Libyan rep is UN expert on mercenaries
Remember Muammar Gadhafi's representative to the United Nations 'Human Rights Council,' Najjat al-Hajjaji, who got a little surprise from UN Watch in the videos
here? Well, now we have a story about Hajjaji herself: It seems that she's the UN expert on the use of mercenaries. This is from a press release I received via email from UN Watch.
With the Libyan regime deploying hired guns to massacre its own people, the UN Human Rights Council was urged today to fire Najat Al-Hajjaji, a long-time mouthpiece of Col. Muammar Qaddafi, from her post as a council investigator on human rights violations by mercenaries.
“Every day she stays with the UN Human Rights Council is an insult to the victims of Qaddafi’s murderous regime,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, a Geneva-based human rights group that initiated the successful campaign to suspend Libya as a member of the 47-nation council.
“At a time when Qaddafi is using mercenaries to kill his own people, it is outrageous that one of his long-time representatives would sit on the world’s highest human rights body as a supposed defender of human rights -- and, of all things, as a defender of victims of mercenaries,” said Neuer.
Since 2005, Ms. Al-Hajjaji has served on the council’s 5-person “Working Group on the use of mercenaries as a means of violating human rights.”...
"For more than a decade, Al-Hajjaji whitewashed the crimes of the Qaddafi regime as its representative to UN human rights bodies in Geneva," said Neuer. In 2003, human rights groups universally condemned her election as Chair of the now-defunct UN Commission on Human Rights. Al-Hajjaji's tenure was widely seen as the last straw in the decline of the commission's credibility, with Kofi Annan saying soon afterward that member states had joined to shield their records of abuse and that it should be scrapped.
In April 2009, when Al-Hajjaji chaired the planning committee of the UN's World Conference on Racism, known as Durban II, she silenced testimony by a victim of the Qaddafi regime, who was tortured together with five Bulgarian nurses under trumped-up charges of infecting Benghazi children with HIV....
In letters sent today to UN chief Ban Ki-moon, UN rights commissioner Navi Pillay, and UNHRC president Sihasak Phuangketkeow, UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer demanded that the officials take immediate action to expel Al-Hajjaji from the Human Rights Council. Neuer also urged action in letters sent to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and EU foreign minister Catherine Ashton.
The council, which is now in session, has the power to trigger an urgent debate and immediately adopt a resolution removing Al-Hajjaji from her post.
Heh.
Labels: Libyan civil war, mercenaries, Najjat al-Hajjaji
President Obama's in the Cone of Silence
Remember when President Obama went into a
Get Smart-style Cone of Silence? Well, he's done it again on
Libya.
It is rumored that there are differences within the administration, but it is still unclear who could be counseling silence, or for what purpose. To be sure, the Bush administration neutered Qaddafi with the 2003 invasion of Iraq, leaving him to believe he was next on Washington’s agenda. He dropped his nuclear weapons program and stopped sponsoring terrorism—but Qaddafi is not a U.S. ally, and with his treatment of his Libyan citizens he has shown he is the same old Qaddafi, a danger to his own people as well as the rest of the world.
The Obama administration would do well to exercise some moral clarity regarding a man whose personal demeanor has long symbolized the most repressively autocratic and obscurantist features of Arab political culture—a man who reportedly has now, among other things, dispatched his air force to put down the people he rules. The White House’s silence is perhaps explained by the idea that a public statement will do more harm than good.
“It is remarkable,” says Elliott Abrams, deputy national security adviser handling Middle East affairs in the George W. Bush White House, “that the administration appears to believe at the same time that our government is headed by a Nobel Peace Prize winner who is globally beloved, and that if he states his support for any cause it is immediately doomed or at least damaged. This may be some complex cognitive dissonance, but it appears more like simple confusion.”
The same is true of the White House’s decision to keep its support of Iranian protestors muted, for fear that the Islamic Republic might turn even more vicious. This policy seems to be a result of the Obama White House buying into the “kiss of death” fallacy. This line of thinking holds that since the U.S. is so hated in the Middle East, American support for any political cause in the region can only backfire by undermining the cause.
Others, however, are speaking out. Senators Joe Lieberman (I-Ct - won't we miss him when he retires in 2012) and John McCain (R-Az) issued a statement on Tuesday in which they called for a '
no-fly zone' over Libya, which would prevent Gadhafi from using his air force to attack his own people.
"The community of responsible nations must now take concrete steps to support the Libyan people as they seek their liberation from a brutal dictatorship. There is an array of measures that the United States and our global partners, including the European Union and African Union, should immediately pursue.
"Some Libyan diplomats have bravely called for a no-fly zone to stop the Qaddafi regime's use of airpower to attack Libyan civilians. We support this course of action. Other steps that should be considered include targeted sanctions and asset freezes against Libyan officials, an arms embargo, and the immediate suspension of Libya from international organizations.
"In recent weeks we have witnessed revolutions that have opened the door to freedom and democracy in Tunisia and Egypt. We hope and believe the Libyan people will have the same opportunity."
And Sarah Palin called on Obama to
speak out for the Libyan people.
But nothing on the slaughter in Libya? The protests in many places in the Middle East affect regimes that have cooperated with the U.S. on issues from peace with Israel, fighting al Qaeda, hosting our military forces, or cooperating against Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Gaddafi’s Libya is different. For four decades, this tyrant has held power. Gaddafi was Osama before Osama hit the scene. He ordered the bombing of a disco in Germany to kill Americans. When he paid the price for that – after President Reagan rightly ordered retaliation – he directed his agents to blow up Pan Am Flight 103. They did, and more than 250 innocent people died. Gaddafi tried to come in from the cold in 2003 – scared by the demonstration effect of Iraq. But we should have no illusions. Gaddafi is a brutal killer and Libya – not to mention the world – would be better off if he were out of power. Now is the time to speak out. Speak out for the long-suffering Libyan people. Speak out for the victims of Gaddafi’s terror. NATO and our allies should look at establishing a no-fly zone so Libyan air forces cannot continue slaughtering the Libyan people. We should not be afraid of freedom, especially when it comes to people suffering under a brutal enemy of America. Here’s to freedom from Gaddafi for the people of Libya.
Earlier, Israel radio reported - based on a report in an Arabic newspaper published in London - that Gadhafi's air force is being supplemented with mercenaries from Mali and Niger (they also come from Chad and Sudan). The mercenaries are being brought to a staging area in Algeria, from which they are flown to various army bases in Libya.
The mercenaries are each paid $2,000 per day.
Do you mean to tell me that no one can force Algeria to shut down that pipeline? Where are the Western leaders?
Someone has to get Obama out of his cone of silence.
Labels: Algeria, Chad, Libya, Mali, mercenaries, Muammar Gaddafi, Niger, Sudan
Remember Muammar Gadhafi's representative to the United Nations 'Human Rights Council,' Najjat al-Hajjaji, who got a little surprise from UN Watch in the videos here? Well, now we have a story about Hajjaji herself: It seems that she's the UN expert on the use of mercenaries. This is from a press release I received via email from UN Watch. 
