Human Rights

BAGHDAD -- Seven inmates were killed yesterday when mortar shells slammed into an Iraqi Interior Ministry jail in the capital, Iraqi security officials said. A few miles south, fire broke out at one of Iraq's main oil refineries, a possible case of sabotage. There were conflicting reports about the cause of the blaze, but police said a Katyusha rocket hit a gas tanker. More than 450 attacks have been carried out against Iraq's oil installations or industry employees since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003, according to analysts who monitor security issues related to energy.

WASHINGTON -- Six human rights groups released yesterday a list of 39 people they believe have been secretly imprisoned by the United States and whose whereabouts are unknown, calling on the Bush administration to abandon such detentions. The list, compiled from news media reports, interviews and government documents, includes terrorism suspects and those thought to have ties to militant groups. In some suspects' cases, officials acknowledge that they were at one time in U.S. custody. In others, the rights groups say, there is other evidence, sometimes sketchy, that they had at least once been in American hands.

For a few years in the 1980s and 1990s, the world was changing for the better and seemingly destined to keep doing so indefinitely. Back then, freedom resembled justice as described in the Bible - rolling down like waters. But in the last few years, various governments have managed to dam it up, and in some cases even reverse the flow. Between 1990 and 1997, the number of democracies in the world rose from 69 to 118, according to the human rights group Freedom House. In the past decade, though, the number has crept up by just five.

UNITED NATIONS -- President Bush announced yesterday that he planned to tighten sanctions against the military government in Myanmar and deny visas to "those responsible for egregious human-rights violations." In a speech at the United Nations, Bush focused on human rights, outlining new U.S. efforts to force the military rulers to accede to the demands of the democracy movement in the Southeast Asian nation once known as Burma. Calling on the United Nations to honor its human-rights charter, Bush turned a spotlight on efforts to overcome dictatorships in Cuba, Zimbabwe and Sudan.

The recent furor over U.S.-supplied weapons missing in Iraq raises the question of whose hands U.S. weapons are finding their way into in other parts of the world. Since the terrorist attacks on the United States six years ago today, the answer has been, increasingly: to human rights abusers and undemocratic regimes. Immediately after Sept. 11, 2001, the United States began recruiting partners to assist in the myriad efforts necessary to stamp out international terrorist networks. In many cases, the United States chose to partner with countries repeatedly criticized by the State Department for human rights violations, lack of democracy and even past support of terrorism.

AFTER the collapse of the Soviet Union, China replaced Russia as the most important bilateral relationship in U.S. foreign policy.This is not a reward for niceness. Rather, it is recognition of China's immense population, great resources, dynamic economic growth, persistent military development, Communist power structure, territorial ambitions, thirst for oil and national pride.This relationship calls for careful dealing, patient dialogue and courteous attention from a strong base of U.S. interests and values.

A city grand jury that regularly inspects jails will be asked to review a human rights group's report that sharply criticized conditions for youths confined in Baltimore City Detention Center.Baltimore State's Attorney Patricia C. Jessamy said she will recommend that the report by New York-based Human Rights Watch be reviewed by a new city grand jury to be impaneled in January.She disclosed those plans in a Nov. 16 letter to Jonathan M. Smith, executive director of Public Justice Center, a Baltimore advocacy group that provides legal services to the poor.

NEW YORK -- The Kosovo down payment is only $6 billion. Or so the White House told Congress this week.Of course, to be fair, there is no way yet to calculate the cost of rebuilding what we are now destroying. We don't even know how long we will be destroying from on high -- or even if our troops will hit the ground in a parody of D-Day.Why not? All the other World War II words and names we are using to explain Kosovo are parody, beginning with Hitler and Holocaust. To rationalize this turkey shoot, we trivialize the big one.The most striking use of war-movie language these grim days is "passes" -- as in our fighters making several passes over Kosovo roads to spot the bad guys.

Indonesia to give East Timor residents a vote on their futureDILI, East Timor -- After 23 years of brutal rule, Jakarta has agreed to give the people of East Timor what many had long fought for -- a vote on their future.In United Nations-sponsored talks with Portugal, Jakarta agreed to let the East Timorese vote on whether to accept an offer of enhanced autonomy within Indonesia. Rejection could open the way for independence -- an outcome closely eyed by other separatist groups in the archipelago.

BEIJING -- At least three dissidents have been detained in the past week. Others report intensified police scrutiny. Since Wednesday, so many police have been following He Xintong, the wife of imprisoned dissident leader Xu Wenli, that she realized something must be up."They are on bicycles, on motorcycles and in cars, and they all have walkie-talkies so they can communicate with each other," said He, who is accustomed to police harassment but was puzzled by the sudden surge of interest in her activities -- until she heard a foreign radio news broadcast that explained everything.

WASHINGTON - -Hundreds of prisoners held by the U.S. military in Afghanistan will for the first time have the right to challenge their indefinite detention and call witnesses in their defense under a new review system being put in place this week, according to administration officials. The new system will be applied to the more than 600 Afghans held at the Bagram military base, and will mark the first substantive change in the overseas detention policies that President Barack Obama inherited from the Bush administration.

Human Rights Watch has long been a self-proclaimed torch-bearer for human rights around the world. Although the organization can rightly be proud of its initial contribution on behalf of political prisoners incarcerated by oppressive regimes, HRW's activities in more recent years have been characterized by an obsessive focus on Israel and only muted criticism of dictatorships such as Syria, Saudi Arabia and Libya. HRW's Middle East activities recently reached a nadir. In May, Arab News reported that HRW officials had visited Saudi Arabia to raise funds, using their pseudo-research on Israel over the Gaza war as bait.

Progress toward a thaw in U.S.-Cuban relations gained unexpected momentum Friday as leaders of the two countries signaled a willingness to open potentially historic talks on issues that have bitterly divided them since the days of the Cold War. President Barack Obama called for a "new beginning" with the island nation, capping a surge of gestures fed by Cuban President Raul Castro's declaration Thursday that his country "could be wrong" about its approach...

JERUSALEM -Israel's use of white phosphorus artillery shells led to the deaths of at least 12 Palestinian civilians and destroyed millions of dollars in property during the recent three-week war in the Gaza Strip, Human Rights Watch says in a report released Wednesday. Israeli military officials called the claim "baseless" and said the shells, designed to produce a smoke screen, were used in accordance with accepted rules. A frequent critic of Israeli military practices, New York-based Human Rights Watch says its review of the Gaza fighting found instances in which white phosphorus rounds were used in urban areas under circumstances that had no clear military rationale.

Who would have thought that the revival of a creaky TV space opera like Battlestar Galactica would have meaningful lessons to teach about human rights, terrorism and reconciliation? But this complex and intellectually challenging narrative series has delivered all of that and more through four award-winning seasons that will end with its final episode tonight. Battlestar Galactica's explorations of faith, politics and terror have struck so painfully close to home that the United Nations hosted a special panel this week to discuss human rights issues raised by the series.

Human rights have been a central purpose of the United Nations since its creation after World War II. Equally central over that time has been U.S. leadership on human rights. But in the last few years, the U.S. has boycotted the U.N. Human Rights Council, the most important human rights institution in the world body. Citing institutional flaws and misguided decisions, the U.S. refused to run for a seat in each of the first three council elections, from 2006 to 2008. This May, the U.N. General Assembly will elect 18 new members to the council.

BEIJING -Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said yesterday that she would not emphasize contentious issues such as human rights in talks this weekend with the Chinese and focus instead on topics on which progress might be more likely: the economy, climate change and security issues. Clinton's weeklong tour of Asia culminates with meetings in China, where she is remembered for a tough 1994 speech on human rights. But she said that after years of pressing Beijing, the dialogue on human rights, freedom for Tibet and accommodation with Taiwan had grown predictable.

Howard superintendent to get human rights honor Howard County schools Superintendent Sydney L. Cousin will be honored by the county's Human Rights Commission as the recipient of the 2008 Human Rights Award. Cousin will be honored at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Slayton House, 10451 Twin Rivers Road in Columbia. The ceremony is open to the public. "I'm honored to receive this prestigious award," said Cousin, 63, who was appointed superintendent in July 2004. The commission also will honor the late Leola M. Dorsey, a longtime member of the NAACP and the Howard Community College board of trustees.

Michael Davis recognized for work to help elderly Michael W. Davis, senior partner in the Columbia firm of Davis, Agnor, Rapaport & Skalny LLC, has been recognized as a founder and longtime member of the Maryland chapter of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys Inc. He was also acknowledged for his work with members of the Maryland General Assembly, assisting with attempts to enact legislation to protect vulnerable adults from financial abuse....

SOACHA, Colombia - Julian Oviedo, a 19-year-old construction worker in this gritty patchwork of slums, told his mother on March 2 that he was going to talk to a man about a job offer. A day later, Oviedo was shot dead by army troops some 350 miles to the north. He was classified as a subversive and registered as a combat kill. Colombia's government, the Bush administration's top ally in Latin America, has been buffeted by the killings of Oviedo and dozens of other young, impoverished men and women whose cases have come to light in recent weeks.