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Jimmy Carter Accuses U.S. of Widespread Abuse of Human Rights – Yahoo! News

Jimmy Carter Accuses U.S. of Widespread Abuse of Human RightsBy Amy Bingham | ABC News – 22 hrs agoEmail86PrintRelated ContentJimmy Carter Accuses U.S. of Widespread …A former U.S. president is accusing the current president of sanctioning the “widespread abuse of human rights” by authorizing drone strikes to kill suspected terrorists.Jimmy Carter, Americas 39 th president, denounced the Obama administration for “clearly violating” 10 of the 30 articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, writing in a New York Times op-ed on Monday that the “United States is abandoning its role as the global champion of human rights.””Instead of making the world safer, Americas violation of international human rights abets our enemies and alienates our friends,” Carter wrote.While the total number of attacks from unmanned aircraft, or drones, and the resulting casualties are murky, the New America Foundation estimates that in Pakistan alone 265 drone strikes have been executed since January 2009 . Those strikes have killed at least 1,488 people, at least 1,343 of them considered militants, the foundation estimates based on news reports and other sources.In addition to the drone strikes, Carter criticized the current president for keeping the Guantanamo Bay detention center open, where prisoners “have been tortured by waterboarding more than 100 times or intimidated with semiautomatic weapons, power drills or threats to sexually assault their mothers.”The former president blasted the government for allowing “unprecedented violations of our rights to privacy through warrantless wiretapping and government mining of our electronic communications.”Want more off-the-cuff politics? Check out OTUS on Facebook and follow us on Twitter @OTUSNews.He also condemned recent legislation that gives the president the power to detain suspected terrorists indefinitely, although a federal judge blocked the law from taking effect for any suspects not affiliated with the September 11 terrorist attacks.”This law violates the right to freedom of expression and to be presumed innocent until proved guilty, two other rights enshrined in the declaration,” Carter said.While Carter never mentioned Obama by name, he called out “our government” and “the highest authorities in Washington,” and urged “concerned citizens” to “persuade Washington to reverse course and regain moral leadership.”Get more pure politics at ABC News.com/Politics and a lighter take on the news at OTUSNews.com

via Jimmy Carter Accuses U.S. of Widespread Abuse of Human Rights – Yahoo! News.

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UN Human Rights Committee

Geneva, Switzerland is home to the United Nations Human Rights Committee.

The UN prides itself on upholding the human rights of the poor, oppressed, and marginalised of the world. In the Charter of the UN, they lay out their purpose as that of promoting world peace, freedom of religion, freedom from all forms of discrimination, the promotion of democracy and harmony across nations.

If only it were that simple! Often the “rights” of one group can be in opposition to the “rights” of another. Take abortion as an example. In 1981 the UN passed the “Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief” They have also passed similar declarations on woman’s rights. Now, Anand Grover, UN Special Rapporteur for Health, has said that it is the right of all women to be able to legally access abortion facilities within their country: “Criminal laws penalising and restricting induced abortion are the paradigmatic examples of impermissible barriers to the realisation of women’s right to health and must be eliminated. These laws infringe upon women’s dignity and autonomy by severely restricting decision-making by women in respect of their sexual and reproductive health.”

The reality of this is that poor nations where abortion is illegal will find themselves bullied into changing the law, regardless of the religious convictions of the general population. Governments of these poor nations will fear the loss of the aid packages the UN has to offer, for refusing to comply to their dictates.

Abortion is not the only area the UN have passed articles on. Recently the UN Human Rights Committee passed, “UN declaration on sexual orientation and gender identity”  How will this be used to change the laws of nation states?

Also in the pipeline for the UN Human Rights Committee is a declaration to see the death penalty outlawed internationally.  They are already using their power to pressurise states with death penalty laws to have a formal moratorium on the death penalty. Whatever ones personal views on these matters, do you want a group of bureaucrats sitting in Geneva, Switzerland deciding how your nation is ran?

Prophet.tv has been highlighting the importance of Switzerland in the global scheme of things. Be aware that this seemingly insignificant region of Europe has a lot of influence over what is happening globally in these days.