Antarchia | ukwatch.net

Amnesty International's War Policy

Ellie Keen — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 23:40:37 +0000

“It’s one thing to keep an eye on the human rights situation in North Korea, China, or Uzbekistan. But monitoring human rights in Britain or Germany would be laughable.”

Ludmilla Alexeyeva, doyenne of the Russian human rights movement¹

Amnesty International has a principle known as WOOC, which stands for Work On Own Country. The principle says (roughly) that members of Amnesty International are not permitted, as members, to do campaigning work on cases in their own country². The lobbying and campaigning that members do has to be directed (primarily) at governments other than one’s own. Thus, if you are a member of the UK Section of Amnesty, you are likely to be fighting for the rights of individuals living in Sudan, in Burma, in France or Bulgaria, rather than for victims of the British government located in the UK. If you are a member of the fledgling branches of the organisation in – for example – Russia, Argentina or Burkina Faso, then you are more likely to be fighting to repeal the death penalty in the US, than to be applying pressure on behalf of (respectively) Russian, Argentinian or Burkina Faso victims.

The reasons for the rule are fairly sound: first, the organisation does not want to put members in danger, and criticising your own government can be a risky business. Second, the organisation can better ensure objectivity and impartiality, if people work on issues which do not directly concern them (or their nearest and dearest). Third, human rights violations are not supposed to be any more reprehensible or unacceptable just because they happen in another country than your own: fighting for rights in different parts of the globe is tied in with international solidarity and the universality of human rights.

Those are all important principles. But in almost any part of the world other than the comfy regions of the global north, the strictures of WOOC can appear nonsensical – at least for an organisation concerned with urgent matters of life and death, concerned with challenging the power of government in the most effective way, and with working to achieve real change. WOOC is, after all, an upside down view of activism.

You see this very clearly in Russia and the former Soviet Union, where real human rights activists are rarely members of Amnesty International, and members of Amnesty are rarely real human rights activists. It is probably the same in other regions, and is not all that surprising: real activists in Russia (for example) are keen to work on the problems created by their own government – the problems which they see all around them – and most of them simply laugh at the idea that rather than lobbying their local leaders, they should instead be sending letters or faxes off to the President of Chad or the Prime Minister of Great Britain. They laugh at the idea that letters addressed to President Putin (now Medvedev-Putin) from the citizens of Chad might alter his behaviour or policies; and they laugh at the idea that rather than protesting about torture in Russian gaols, racist attacks in Russian cities, continuing abuse in Chechnya or corruption in the legal system, they should be standing on the street collecting signatures to protest about the treatment of women in Saudi Arabia. You can sort of see their point.

The geography of human rights

But exactly the same point ought to apply here in the UK, and it is strange in some ways that the so-called human rights activists³ in this comfy region, or in the United States of Europe and America do not see the problem. People in the UK – and not only, as the quote above illustrates – do not in general question Amnesty’s policy, because it is assumed that real human rights violations do not happen in the rich and established democracies (so-called): they happen in the third world (so-called). Here, they are assumed to be no more than a fringe phenomenon, a freak, not systematic and entrenched. That means that any British resident who wants to fight against human rights violations automatically assumes that his or her support is needed most urgently outside the borders of this country.

That is a very natural assumption, but it all depends on what you understand by violations ‘happening’, and on how you think it might be most effective to concentrate energies in order that the ‘happening’ does not happen. If you believe that a violation of human rights ‘happens’ where the victim is located, then it is probably true to say that there are fewer violations of human rights in the so-called established democracies (the richer ones, in other words). But if you think that the importance of the happening lies not so much in who the victims are, nor in where they are located, but rather in the location of those responsible for the violation – then that claim collapses. In the UK, for example, real human rights violations can surely be said to ‘happen’ when we fabricate a war in distant lands and destroy a nation (or two).

So one problem with WOOC is that it only makes a bare amount of sense to people who assume that their own government is not carrying out systematic human rights violations, of the very worst sort. It only makes sense, in other words, to do-gooders in the richer world, who want to save the world, and who see on their own doorstep neither the cause nor the consequences of the current unsafe, vile, violent world.

Because there is a second problem with WOOC: if you did see the cause of the violence and vileness in other regions of the world on your own doorstep, and if you really were concerned to stop it, then you would behave like the real activists in other regions of the world, and you would stop fiddling about with Amnesty and WOOC. From an activist’s point of view, it is much more effective, where possible, for those closest to the cause of violations to try to address that cause directly. Power and influence dissipate with distance, and the further you are from a source of power, the harder it is to influence or deflect it.

None of our business

WOOC makes absolutely no sense in countries like the UK, where the danger involved in fighting for human rights is minimal. Unless, of course, you think – like Amnesty – that starting wars, fighting wars, failing to clean up after wars, bombing, killing, maiming, destroying physically and mentally those unwittingly caught up in wars, occupying their land, and making off with the proceeds of wars – that all of those are not human rights issues.

What does Amnesty think about war?

Amnesty International is independent of any government, political persuasion or religious creed. It neither supported nor opposed the war in Afghanistan in October 2001, and takes no position on the legitimacy of armed struggle against foreign or Afghan armed forces⁴.

From All who are not friends, are enemies: Taleban abuses against civilians

I wonder how it would be possible ‘neither to support nor oppose’ a war which was unnecessary, which has brought only misery to people in one of the poorest countries on this earth, which was predicted to do so, and which will continue to do so for decades to come – if you really were concerned about human rights. And I wonder how you can condemn the consequences – which are terrible, by any scale, and Amnesty condemns them – yet not condemn the actions of those who brought those consequences about deliberately, with foresight, and who have since failed to secure the most basic living conditions or security for the country they are occupying.

Amnesty International can think what it likes, of course, and it can even savour its famed impartiality and objectivity at the expense of potential victims of war the world over, if it chooses. But it should be noted that it is doing so in this country (alone) at a cost of £22 million (about $44 million), taken from individual supporters who have trusted the organisation to tell them where the real human rights offenders are, and to use the funds effectively⁵.

More seriously, for those who are the victims of British policy around the world, that £22 million, and the efforts of Amnesty UK’s 260,000-odd supporters – who now think that they have done their bit for human rights – are thereby stolen from the real human rights campaigns we should be fighting in this country. Instead of campaigning against the violations committed on their own doorstep, by their own government, against the weakest and defenceless of the world, Amnesty International advises that those wanting to ‘protect the human’ avert their gaze, adopt a position neither supporting nor opposing an unprovoked war of aggression, and direct their efforts overseas, to other people’s governments.

How fitting, but how tragic, that a country which has, throughout its history, been better at repressing other people than its own, and which has with great efficiency exported its worst crimes overseas, should have given birth to a human rights organisation which serves that purpose perfectly. How inconvenient it would be, after all, to have Amnesty International’s 260,000-odd supporters banging on the door of 10 Downing Street. How much better that they bang on doors in other countries, and leave our warmongers in peace.

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Notes:

1. This comment was made when the Russian government announced that it was planning to set up an organisation to monitor human rights in the west (see here for details)

2. ‘The principle intended to establish an objective distance between the Amnesty activist and the human rights concern. Amnesty groups must not ask for, assess, or act upon information about individual cases in their own country.’ From AI UK’s site. The rule has been relaxed slightly since its earlier manifestations, but the principles remain.

3. Very much so-called. In the UK, real human rights activists probably call themselves activists, without the human-rights tag. The human rights armies (who use the tag) are very rarely activists.

4.Of course, they refused to condemn the Iraq war as well. For Irene Khan’s pathetic plea to the Security Council, urging them to ‘put the protection of human rights and humanitarian concerns for the life and safety of the Iraqi population at the forefront of your deliberations’ see this page (and my comments on it here)

5. A lot of the £22 million is spent on gimmicky campaigns, publicity and super-flash websites with interactive, cool ways of getting involved in human rights. A lot of it (of course) is spent on highly paid ‘experts’, managers, fundraising and publicity consultants – and plush offices for all these individuals. As one researcher said, quoted in Stephen Hopgood’s book Keepers of the Flame: ‘I mean, when the people that I work with, when they see this office, my God, it’s… we look like the UN, don’t we? You know. And I can remember being really embarrassed in a sense. When we moved from our shabby old place in Covent Garden and we came here. And that was the embarrassment. I mean, we are working with the poorest of the poor. And the, the most powerless people in the world. and they come here and course what do they think? You know. We are, we are a rich Western organisation.’

Miliband is Very Sorry

Ellie Keen — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 02:14:29 +0000

The European Court of Human Rights condemned the so-called “five techniques” used by UK military and security forces during that period. It ruled that the techniques – hooding, wall-standing, noise, deprivation of food and drink, and sleep deprivation – were cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, banned under the European Convention on Human Rights. The British government gave “a solemn undertaking” to the court that the techniques would never again be used on British soil."

Human Rights Watch – Dangerous Ambivalence: UK Policy on Torture since 9/11

Never again on British soil, but we can solemnly undertake that you can ship it overseas and we shall turn a blind eye – especially if there are others who will do the actual dirty business. We shall not engage in torture (so if by chance you find a case or two, be sure that these are only rotten apples).

This is the British way. Our public face is principled, well-spoken and well-educated. We play fair, and you can trust our simple swords of truth and trusty shields. In fact, if those dirty Americans (our special friends) should ever happen – perchance – to fly an aeroplane through our airspace, carting their prisoners of war off to secret detention camps to be tortured, you can be quite sure that we knew nothing about it, that it didn’t happen anyway, and if someone finds out that it did, we shall apologise for having told you otherwise.

And so we did, or rather so our well-spoken, principled, well-educated Foreign Secretary did. The very same Foreign Secretary, incidentally, who features on the front page¹ of Amnesty’s UK Section website with the Director of Amnesty UK (Kate Allen) and a candle in the background.

You see: he believes in human rights, and our human rights organisations believe in him.

But just for the record:

Miliband was Head of the Prime Minister’s Policy Unit in Downing Street from 1997 to 2001. The Policy Unit ‘provides expert advice to the Prime Minister’ – and presumably did so in those crucial years when the Prime Minister was a) bombing Iraq illegally, b) ensuring the continuation of a ‘genocidal’ (in the words of Denis Halliday) sanctions policy in Iraq, c) bombing Serbia illegally.
In May 2001, Miliband entered Parliament as a Labour MP, from which time he has voted loyally with the Government on all major issues – including supporting the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq, draconian anti-terrorism bills, pre-charge detention up to a maximum of 28 days, restrictions on free speech and the right to protest, and the imposition of control orders.To name but a few.
From May 2005, Miliband has been a member of the Cabinet and from July 2007, Foreign Secretary. Since then, and despite much muttering that things would change, nothing has. He still says of the Iraq invasion ‘I believe this was done for the right reasons.’

He must be the only person left in the UK who does. It also makes it rather strange that he should have tried so hard to prevent the first draft of the dodgy dossier from being released under a FOI request, as he did. I wonder what he was afraid that we might see.

Rendition, British-style

And now there is this latest episode: Ben Griffin is a former SAS soldier who served in the US/UK Task Force in Afghanistan, and who has decided to go public on British complicity with torture. Last Monday, he made a statement to the press – his last, before the Government put a gagging order on him – in which he said:

Throughout my time in Iraq I was in no doubt that individuals detained by UKSF and handed over to our American colleagues would be tortured. During my time as member of the US/UK Task Force, three soldiers recounted to me an incident in which they had witnessed the brutal interrogation of two detainees. Partial drowning and an electric cattle prod were used during this interrogation and this amounted to torture. It was the widely held assumption that this would be the fate of any individuals handed over to our America colleagues.

Griffin says he has been told by his legal team that whenever British soldiers hand over detainees to the Americans (or the Afghan or Iraqi powers) – this is rendition.² It is rendition, and it is illegal, both because it is done secretly, or at least without formal procedures; but also because by now there is enough evidence to know that the recipient parties all engage in torture on a systematic basis.

So quite apart from whether we, the British, torture with our own clean hands – and we do³ – we are still contravening human rights law, regularly, by handing those we detain over to hands that we know are dirty⁴.

...it is the essential responsibility of States to prevent acts of torture and other forms of ill-treatment being committed, not only against persons within any territory under their own jurisdiction… but also to prevent such acts by not bringing persons under the control of other States if there are substantial grounds for believing that they would be in danger of being subjected to torture.

Report of the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel inhuman or degrading treatment and punishment

Can we then expect an apology from our Foreign Secretary, for our engaging in rendition, systematically, and deliberately? It might mean just a little more than an apology for his predecessor having misled the House 5 years ago about 2 aeroplanes touching down on British territory.

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1. It was up for a good 2 weeks, but I see they’ve taken it away from there now. You can see it here. I do wonder what it would take for Amnesty International to realise that war IS a human rights issue, and that those who wage it unprovoked, or vote for it and try to hide its crimes, should be brought to trial, and certainly not portrayed as candlelit icons on human rights websites.

2. You can see Griffin speaking here

3. For example, see http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/feb/23/iraq.military

4. See the Human Rights Watch report No Blood, No Foul for US soldiers’ testimony on torture; or Amnesty’s own report on the complicity of Nato forces in torture: Afghanistan: Detainees transferred to torture: ISAF complicity?