol: Right to education

Article 1 of the First Protocol: Protection of property

Article 14 No discrimination

Article 12 Right to marry

Article 11 Right to protest and freedom of association

Article 10 Freedom of expression

Article 9 Freedom of religion

Article 8 Right to a private and family life

Article 7 No punishment without law

Article 6 Right to a fair hearing

Article 4 No slavery or forced labor

Article 3 No torture, inhuman or degrading treatment

Article 2 Right to life

Article 5 Right to liberty 

What’s not to love, http://www.liberty-human-rights.org.uk/human-rights/human-rights/the-human-rights-act/what-the-rights-mean/index.php

Liberty: http://www.liberty-human-rights.org.uk/about/index.php

Sharmishta Chakrabarti

Sharmishta Chakrabarti is director of the British civil liberties advocacy organization Liberty (2003 - ) and Chancellor of Oxford Brookes University. Chakrabarti took her law degree at the London School of Economics and later was a barrister with UK’s Home Office.

Before her appointment as director of Liberty, Sharmishta Chakrabarti was that organization’s in-house counsel. Under her leadership, Liberty has become an outstanding “opponent of counter-terrorism legislation” and “she has campaigned against ‘excessive’ anti-terrorist measures, such as the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 (ATCSA), which followed the September 11, 2001, attacks in the United States. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shami_Chakrabarti

Shami Chakrabarti appeared this week (Friday December 13) on BBC Radio 4’s “Any Questions”, a political debate and discussion chaired by Jonathan Dimbleby,  http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03kvd59

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Bennett's books are available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY] • See also: World Pulse: Global Issues through the eyes of Women: http://www.worldpulse.com/ http://www.worldpulse.com/pulsewire http://www.facebook.com/#!/bennetts2ndstudy
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USA Retail callousness is U.S. Global relations paradigm: unspeakable disregard for life

Factory collapse
Bangladesh

Think Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Bahrain, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Occupied Territories/Palestine, and others in South Central Asia/Middle East/Persia/ North and Eastern Africa: endless destruction with impunity

Editing and commentary by 

Carolyn Bennett

C

orporations ─ particularly Western corporations ─ treat workers as the U.S. government, in foreign relations, treats sovereign peoples. Affairs of merchants and governments cast in a model of constant destruction, in defiance and deliberately dismissive of international convention. In the news this week: Who signs and who refuses to sign an international Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladeshi factories?

More than reasonable Accord 

The safety agreement set forth after Bangladeshi workers died repeatedly in factory fires and unsafe, collapsing buildings requires companies to conduct independent safety inspections, make their reports on factory conditions public, and cover the costs for needed repairs. It also calls for companies to pay up to $500,000 annually toward the effort; and to stop doing business with any factory that refuses to make safety upgrades and refuses to allow workers and their unions to have a voice in factory safety.

 Bangladeshi women
working in factory

Research by the advocacy group, International Labor Rights Forum, found that since 2005, at least 1,800 workers have died in Bangladeshi garment industry factory fires and building collapses. The two latest tragedies (fires and collapse) in the Bangladesh’s garment industry pushed the alarm: a building collapse on April 24 this year was the industry’s worst disaster in history, leaving more than a thousand people dead; The November 2012 fire in another garment factory in Bangladesh left 112 workers dead.

Callous merchants careless of Bangladeshi life

Retailers staying in Bangladesh and or refusing to sign the fire and safety accord include: H&M, Wal-Mart, The Children’s Place, Mango, J.C. Penney, Gap, Benetton, and Sears

Those refusing to sign the international Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh are, according to the Washington Post, “Nearly all U.S. clothing chains.”

Wal-Mart, Gap, Target, J.C. Penney had been pressed by labor groups to sign the document in the wake of last month’s factory collapse in Bangladesh that killed at least 1,127 people.

 Bangladesh

Found in the April Rana Plaza rubble were labels and purchase orders of retailers Benetton, Cato Fashions, The Children’s Place, El Corte Inglés, and Loblaw (owner of Joe Fresh).

Sign of care

The legally-binding, first-of-its-kind contract requiring Western businesses to help finance improvements in the factories they use in Bangladesh and calling for independent building inspections, public disclosure of audit results, mandatory building renovations to address hazards, and union access to factories to educate workers on their rights and their safety was signed by more than a dozen European retailers

Signers of the five-year international Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh include H&M (a Swedish chain and the largest clothing buyer in Bangladesh), C&A (Netherlands), Marks & Spencer, Tesco and Primark (UK retailers), PvH Corp. (owner of Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger brands, the only major U.S. company to sign the contract), Tchibo (a German coffee retailer selling clothes), and Inditex (owner of the Zara chain of Spain), El Corte Inglés (Spain), Carrefour (France), Benetton (Italy)

A

 Bangladeshi women
mourn their dead

 representative of Clean Clothes Campaign, Ineke Zeldenrust, told the press that, “The accord includes all of the components essential to be effective: independent safety inspections with public reports, mandatory repairs and renovations, the obligation by brands and retailers to underwrite the costs and to terminate business with any factory that refuses to make necessary safety upgrades, and a vital role for workers and their unions.” The heart of the agreement “is the commitment by companies to pay for the renovations and repairs necessary to make factory buildings in Bangladesh safe.”

But this was too burdensome for the world’s No. 1 retailer, Wal-mart (USA),  which was also implicated in the November Tazreen Fashions factory fire that left 112 people dead. To burdensome for Gap that, according to the Post, has “contracts with 78 of Bangladesh’s 6,500 factories.”

Found the rubble
 Bangladesh

Global call to solidarity

G

lobal citizens have weighed in sending messages to international brands sourcing from Bangladesh, calling on brands to take immediate action in implementing sustainable safety measures in their supplier factories in order to prevent another tragedy such as Rana Plaza.

This week labor-rights activists worldwide banded together to persuade Western companies to sign the Bangladesh safety accord.

Found in the rubble
 Bangladesh

Trade unions and labor-rights groups worldwide ─ including the Clean Clothes Campaign, International Labor Rights Forum, Avaaz, United Students Against Sweatshops, War on Want, Causes, IndustriAll Global Union, SumOfUs.org, Change.org, and Maquila Solidarity Network ─  banded together in a unified campaign to persuade Western companies to sign the safety accord. Petitions were launched by the Clean Clothes Campaign, the Labor Rights Forum, the War on Want, AVAAZ, the Causes, the U.S. Students Against Sweatshops, Gap Death Traps, the CREDO Action, the Fashion Takes Action, the Change.org, the Sumofus.org

West consumed
Bangladeshis died

General Secretary of IndustriAll Global Union, Jyrki Raina, says the standards enunciated in the accord are “straightforward, commonsense measures that will have a vital impact on worker safety in factories in Bangladesh. And it is time for all other brands to commit to sustainable safety” in this country.

I am thinking

How much is enough
How much "more" harms?

• How much does any one person or entity, merchant or corporate owner need ─ even allowing for a few perks, surprises or “special” stuff but not for the criminal waste committed routinely by the West? 

• How much does grabbing “more” deny true need and cause destitution and or death; and what are the moral implications of this? 

Waste

• How much are peoples of Western nations willing to forego, give up, do without to secure human rights and justice for all workers, all peoples of the world ─ immediate neighbors to Bangladeshi workers?
  

I believe

that while it is clearly important that corporations and governments are reined in, monitored, regulated and checked ─ it is also imperative that in every pursuit and interaction including market interactions ordinary people (we) live our “ethics” and our humanity. No land is an island; no people are apart.

Sources and notes

“Big retailers back safety accord in Bangladesh” ( Posted: 7:30 p.m. Monday, Updated: 7:34 p.m. Monday),  Copyright 2013 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. http://www.wral.com/big-retailers-back-safety-accord-in-bangladesh/12440691/

“Win for Bangladesh,” http://www.ecouterre.com/hm-zara-commit-to-signing-bangladesh-fire-and-safety-agreement/bangladesh-fire-3/

http://www.ecouterre.com/international-support-for-improving-bangladesh-safety-surpasses-1-million/

“Most U.S. clothing chains did not sign pact on Bangladesh factory reforms” (by Brad Plumer, published: May 15, 2013, © The Washington Post Company), http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/most-us-clothing-chains-did-not-sign-pact-on-bangladesh-factory-reforms/2013/05/15/4290133a-bd93-11e2-97d4-a479289a31f9_story.html

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Bennett's books are available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY] • See also: World Pulse: Global Issues through the eyes of Women: http://www.worldpulse.com/ http://www.worldpulse.com/pulsewire http://www.facebook.com/#!/bennetts2ndstudy

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Profiteers at counter purposes with human need peddle cells, not privies

Sudanese woman
carries water home

Baffling (or is it?): Why Third World under-developing countries remain underdeveloped ─ or worse

Re-reporting, editing, brief comment by 

Carolyn Bennett

Canon of profiteers: profit at all costs holds back human progress

S

ix billion of the world’s seven billion people have mobile phones. But only 4.5 billion have access to toilets or sanitary latrines, the United Nations reported on World Water Day March 22. 

Woman in Northern India
bathes at public pump

Dehumanizing human beings

Some 2.5 billion people, mostly in rural areas of Asia and Africa, have no access to proper sanitation. In the twenty-first century, 1.1 billion people have no choice but to defecate in the open.

“Let’s face it,” UN Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson says, “this is a problem that people do not like to talk about. But ─

It goes to the heart of ensuring good health, a clean environment and fundamental human dignity for billions of people – and achieving the Millennium Development Goals.

R

eview: the eight UN Millennium Development Goals for 2015:

1. Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
2. Achieve universal primary education
3. Promote gender equality and empower women
4. Reduce child mortality
5. Improve maternal health
6. Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
7. Ensure environmental sustainability
8. Develop a global partnership for development

Woman seeks water
from karez at
Piskandi Village
Northern Iraq

Developing countries never develop

But nearing 2015, countries of South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, some 20 countries, account for more than 80 percent of the global problem of open defecation. These countries have the 

• Highest incidence of death among the under-five-year-olds;

• High levels of malnutrition and poverty; and

• Large disparities in wealth

Women and girls are hardest hit. Lack of sanitation is particularly detrimental to women and girls, the UN reports. Women and girls who have to leave their homes to find a place to urinate or defecate are vulnerable to sexual violence. The lack of toilets in schools impedes girls’ access to education.

What if corporate canon changed?

The head of one non-governmental organization, WaterAid, which focuses on water and sanitation, said, “Few interventions would have greater impact on the lives of women and girls than addressing the health problems caused by poor sanitation and hygiene.”

Little girls carrying watercross rice field
after heavy rains

The United Nations says investing in good sanitation is a good investment. Such investment “produces a good return: Every dollar spent on sanitation brings a $5.50 return by keeping people healthy and productive.”

A

pproaching 2015, the United Nations reports, however, that the target in the MDGs of at least halving the proportion of people without access to sanitation ─ and this is a small order, achievable but for countering profit motives  ─ has “far to go.”

This means that the goal will not be achieved without a change in ethos and canon, political will, change of heart. A conviction that all of us are Africa and Asia and their well-being is our well-being,  that we are not islanded and apart. 

Delivering water in
Sudan

No land an island no people apart.

Surely, I am not the only person who believes this ─ that we can do better if we alter the course of our thinking and acting, our sense of being among peoples coexisting in world society. I think the United Nations tries in a variety of special days, celebrations and conferences to help us sense this “oneness.”

This year has been designated “International Year of Water Cooperation.” Friday March 22 was “World Water Day.”

Sources and notes

“More people have mobile phones than toilets – UN” (AlertNet, Lisa Anderson), March 22, 2013, http://www.trust.org/alertnet/news/more-people-have-mobile-phones-than-toilets

UN Millennium Development Goals

In September of the year 2000, leaders of 189 countries met at the United Nations in New York and endorsed the Millennium Declaration, a commitment to work together to build a safer, more prosperous and equitable world.

The Declaration was translated into a roadmap setting out eight time-bound and measurable goals to be reached by 2015, known as the Millennium Development Goals

Eight UN Millennium Development Goals for 2015

1. Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
2. Achieve universal primary education
3. Promote gender equality and empower women
4. Reduce child mortality
5. Improve maternal health
6. Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases
7. Ensure environmental sustainability
8. Develop a global partnership for development

http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/mdgoverview.html

For more information, please visit: www.un.org/millenniumgoals

http://www.un.org/en/mdg/summit2010/pdf/List%20of%20MDGs%20English.pdf

The United Nations reports that the Millennium Development Goal of halving the proportion of people without access to improved sources of water has been met but

The target to halve the proportion of people without access to sanitation still has “far to go.”

A call to action issued by U.N. Deputy Secretary-General Jan Eliasson aims at a 2025 goal of improving hygiene, better managing of   human waste and waste-water, and eliminating the practice of open defecation.

“Ending open defecation,” says United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) deputy executive director Marin Mogwanja, “will contribute to a 36 percent reduction in diarrhea,” a condition that kills three quarters of a million under-five-year-old children every year.”

 

World Water Day March 22

World Water Day is held annually on March 22 as a means of focusing attention on the importance of freshwater and advocating for the sustainable management of freshwater resources.

An international day to celebrate freshwater was recommended at the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED).  The United Nations General Assembly responded by designating March 22, 1993, as the first World Water Day.

E

ach year, World Water Day highlights a specific aspect of freshwater. In 2013, in reflection of the International Year of Water Cooperation, World Water Day is also dedicated to the theme of cooperation around water and is coordinated by UNESCO in collaboration with UNECE and UNDESA on behalf of UN-Water. http://www.unwater.org/water-cooperation-2013/events/world-water-day/en/

2013 International Year of Water Cooperation

In December 2010, following the proposal initiated by Tajikistan [a country lying in the heart of Central Asia, bordered by Kyrgyzstan on the north, China on the east, Afghanistan on the south, and Uzbekistan on the west and northwest] and submitted by a group of countries, the United Nations General Assembly declared 2013 ─  the United Nations International Year of Water Cooperation (Resolution A/RES/65/154).

T

he United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) was appointed by UN-Water to lead the preparations for both the 2013 International Year of Water Cooperation and the World Water Day, in collaboration with the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) and with the support of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA), the UN-Water Decade Program on Capacity Development (UNW-DPC) and the UN-Water Decade Program on Advocacy and Communication (UNW-DPAC).

UN-Water called upon UNESCO to lead the 2013 International Year of Water Cooperation in view of the organization’s multi-dimensional mandate in the realm of natural and social sciences, culture, education and communication, and its significant and long-standing contribution to the management of the world’s freshwater resources. http://www.unwater.org/water-cooperation-2013/water-cooperation/en/

IMAGES

http://www.flickr.com/photos/unworldwaterday/8476002418/

UNESCO Béatrice Petit, Aerial view of Assouan dam Egypt water coop 2013

© Dale Lightfoot, 2010, Woman seeking water from the karez at Piskandi Village in northern Iraq....

© UN Photo/Milton Grant, A young woman pumps water from a well in the lowlands area of Eritrea.

© UN Photo/Tim McKulka, A Sudanese woman carries water home in a plastic container.

Delivering water in Sudan - All rights reserved, Uploaded on Feb 15 2013

© Kate Holt: During the drought last year many people died. Eyanai, a young boy, et.al  ...

UN Photo/Martine Perret, Little girls cross a rice field after heavy rains carrying water in plastic containers.

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Bennett's books are available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY] • See also: World Pulse: Global Issues through the eyes of Women: http://www.worldpulse.com/ http://www.worldpulse.com/pulsewire http://www.facebook.com/#!/bennetts2ndstudy

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Foreign relations paradigm unabashedly reverts to barbarism

“The US/UN/NATO race for global full-spectrum dominance” (August 20 and 21, 2012)  by Christopher Black, James Henry Fetzer, Alex Mezyaev, and Christof Lehmann writing at Pravda.ru

Excerpt, editing by
Carolyn Bennett

Under any pretext ─ freedom, democracy, ‘responsibility to protect,’ human rights, ‘war on terrorism’ ─ no act of lawlessness or terrorism is shied away from: assassination of Iranian nuclear scientists, murder of Libyan leader (Col.) Muammar al-Qaddafi Muammar or the President of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Slobodan Milosevic, the President of Iraq Saddam Hussein, or President of the Republic of Rwanda Juvenal Habyarimana.

Unless this regression into global barbarism is opposed by all necessary popular, political, diplomatic, economical, legal, and if necessary, military means, humanity will descend into a state of global barbarism and unspeakable outrages.

Principles, conventions, declarations of law, human rights (breach)

These authors correctly observe that recent decades have witnessed “an unprecedented deterioration, a ‘collapse’ (I have termed it BREAKDOWN) of international law.

“This deterioration is driven by the United States and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and their refusal to abide by long-established legal principles of international law in all its aspects: peaceful coexistence, human rights, military conduct and others, which have been established over hundreds of years. Many of these principles and laws were implemented after unspeakable human suffering.”

Principles in Treaty of Westphalia, National Sovereignty (breach)

The Treaty of Westphalia (Peace of Westphalia) was signed by European powers in 1648 after a religious and political power struggle between European empires had resulted in more than thirty years’ war. “The treaty defines the sovereignty of national states and the principle of non-interference into the internal political affairs of sovereign nations by others.”

The Treaty was one of the international legal principles used in guiding the drafting of the Charter of the United Nations; to many people, it is considered “the most important principle of international law with respect to the regulation of bilateral and multilateral diplomacy and politics.”

Sovereignty (breach)

“The principle of non-interference into domestic affairs and the principle of national sovereignty enshrined in the UN Charter is increasingly being challenged by those (that is, the Americans) who argue that the ‘international community’ (again, the Americans) has a ‘responsibility to protect’ civilians in cases where the government of a sovereign state is unable to protect its citizens, or when the government of a sovereign state is committing severe violations of other principles such as human rights. A resolution that implemented the ‘responsibility to protect’ was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 2009 in violation of the UN Charter.

“This false responsibility was first termed ‘humanitarian intervention’ but it appears that this term could only be used in propaganda when a crisis was already in progress. The slogan responsibility to protect was coined in order to give this strategy more flexibility so that ‘intervention’ could be used ─ even before the United States had succeeded in creating a crisis.”

Hague Conventions

Law against mercenaries (breach)

Coining of the term ‘unlawful-combatant’ was designed in the attempt “to evade provisions of The Hague Convention, which clearly specifies that a population has the right to armed resistance against an aggressor’s military forces.

“The use of mercenary forces (e.g., using 20,000 mercenaries of the Al-Qaeda associated Libyan Islamic Fighting Group in the attempted subversion of Syria) erodes the concept of  command responsibility.

“It provides the USA/NATO with a loophole to commit the most serious acts of terrorism, massacre and military barbarism, while NATO’s military leadership and Defense Ministries and NATO member governments enjoy ‘plausible deniability’ for their command decisions.” But it is clear in international law that U.S. officers have the real command responsibility (effective command and control) over these mercenaries and therefore for their war crimes if ever they could be brought before an international tribunal.

The International Convention against the Recruitment, Use, Financing and Training of Mercenaries (from December 4, 1989) forbids use of mercenaries; thus the United States’  illegal use of mercenary forces is a systematic circumvention of the Hague Convention.

Nevertheless the United States “reserves for itself the right not to make its citizens ─ including military personnel ─ subject to the International Criminal Court at The Hague.”

It does demand prosecution of citizens of nations opposed to US/NATO hegemony. “Members of militia who legally resist US/NATO occupation are often turned over to authorities of a government installed with US/NATO assistance.” They may then be sentenced to long prison terms or execution because US/NATO has found a way around the guarantee of protection under The Hague Conventions. But U.S.-deployed mercenaries, “private contractors,” soldiers of fortune used repeatedly in relatively recent years (from “the war on Yugoslavia” through the “wars on Afghanistan and Iraq”) to fulfill military tasks routinely and with impunity disobey “the rules or customs of war.

“The use of private military contractors and the use of allied or state-sponsored mercenary forces including Al Qaeda brigades are a breach of  the Hague Conventions.”

Global assassination

CIA drones military operations (breach)

“Extrajudicial executions and assassinations warn of what ‘human rights,’ ‘civil liberties,’ ‘freedom,’ ‘democracy’ and ‘justice’ now mean ─ in practice as opposed to in preaching ─ to the United States of America and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.”

Whether a drone attack is targeting resistance fighters (so-called ‘terrorists’) or Gameboy Killers at Langley, Virginia, blow up a bride and groom at a wedding party in Pakistan or Somalia ─ “any and all of such attacks circumvent The Hague Conventions.” Though the United States increasingly uses “unmanned aerial vehicles for observation and kinetic military actions, the CIA’s Gameboy Killers in Langley operate outside a legal military command structure.”

Barbarism veiled, plausibly denied, the authors conclude, consists of systemic acts of lawlessness. 

Circumvention of international law
Circumvention of legal responsibility for illegal acts of war
Circumvention of human rights, civil liberties
Implementation of torture

NATO family photo

Institutionalization of terrorism, massacre of civilians, members of militaries, combatants, non-combatants

Barbarism in war ● Return to endless wars of aggression

Crimes against the peace, unrestrained in ferocity and cruelty

Establishment of illegal international courts, politicized trials, pseudo-legalistic political witch hunts, victors’ justice ─ dangerous acts disguised as legitimate justice, more dangerous than outright violation of international laws and conventions

Sources and notes

Two-part article August 20 and 21, 2012,

Part I

“The US/UN/NATO Race for Global Full Spectrum Dominance” (Christopher Black., James Henry Fetzer, Alex Mezyaev, Christof Lehmann), August 20, 2012, http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/20-08-2012/121926-race_global_dominance-0/

Part II

“The US/UN/NATO Race for Global Full Spectrum Dominance Part II” (Christopher Black., James Henry Fetzer, Alex Mezyaev, Christof Lehmann), August 21, 2012, http://english.pravda.ru/opinion/columnists/21-08-2012/121938-race_global_dominance-0/

Copyright © 1999-2012, «PRAVDA.Ru». When reproducing our materials in whole or in part, hyperlink to PRAVDA.Ru should be made. The opinions and views of the authors do not always coincide with the point of view of PRAVDA.Ru's editors.

Peace of Westphalia: European settlements of 1648, which brought to an end the Eighty Years’ War between Spain and the Dutch and the German phase of the Thirty Years’ War.

The peace was negotiated, from 1644, in the Westphalian towns of Münster and Osnabrück. The Spanish-Dutch treaty was signed on January 30, 1648. (Westphalia (German Westfalen) is a historic region of northwestern Germany, comprising (with the former state of Lippe) the present federal Land (state) of North Rhine–Westphalia and parts of the Länder (states) of Lower Saxony and Hesse.)

Under the terms of the peace settlement, a number of countries received territories or were confirmed in their sovereignty over territories. The territorial clauses all favored Sweden, France, and their allies. Constitutional changes made by the treaty ended the century-long struggle between the monarchical tendencies of the Holy Roman emperors and the federalist aspirations of the empire’s German princes.

The Peace of Westphalia recognized the full territorial sovereignty of the member states of the empire. They were empowered to contract treaties with one another and with foreign powers, provided that the emperor and the empire suffered no prejudice. By this and other changes, the princes of the empire became absolute sovereigns in their own dominions. The Holy Roman emperor and the Diet were left with a mere shadow of their former power.

Sweden and France as guarantors of the peace acquired the right of interference in the affairs of the empire. For many years, Germany became the principal theatre of European diplomacy and war, and the natural development of German national unity was delayed.

Though pronouncing the dissolution of the old order in the empire, the Treaty of Westphalia also facilitated the growth of new powers in its component parts, especially Austria, Bavaria, and Brandenburg. The treaty was recognized as a fundamental law of the German constitution and formed the basis of all subsequent treaties until the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806.

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Bennett's books are available in New York State independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY]; Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]; Burlingham Books – ‘Your Local Chapter’: http://burlinghambooks.com/ [Perry, NY 14530]; The Bookworm: http://www.eabookworm.com/ [East Aurora, NY] • See also: World Pulse: Global Issues through the eyes of Women: http://www.worldpulse.com/ http://www.worldpulse.com/pulsewire http://www.facebook.com/#!/bennetts2ndstudy
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Restrain State aggression — Why Geneva Conventions

Compiled and edited by Carolyn Bennett

“The importance of the Geneva Conventions and their additional protocols was reflected in the establishment of war-crimes tribunals for Yugoslavia (1993) and Rwanda (1994) and by the Rome Statute (1998) creating an International Criminal Court.”

Convention for the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War
Convention (IV)
Geneva, August 12, 1949

This Convention IV establishes an international provision for the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War. Signing plenipotentiaries [persons, especially diplomatic agents invested with full power to transact business] of the Governments represented at the Diplomatic Conference held at Geneva, Switzerland, April 21 to August 12, 1949, agreed [excerpt] …

That the High Contracting Parties undertake to respect and to ensure respect for the present Convention in all circumstances.…

Article 2
In addition to the provisions which shall be implemented in peace-time, the present Convention shall apply to all cases of declared war or of any other armed conflict which may arise between two or more of the High Contracting Parties, even if the state of war is not recognized by one of them.

The Convention shall also apply to all cases of partial or total occupation of the territory of a High Contracting Party, even if the said occupation meets with no armed resistance.

Although one of the Powers in conflict may not be a party to the present Convention, the Powers who are parties thereto shall remain bound by it in their mutual relations. They shall furthermore be bound by the Convention in relation to the said Power, if the latter accepts and applies the provisions thereof.

Article 3
In the case of armed conflict not of an international character occurring in the territory of one of the High Contracting Parties, each Party to the conflict shall be bound to apply, as a minimum, the following provisions:

(1)
Persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including members of armed forces who have laid down their arms and those placed hors de combat [out of combat: disabled] by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause, shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction founded on race, color, religion or faith, sex, birth or wealth, or any other similar criteria.

To this end the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever with respect to the above-mentioned persons:

(2) The wounded and sick shall be collected and cared for.

(a) Violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture;
(b) Taking of hostages;
(c) Outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment;
(d) The passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court, affording all the judicial guarantees which are recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples.

An impartial humanitarian body, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, may offer its services to the Parties to the conflict.

The Parties to the conflict should further endeavor to bring into force, by means of special agreements, all or part of the other provisions of the present Convention.

The application of the preceding provisions shall not affect the legal status of the Parties to the conflict.

Protocol II [excerpt]

Article 3 Non-intervention
1. Nothing in this Protocol shall be invoked for the purpose of affecting the sovereignty of a State or the responsibility of the government, by all legitimate means, to maintain or re-establish law and order in the State or to defend the national unity and territorial integrity of the State.

2. Nothing in this Protocol shall be invoked as a justification for intervening, directly or indirectly, for any reason whatever, in the armed conflict or in the internal or external affairs of the High Contracting Party in the territory of which that conflict occurs.

Article 13 Protection of the civilian population
1. The civilian population and individual civilians shall enjoy general protection against the dangers arising from military operations. To give effect to this protection, the following rules shall be observed in all circumstances.

2. The civilian population as such, as well as individual civilians, shall not be the object of attack. Acts or threats of violence the primary purpose of which is to spread terror among the civilian population are prohibited.

3. Civilians shall enjoy the protection afforded by this Part, unless and for such time as they take a direct part in hostilities.

Article 17 Prohibition of forced movement of civilians
1. The displacement of the civilian population shall not be ordered for reasons related to the conflict unless the security of the civilians involved or imperative military reasons so demand. Should such displacements have to be carried out, all possible measures shall be taken in order that the civilian population may be received under satisfactory conditions of shelter, hygiene, health, safety and nutrition.

2. Civilians shall not be compelled to leave their own territory for reasons connected with the conflict.

Geneva Conventions are a series of international treaties concluded in Geneva between 1864 and 1949 for the purpose of ameliorating the effects of war on soldiers and civilians. Two additional protocols to the 1949 agreement were approved in 1977.

The development of the Geneva Conventions was closely associated with the Red Cross, whose founder, Henri Dunant, initiated international negotiations that produced the Convention for the Amelioration of the Wounded in Time of War in 1864....

The 1864 convention was ratified within three years by all the major European powers as well as by many other states. It was amended and extended by the second Geneva Convention in 1906, and its provisions were applied to maritime warfare through the Hague conventions of 1899 and 1907. The third Geneva Convention, the Convention Relating to the Treatment of Prisoners of War (1929), required that belligerents treat prisoners of war humanely, furnish information about them, and permit official visits to prison camps by representatives of neutral states.

Because some belligerents in World War II had abused the principles contained in earlier conventions, an International Red Cross conference in Stockholm in 1948 extended and codified the existing provisions.

The conference developed four conventions approved in Geneva, August 12, 1949:

(1) Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field
(2) Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded, Sick, and Shipwrecked Members of Armed Forces at Sea
(3) Convention Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War
(4) Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War

More than 180 states have become parties to the 1949 conventions. Approximately 150 states are party to Protocol I. More than 145 states are party to Protocol II, though the United States is not. In addition, more than 50 states have made declarations accepting the competence of international fact-finding commissions to investigate allegations of grave breaches or other serious violations of the conventions or of Protocol I.

Protocol I supplementary to the Geneva Conventions of August 12, 1949

Proclaims to the High Contracting Parties’ earnest wish to see peace prevail among peoples

Recalling that every State has the duty, in conformity with the Charter of the United Nations, to refrain in its international relations from the threat or use of force against the sovereignty, territorial integrity or political independence of any State, or in any other manner inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations

Believing it necessary nevertheless to reaffirm and develop the provisions protecting the victims of armed conflicts and to supplement measures intended to reinforce their application,

Expressing their conviction that nothing in this Protocol or in the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 can be construed as legitimizing or authorizing any act of aggression or any other use of force inconsistent with the Charter of the United Nations,

Reaffirming further that the provisions of the Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 and of this Protocol must be fully applied in all circumstances to all persons who are protected by those instruments, without any adverse distinction based on the nature or origin of the armed conflict or on the causes espoused by or attributed to the Parties to the conflict …

High Contracting Parties undertake to respect and to ensure respect for this Protocol in all circumstances.

In cases not covered by this Protocol or by other international agreements, civilians and combatants remain under the protection and authority of the principles of international law derived from established custom, from the principles of humanity and from dictates of public conscience.

This Protocol, which supplements the Geneva Conventions of August 12, 1949 for the protection of war victims, shall apply in the situations referred to in Article 2 common to thoseConventions.


Sources and notes

Final Act of the Diplomatic Conference of Geneva, August 12, 1949


Conference convened by the Swiss Federal Council for the purpose of revising the Geneva Convention of July 27, 1929, for the Relief of the Wounded and Sick in Armies in the Field; the tenth Hague Convention of October 18,1907, for the Adaptation to Maritime Warfare of the Principles of the Geneva Convention of July 6, 1906; the Geneva Convention of July 27, 1929, relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War; and for establishing a Convention for the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War—


On the basis of the four Draft Conventions examined and approved by the 17th international Red Cross Conference held at Stockholm, deliberated from April 21 to August 12, 1949, at Geneva


The Conference established the texts of the following Four Conventions

Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field
Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of Wounded, Sick and Shipwrecked Members of Armed Forces at Sea
Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War
Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of WarProtocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of August 12, 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of Non-International Armed Conflicts (Protocol II), June 8, 1977, http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/WebART/475-760002?OpenDocumentProtocol

Protocol Additional to the Geneva Conventions of August 12, 1949, and relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts (Protocol I), June 8, 1977
http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/7c4d08d9b287a42141256739003e636b/f6c8b9fee14a77fdc125641e0052b079


State Parties to Geneva Conventions of August 12, 1949
State Parties Signature Ratification / Accession 1) Reservation / Declaration 2)
Unedited (style of date: day-month-year)

Afghanistan 08.12.1949 26.09.1956
Albania 12.12.1949 27.05.1957 27.05.1957 (text)
Algeria 20.06.1960
Andorra 17.09.1993
Angola 20.09.1984 20.09.1984 (text)
Antigua and Barbuda 06.10.1986
Argentina 08.12.1949 18.09.1956
Armenia 07.06.1993
Australia 04.01.1950. 14.10.1958 14.10.1958 (text)
Austria 12.08.1949 27.08.1953
Azerbaijan 01.06.1993
Bahamas 11.07.1975
Bahrain 30.11.1971
Bangladesh 04.04.1972 20.12.1988 (text)
Barbados 10.09.1968 10.09.1968 (text)
Belarus 12.12.1949 03.08.1954
Belgium 08.12.1949 03.09.1952
Belize 29.06.1984
Benin 14.12.1961
Bhutan 10.01.1991
Bolivia 08.12.1949 10.12.1976
Bosnia-Herzegovina 31.12.1992
Botswana 29.03.1968
Brazil 08.12.1949 29.06.1957
Brunei Darussalam 14.10.1991
Bulgaria 28.12.1949 22.07.1954
Burkina Faso 07.11.1961
Burundi 27.12.1971
Cambodia 08.12.1958
Cameroon 16.09.1963
Canada 08.12.1949 14.05.1965
Cape Verde 11.05.1984
Central African Republic 01.08.1966
Chad 05.08.1970
Chile 12.08.1949 12.10.1950
China 10.12.1949 28.12.1956 28.12.1956 (text)
Colombia 12.08.1949 08.11.1961
Comoros 21.11.1985
Congo (Dem. Rep.) 24.02.1961
Congo 04.02.1967
Cook Islands 07.05.2002
Costa Rica 15.10.1969
Côte d'Ivoire 28.12.1961
Croatia 11.05.1992
Cuba 12.08.1949 15.04.1954
Cyprus 23.05.1962
Czech Republic 05.02.1993
Denmark 12.08.1949 27.06.1951
Djibouti 06.03.1978
Dominican Republic 22.01.1958
Dominica 28.09.1981
Ecuador 12.08.1949 11.08.1954
Egypt 08.12.1949 10.11.1952
El Salvador 08.12.1949 17.06.1953
Equatorial Guinea 24.07.1986
Eritrea 14.08.2000
Estonia 18.01.1993
Ethiopia 08.12.1949 02.10.1969
Fiji 09.08.1971
Finland 08.12.1949 22.02.1955
Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia 01.09.1993 18.10.1996. (text)
France 08.12.1949 28.06.1951
Gabon 26.02.1965
Gambia 20.10.1966
Georgia 14.09.1993
Germany 03.09.1954 03.12.1954. (text)
Ghana 02.08.1958
Greece 22.12.1949 05.06.1956
Grenada 13.04.1981
Guatemala 12.08.1949 14.05.1952
Guinea-Bissau 21.02.1974 21.02.1974. (text)
Guinea 11.07.1984
Guyana 22.07.1968
Haiti 11.04.1957
Holy See 08.12.1949 22.02.1951
Honduras 31.12.1965
Hungary 08.12.1949 03.08.1954
Iceland 10.08.1965
India 16.12.1949 09.11.1950
Indonesia 30.09.1958
Iran (Islamic Rep.of) 08.12.1949 20.02.1957 20.02.1957 (text)
Iraq 14.02.1956
Ireland 19.12.1949 27.09.1962
Israel 08.12.1949 06.07.1951 08.12.1949 (text)
Italy 08.12.1949 17.12.1951
Jamaica 20.07.1964
Japan 21.04.1953
Jordan 29.05.1951
Kazakhstan 05.05.1992
Kenya 20.09.1966
Kiribati 05.01.1989
Korea (Dem.People's Rep.) 27.08.1957 27.08.1957. (text)
Korea (Republic of) 16.08.1966 16.08.1966. (text)
Kuwait 02.09.1967 02.09.1967. (text)
Kyrgyzstan 18.09.1992
Lao People's Dem.Rep. 29.10.1956
Latvia 24.12.1991
Lebanon 08.12.1949 10.04.1951
Lesotho 20.05.1968
Liberia 29.03.1954
Libyan Arab Jamahiriya 22.05.1956
Liechtenstein 12.08.1949 21.09.1950
Lithuania 03.10.1996
Luxembourg 08.12.1949 01.07.1953
Madagascar 18.07.1963
Malawi 05.01.1968
Malaysia 24.08.1962
Maldives 18.06.1991
Mali 24.05.1965
Malta 22.08.1968
Marshall Islands 01.06.2004
Mauritania 30.10.1962
Mauritius 18.08.1970
Mexico 08.12.1949 29.10.1952
Micronesia 19.09.1995
Moldova (Republic of) 24.05.1993
Monaco 12.08.1949 05.07.1950
Mongolia 20.12.1958
Montenegro (Republic of) 02.08.2006
Morocco 26.07.1956
Mozambique 14.03.1983
Myanmar 25.08.1992
Namibia 22.08.1991
Nauru 27.06.2006
Nepal 07.02.1964
Netherlands 08.12.1949 03.08.1954
New Zealand 11.02.1950. 02.05.1959
Nicaragua 12.08.1949 17.12.1953
Nigeria 20.06.1961
Niger 21.04.1964
Norway 12.08.1949 03.08.1951
Oman 31.01.1974
Pakistan 12.08.1949 12.06.1951 12.06.1951. (text)
Palau 25.06.1996
Panama 10.02.1956
Papua New Guinea 26.05.1976
Paraguay 10.12.1949 23.10.1961
Peru 12.08.1949 15.02.1956
Philippines 08.12.1949 06.10.1952
Poland 08.12.1949 26.11.1954
Portugal 11.02.1950. 14.03.1961 14.03.1961. (text)
Qatar 15.10.1975
Romania 10.02.1950. 01.06.1954
Russian Federation 12.12.1949 10.05.1954 12.12.1949 (text)
Rwanda 05.05.1964
Saint Kitts and Nevis 14.02.1986
Saint Lucia 18.09.1981
Saint Vincent Grenadines 01.04.1981
Samoa 23.08.1984
San Marino 29.08.1953
Sao Tome and Principe 21.05.1976
Saudi Arabia 18.05.1963
Senegal 18.05.1963
Serbia (Republic of) 16.10.2001
Seychelles 08.11.1984
Sierra Leone 10.06.1965
Singapore 27.04.1973
Slovakia 02.04.1993
Slovenia 26.03.1992
Solomon Islands 06.07.1981
Somalia 12.07.1962
South Africa 31.03.1952
Spain 08.12.1949 04.08.1952
Sri Lanka 08.12.1949 28.02.1959
Sudan 23.09.1957
Suriname 13.10.1976 13.10.1976. (text)
Swaziland 28.06.1973
Sweden 08.12.1949 28.12.1953
Switzerland 12.08.1949 31.03.1950
Syrian Arab Republic 12.08.1949 02.11.1953
Tajikistan 13.01.1993
Tanzania (United Rep.of) 12.12.1962
Thailand 29.12.1954
Timor-Leste 08.05.2003
Togo 06.01.1962
Tonga 13.04.1978
Trinidad and Tobago 24.09.1963
Tunisia 04.05.1957
Turkey 12.08.1949 10.02.1954
Turkmenistan 10.04.1992
Tuvalu 19.02.1981
Uganda 18.05.1964
Ukraine 12.12.1949 03.08.1954
United Arab Emirates 10.05.1972
United Kingdom 08.12.1949 23.09.1957 23.09.1957. (text)
United States of America 12.08.1949 02.08.1955 02.08.1955. (text)
Uruguay 12.08.1949 05.03.1969 05.03.1969. (text)
Uzbekistan 08.10.1993
Vanuatu 27.10.1982
Venezuela 10.02.1950. 13.02.1956
Viet Nam 28.06.1957 28.06.1957. (text)
Yemen 16.07.1970 25.05.1977. (text)
Zambia 19.10.1966
Zimbabwe 07.03.1983


Ratification
A treaty is generally open for signature for a certain time following the conference which has adopted it. However, a signature is not binding on a State unless it has been endorsed by ratification. The time limits having elapsed, the Conventions and the Protocols are no longer open for signature. The States which have not signed them may at any time accede or, in the appropriate circumstances, succeed to them.


Accession
Instead of signing and then ratifying a treaty, a State may become party to it by the single act called accession.

Reservation / Declaration
Unilateral statement, however phrased or named, made by a State when ratifying, acceding or succeeding to a treaty, whereby it purports to exclude or to modify the legal effect of certain provisions of the treaty in their application to that State (provided that such reservations are not incompatible with the object and purpose of the treaty).

“ Palestine — June 21, 1989:
The Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs received a letter from the Permanent Observer of Palestine to the United Nations Office at Geneva informing the Swiss Federal Council ‘that the Executive Committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, entrusted with the functions of the Government of the State of Palestine by decision of the Palestine National Council, decided, on May 4,1989, to adhere to the Four Geneva Conventions of August 12, 1949 and the two Protocols additional thereto.’

September 13, 1989, the Swiss Federal Council informed the States that it was not in a position to decide whether the letter constituted an instrument of accession, ‘due to the uncertainty within the international community as to the existence or non-existence of a State of Palestine.’” Copyright © 2005 International Committee of the Red Cross, International Humanitarian Law - Treaties and Documents, http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/FULL/380?OpenDocument
http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/WebART/360-560001?OpenDocumentBritannica notes




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Bennett's books available at New York independent bookstores: Lift Bridge Bookshop: www.liftbridgebooks.com [Brockport, NY]; Sundance Books: http://www.sundancebooks.com/main.html [Geneseo, NY]; The Book Den, Ltd.: BookDenLtd@frontiernet.net [Danville, NY] Talking Leaves Books-Elmwood: talking.leaves.elmwood@gmail.com [Buffalo, NY]; Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza: http://www.bhny.com/ [Albany, NY]; Mood Makers Books: www.moodmakersbooks.com [City of Rochester, NY] Dog Ears Bookstore and Literary Arts Center: www.enlightenthedog.org/ [Buffalo, NY]