From Indiana to Palestine: Bring the Change We Need Home from Geneva

From Indiana to Palestine: Bring the Change We Need Home from Geneva
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Last week, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) traveled to Geneva, Switzerland to participate in the United Nations' Universal Periodic Review Process. The Review is a relatively new process under the auspices of the U.N. Human Rights Council to review each country in terms of their compliance -- or lack thereof -- with human rights treaties.

Unsurprisingly, the U.S. government glossed over many of the human rights violations and abuses it has committed to make a favorable impression. CCR, along with the other civil society groups there, put the U.S. government on notice that it is not enough to pay lip service to human rights in Geneva -- it must bring those rights home.

This year was the first time that the U.S. was reviewed. To date, the U.S. has ratified only some of the key human rights treaties: the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Racial Discrimination, the Convention Against Torture and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Under these three treaties, the U.S. is obligated to: 1) protect and promote human rights enshrined within these documents; 2) participate in periodic reviews of its compliance; and 3) take adequate steps to redress any deficiencies.

Groups working to promote the full spectrum of human rights -- including civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights -- have been actively engaged in the Review process by issuing reports on U.S. compliance with human rights principles; holding town hall meetings; and organizing campaigns and educational events across the country and during the Review process. CCR participated in several side panels and presented on corporate accountability and experimental prison units.

We addressed the U.S. human rights record in the context of business activities and the degree to which the U.S. is upholding its duties to respect, protect and remedy human rights abuses involving businesses both domestically and abroad. CCR staff attorney Katherine Gallagher and Sangina Patnaik, a relative of the late Rachel Corrie, talked about accountability for the death of the U.S. student activist who was crushed to death by a Caterpillar bulldozer used by the Israeli military to destroy Palestinian homes. The panel highlighted the U.S. failure to hold corporations, including private government contractors, accountable for serious human rights abuses and war crimes committed, and to ensure redress for victims of such abuses.

CCR also participated on a panel discussion "From COINTELPRO to Guantanamo: Repression and Political Prisoners in the US," to talk about our work around Communications Management Units (CMUs), two prison units in the Midwestern U.S. filled predominately by Muslims or political activists. The CMU is designed to isolate and segregate certain prisoners in unprecedented ways -- a significant blemish on the U.S. human rights record.

Individuals detained in the CMU receive no explanation for their transfer to the unit or for the extraordinary communications restrictions to which they are subjected. Upon designation to the unit, there is no meaningful review or appeal process that allows CMU prisoners to be transferred back to general population. Completely void of any due process, it's no surprise that CMUs are used for the purposes of bias, political scapegoating, religious profiling and racism. CCR demands that CMU prisoners receive due process and that constitutional and federal standards are met; otherwise, the CMUs must be shut down.

The U.S. received a formal set of recommendations regarding its human rights record as a result of the Review. The recommendations highlight key issues like prison conditions; the death penalty; closing Guantánamo and the U.S.' flouting of international law in the so-called "war on terror"; the criminalization of immigrants; and the failure to protect economic, social and cultural rights.

Real legal and policy changes are needed here at home if the U.S. is to meet even some of the recommendations issued. For those feeling the effect of U.S. policies -- prisoners in overcrowded prisons or on death row; immigrants targeted for deportation; villagers forced off their land because a U.S. corporation wants to drill for oil; civilians in Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan under threat of arbitrary arrests or drone attacks -- change cannot come too soon.

Check out the review of the U.S. online here.

Check out CCR's contributions to the Review process:

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