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ALERT - DURBAN II
United Nations Hands Genocide Advocate Iran
An Anti-racism Leadership Role
The world's most notorious state exponent of anti-semitism – Iran – is
being given a seat on the UN committee planning a 2009 UN anti-racism conference. This
conference is billed as a review of the implementation of the 2001 UN conference
against racism which was held in Durban, South Africa. The infamous Durban
Conference is remembered for its broadcast of anti-semitism from a global platform
under a UN banner and with UN blessing. Now Iran is being placed in a position
to drive the agenda of Durban II. Other members slated to take their place
on the so-called Bureau for the Durban Preparatory Committee (Prep Com) are Libya
- the Chair, Cuba and Pakistan. The Prep Com will meet for the first time
in Geneva, August 27, 2007.
BACKGROUND – DURBAN I, September 2001
The first UN Durban Racism Conference, which ended September 8, 2001 – three
days before the terrible events of September 11th – was a notorious outpouring
of hate and anti-semitism directed at Jews, Israel and the United States. It
was a global soapbox for terrorists and their sympathizers the world over.
The Durban Non-governmental (NGO) Forum, held in association with the government
conference, adopted a declaration labeling Zionism as racism and deleted proposals
on protection from modern forms of anti-semitism. At the NGO Forum, the only
session on anti-semitism was shut down by a mob screaming "you are killers;" a
news conference by Jewish NGOs from all over the globe who were attempting
to bear witness to the hate was cut short by another mob, and the display and
distribution of copies of anti-semitic literature akin to that of Nazi Germany
was openly tolerated. The government conference which followed permitted the
daily distribution of material drawing direct links between Israelis and Nazis.
Material reading "fight racism, not Jews" was confiscated by security
officials. Ultimately, the government conference adopted a Durban Declaration
which singled out Israel as the world's one and only racist state.
As Anne Bayefsky, editor of www.EYEontheUN.org and
participant in the Durban conference wrote shortly
thereafter, the legacy of the racism and anti-semitism of the Durban conference
extends far beyond the halls and conferences of the UN:
"The Durban World Conference on Racism...revealed
the intimate connections between anti-racism politics and a key platform
in the terrorist agenda, namely, the delegitimation of Israel and the legitimation
of terrorism against its citizens. The Durban phenomenon was repeated in
the aftermath of September 11 as allegations of racism and displays of
anti-semitism abounded from terrorists, apologists of terrorism in the
media, and at the 2001 UN General Assembly deliberations on terrorism.
The linkage between racial hatred and terrorism is a phenomenon which democracies
ignore at their peril. Durban uncovered racism as a real root cause of
terrorism, a motivation which the terrorist seeks to camouflage by the
accusation of racism itself.The World Conference Against Racism became
a forum for racism. Human rights was used not as a facilitator for communication
but as a weapon of political interests antithetical to human rights protection.
A large group of states sought to minimize or exclude references to the
Holocaust, redefine or ignore anti-semitism, and isolate the state of Israel
from the global community as a racist practitioner of apartheid and crimes
against humanity. The vestiges of Jewish victimhood were to be systematically
removed by deleting the references to anti-semitism and the Holocaust,
to be displaced by the Palestinian victim living under racist, Nazi-like,
oppression.The hate literature distributed during the NGO conference included
caricatures of Jews with hooked noses, Palestinian blood on their hands,
surrounded by money, and Israelis wearing Nazi emblems. At the Government
Conference, there was daily distribution by NGO participants of literature
reading "Nazi-Israeli
apartheid," while inside the drafting committees, states such as Syria
and Iran objected to the inclusion of anti-semitism or the Holocaust on the
grounds that anti-semitism was a "complicated," "curious," and "bizarre" concept,
and reference to the Holocaust would be imbalanced or "favoritism." ...
The dangerousness of the Durban rhetoric and its program of action were immediately evidenced
by the events of September 11 and their aftermath. Political actors and
commentators continued to weave the same distorted pattern which Durban
purported to legitimize. At the UN, which was seized throughout the fall
2001 General Assembly with the subject of terrorism, Arab states pressed
the Durban racist strategy in response to September 11. A successful war
against terrorism demands clarity of the target, and the Durban result
threatens its identification."
| Handout at the NGO Forum Conference |
Demonstration during the Durban Conference |
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| See Film from Durban 2001 Conference |
In 2007, after six years of a world poisoned by the Durban 2001 legacy, Iran
continues to develop its nuclear weapons program while advocating genocide
against the Jewish state – with the UN taking no meaningful action
to stop it. On the contrary, now Iran can wrap itself in a UN flag
while at the helm of the next global conference against racism, Durban II.
LEAD UP TO "DURBAN II"
The decision to repeat
Durban was taken by the UN General Assembly on December 19, 2006. The
resolution sought:
"to convene in 2009 a review conference on the implementation of the
Durban Declaration and Programme of Action to be conducted within the framework
of the General Assembly, making use of the three existing and ongoing follow-up
mechanisms, and to this end requests the Human Rights Council to undertake
preparations for this event and formulate a concrete plan by 2007 for the
review conference; and to provide updates and reports on this issue on
an annual basis to both the Secretary-General and the General Assembly."
This resolution followed a vote of the Human Rights Council on December
8, 2006 by which the African Group of states forced through a resolution – against
the wishes of all Western European states and others (34 in favor, 12 against
and 1 abstention) – setting up the preparatory infrastructure for
Durban II. The Council resolution names the Council itself as the conference
preparatory committee, grants the Council the power to elect a Bureau,
and calls for meetings three weeks in 2007 and two weeks in 2008.
One specific inclusion in the Human Rights Council resolution reveals the
direction its supporters intend it to take. In inviting different UN bodies
to contribute to the new preparatory committee's work, the resolution singled
out only two of the UN's many Special Investigators or Rapporteurs – the
Special Rapporteur on Racism and the Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion
or belief. No mention is made, for example, of the rapporteur on promotion
and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression. In other
words, accusations of Islamophobia and objections to the Danish cartoons
will be on the agenda. Freedom of expression will not.
AUGUST 2007: DURBAN PREP COM MEETS IN GENEVA
The first session will
begin with Iran and company, as members of the Bureau of the Prep Com of
the Durban Review Conference, taking their seats. With
Iran's election to the Bureau, the racists will be the UN spokespersons
against racism, and the message and mission of the United Nations will have
been totally inverted – again. Here is what the Iranian member
of the Bureau can contribute to an anti-racism conference:
- Iranian president Mahmoud
Ahmadenijad has called for the Jewish state to be wiped off the map and
has backed up this threat already by arming terrorist organizations such
as Hezbollah.Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadenijad has called the Holocaust
a "myth" and
in 2006 sponsored a Holocaust cartoon exhibition.
Serious ongoing Iranian human rights abuses abound. Newspapers
report: "Under Iranian law, capital offenses include adultery
by married people, incest, rape, convictions of unmarried persons for fornication,
convictions for drinking alcohol, or convictions for homosexual acts among
men."
- A long history of
persecution of the Ba'hai minority in Iran.
In addition to Iran as
a Bureau member, Libya will be the Chair of the Prep Com's Bureau.
Libya is a country with one of the world's worst human rights records and
its chairmanship of the former Commission on Human Rights was both a disgrace
and a significant factor in its ultimate demise. Looking at all Bureau
members, they will be:
African Group: Cameroon, Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Senegal, South Africa
Asian Group: Indonesia, India, Islamic Republic of Iran, Pakistan
Latin American and Caribbean Group: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Cuba
Eastern European Group: Armenia, Croatia, Estonia, Russian Federation
Western European and Others Group: Belgium, Greece, Norway, Turkey
Some of these Bureau members have used the UN in the recent past as a
platform to promote terrorism, defend states guilty of genocide and demonize
Jews and Israel repeatedly. The following statements provide a glimpse
into their plans for Durban II:
Libya – chair
of the Durban Prep Com - comparing Jews to Nazis at the Fourth Committee
of the General Assembly on November 8, 2006:
"...the practices of the Israeli forces in the Occupied Palestine
Territories reminds us of the massacres that were made in the last century. And
here we need psychologists and therapists to interpret the repetition of
the victim for the same criminal acts, the repetition of the same victim
to be exposed as the same criminal acts to which it was -- One of the Arab
settlers said -- and I quote – 'I have an impression that those
who perpetrate such barbarian acts against the Palestinian people are the
remnants who committed similar acts against the Jews in Europe.'"
Libya,
calling for the end of Israel as a Jewish state at the General Debate of
the General Assembly, September 25, 2006:
"The only solution...is to guarantee the return of all Palestinian
refugees to their lands and to establish a democratic state on the land of
historical Palestine..."
South
Africa , voting against a draft resolution on Burma/Myanmar, January
12, 2007, Security Council:
"I
regret to inform the Council that South Africa will vote against the
draft resolution on Myanmar."
South
Africa on the problematic "Jewish character" of Jerusalem,
at the Emergency Special Session on the security fence, December 15, 2006:
"Israel continues its policy of the de-Palestinization of Jerusalem....action
of the Israeli government is designed to ensure that Jerusalem assumes a
predominantly Jewish character..."
Indonesia,
in defense of the government of Sudan at the Special Session of the Human
Rights Council on the situation of Human Rights in Darfur, December 12, 2006:
"...the Government of Sudan is cooperating with the Council...The
situation in Darfur...is complicated, multi-dimensional, and involves
many actors and groups. It encompasses tribal conflicts; conflicts
between farmers and herders; and conflicts between political interests..."
Indonesia blaming
the "campaign against terrorism" and free speech for religious
intolerance, while at the Third Committee of the General Assembly, September
22, 2006:
"...the present predicament in which the global community finds
itself with regard to the way different religious and cultural denominations
perceive one another, arises from a state of confrontation. This confrontation
is exacerbated by a sense of injustice and persecution which feed essentially
on the raft of measures introduced in the campaign against terrorism...we
agree with cautions against unlimited freedom of expression and the risk
it presents of inhibiting the balance that international norms seek to establish
between freedom of expression and religious freedom. Only and specifically
by maintaining this balance can the prohibition of the incitement to religious
and racial hatred...be guaranteed."
Pakistan excusing
violence against Israelis at the Third Committee of the General Assembly,
November 7, 2006
"...the
legitimacy of the struggles of peoples for self-determination cannot
be compromised by tarnishing it with the tarbush of terrorism."
Pakistan on
the importance of fighting free speech with the same "zeal" as
fighting terrorism at the Third Committee of the General Assembly, November
6, 2006:
"Hate
speech against manifestations of religious and cultural practices must
be condemned with the same zeal with which the fight against terrorism
is being pursued."
Cuba blaming
the West for the racist genocide being perpetrated by the Sudanese government
at the Special Session of the Human Rights Council on the situation of Human
Rights in Darfur, December 12, 2006:
"The grave human rights and humanitarian situation in Darfur, Sudan....is
a complex and delicate situation with deep roots in the colonial past, in
the artificial divisions crated in Africa by ancient metropolis, in the structural
poverty caused by centuries of exploitation and plundering, and in current
economic and geostrategic interests of the great superpower. In addition
to these elements, there is a persistent campaign of discredit and exaggeration
orchestrated against the Government of Sudan with the clear aim of encouraging
the hegemonic pretensions of the West. Cuba can attest to the tireless
efforts of the Government of Sudan to face this crisis..."
Cuba,
accusing Israel of planning genocide at the Third Special Session of the
Human Rights Council on November 15, 2006:
"It
is evident then that an entire population is being a victim a true
genocide, deliberately planned and carried out as a state policy."
Cuba legitimizing
terrorism against civilians at the Sixth Committee of the General Assembly
on October 12, 2006:
"A Comprehensive Convention on international terrorism has to guarantee
a clear distinction between terrorism and the peoples' legitimate
struggle for their independence and in defense of their right to self-determination."
The warm-up for the racists and anti-semites
commanding "anti-racism" leadership roles for the UN's Durban II.
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