US, Rights Groups Call for Tougher Stand on Syria

Calls came today for concerted and tough international action against the Assad regime in Syria on the heels of a fresh report on repression by the Syrian government against its population.

A new UN-mandated report said the Syrian government of Bashar Al Assad and its security forces have coordinated a campaign of repression and violence against protesters that amounts to crimes against humanity.

Susan Rice, the US Ambassador to the UN today said the report backs up the idea “that the Assad regime has participated in outrageous and now well documented atrocities,” and suggested it was time for the Security Council “to revisit the question of what might be possible here in New York.” 

Last month, Russia and China used their veto at the Council to block a European and US backed resolution against Syria’s repression of anti-government protest.

Western diplomats and international human rights groups now say they hope the report, along with the Arab League’s decision over the weekend to impose sanctions on the Syrian government, will bring the issue back before the Security Council.

“We were more than disappointed that the effort of a couple of a months ago to pass a very mild resolution of condemnation was vetoed by two permanent members and other that were unable to support it.” US Ambassador Susan Rice told reporters outside the Security Council this evening, adding that with the the Arab League having acted and  evidence of repression  “becoming increasingly clear even for those who would rather deny it”, the patience of Syria’s neighbors and the international community had “evaporated“.

Amnesty International and a Syrian activist who fled the repression also called for strong Security Council action.

 At a press conference in New York this afternoon, Amnesty International and Syrian activists Catherine Altalli called on Security Council members to refer the situation to the International Criminal Court and enforce an arms embargo as well as an asset freeze on President Assad and his top officials.

Altalli, a member of the Syrian National Council opposition group, took part in anti-government protests during the first six month of demonstrations in Syria but has since had to flee to the US. She says officials for Syria’s opposition group are lobbying various Security Council members to vote in favor of sanctions against the Assad regime. 

Altalli says Russia and China have blocked significant action at the Security Council to protect their own national interests in the region but that in the long run, such measures will be counter-productive for both countries.

“Even if they[Russia and China] don’t agree at the Council, the government has maybe one or two years before it is gone but the Syrian people will stay forever and they will not forget.” she said after the press conference. 

The Independent International Commission of Inquiry report on Syria released today in Geneva found that Syrian state security forces and government backed militias have carried out extra-judicial executions, tortured and arbitrarily detained protesters without trial and systematically violated fundamental freedoms since anti-government demonstration broke out in March. 

 The report says that the scale, coordinated and repetitive nature of attacks on Syrian civilians has led investigators to believe they were sanctioned and carried out pursuant Assad government policy. 

 Authorities in Damascus refused to grant the Commission of Inquiry entry into Syria, and instead said they would provide it with the results of an independent Syrian investigation once it had been completed.The commission interviewed over 200 victims and witnesses of rights abuses, including defectors from Syria’s security forces .

The United Nations says that over 3500 people have been killed and several thousand more detained for their alleged role in the protests and uprising. In its report, the Commission also says it has information from reliable sources indicating that, as of November 9th, at least 256 children have died during the government crackdown.

Syrian officials maintain that they are fighting foreign-backed armed groups and that Syrian security forces have themselves suffered important casualties.

 While the report says it is aware of instances in which protesters carried out acts of violence and also acknowledges that  a group of military defectors calling itself the “Free Syrian Army” has claimed responsibility for attacks on security forces, it says the majority of protesters “were largely unarmed and determined to claim their rights and express their discontent peacefully.”

 Amnesty International representative Maha Abu Shama says there has been an increase in defections from state security forces to the Free Syrian Army,but that the intensity and scale of clashes did not constitute armed conflict. She said that only 50 of the 3500 reported deaths were caused by individual protesters but warned that if the Security Council failed to refer the situation to the ICC, chances of an escalation in conflict would grow.

UN Rights Chief: Egyptian Army Making Things Worse

The Egyptian military’s crackdown on demonstrators is further destabilizing the country ahead of its landmark election scheduled for next week, says the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay. 

In a statement today, the UN rights chief called on Egypt’s military leaders to stop operations against demonstrators and conduct an impartial investigation into the violence that has left at least 30 people dead and injured thousands more over the past five days.

“The actions of the military and security forces, instead of improving security and helping Egypt’s difficult transition to democracy, have once again simply served to inflame the situation, resulting in huge numbers of people taking to the streets to demand their rights. The more they see fellow protestors being carted away in ambulances, the more determined and energized they become.” Pillay said in the statement. 

Pillay says Egyptian protesters have good reason to be angry at the country’s military leaders, who have been slow, and in many cases failed, to implement reform measures they had promised. 

“The lifting of the state of emergency, the implementation of an effective monitoring system during the elections, the full eradication of torture and ill-treatment, the adoption of a comprehensive approach to transitional justice and a comprehensive reform of the security sectors, are among the key future steps identified by the fact-finding mission I dispatched back in April,” she said.

Rights group Amnesty International released a report yesterday detailing actions taken by Egypt’s military leaders, the Supreme Council of Armed Forces, since taking over from deposed President Hosni Mubarak’s government in February.

In its report, “Broken Promises: Egypt’s Military Rulers Erode Human Rights”, Amnesty says SCAF has maintained many of the Mubarak regime’s policies and ignored promises to lift the country’s 30 year old emergency law, instead expanding its reach to cover even more potential offenses.

Amnesty International also says the Supreme Council of Armed Forces has continued using arbitrary arrests and torture as a means of intimidating its critics, even hiring groups of “thugs” to attack protesters.

“The Egyptian military cannot keep using security as an excuse to keep to the same old practices that we saw under President Mubarak,” Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa  Philip Luther Director said in a statement posted on the group’s website. “If there is to be an effective transition to the new Egypt that protesters have been demanding, the SCAF must release their grip on freedom of expression, association and assembly, lift the state of emergency and stop trying civilians in military courts.”

American University students participate in Darfur awareness

During an impassioned speech by Mohamed A. Yahya, Founder and Executive Director of DAMANGA, students at American University participated in the “die-in,” where they lay on the ground to symbolize the dead in Darfur.

At the Eric Friedheim Quadrangle on the main campus of AU, a mock refugee camp was set up, and groups concerned with Darfur had tables with information set up nearby. Among the groups was SaveDarfur.org, a group that says they want students to “Learn More and Take Action.” They said they encourage students and the public to visit their website and send messages to President Bush. They were selling Save Darfur t-shirts and green wrist-bands emblazoned with “Save Darfur. org” and “Not on Our Watch.”

Amnesty International was present as well, handing out buttons that said “End the Killing in Darfur,” and postcards that were pre-addressed to Condoleezza Rice, the Secretary of State. The postcards, they said, are designed to be mailed by concerned citizens to the office of the Secretary, because hopefully the mass amounts of them might catch some attention. The postcards are preprinted about the concern for Darfur, but included a section to write in the person’s name and address. Amnesty International also said they have an email campaign.

A group from Solar Household Energy, Inc. was prominently displaying different forms of inexpensive solar cookers to be used in preparing meals utilizing heat from the sun. Although it was overcast and drizzling, the pot that was sitting in the middle of the solar display was warm. Patricia McArdle, a member of the Board of Directors, explained that the solar cookers were like ‘crock-pots from the sun’ and not only were they inexpensive to buy, but they could actually be made by people using cardboard and mylar. Mylar, she said, could be something like a balloon or a solar blanket. The solar cookers are inexpensive and would keep the inhabitants of the poorer countries from cutting down so much of their forests.

In addition to the solar cookers, Solar Household Energy was displaying a basket that would hold a boiling pot of water (which would keep it warm for hours, in effect doing the same thing as a crock pot) and a coffee can that had been converted into a tiny stove, called a Rocket Stove. The Rocket was simply a coffee can that had been sliced, bent, and reshaped to harness the power of physics and make it possible for a few burning twigs to be able to boil a pot of water.