Surprise! Amnesty International in Bed WIth Taliban Supporter

We've always been suspicious about the motives of this far left group and for good reason. Evidence now shows a senior official at the "human rights" group has been getting very cozy with a Taliban supporter.

Shocking, isn't it?

A SENIOR official at Amnesty International has accused the charity of putting the human rights of Al-Qaeda terror suspects above those of their victims.

Gita Sahgal, head of the gender unit at Amnesty’s international secretariat, believes that collaborating with Moazzam Begg, a former British inmate at Guantanamo Bay, “fundamentally damages” the organisation’s reputation.

In an email sent to Amnesty’s top bosses, she suggests the charity has mistakenly allied itself with Begg and his “jihadi” group, Cageprisoners, out of fear of being branded racist and Islamophobic.

Sahgal describes Begg as “Britain’s most famous supporter of the Taliban”. He has championed the rights of jailed Al-Qaeda members and hate preachers, including Anwar al-Awlaki, the alleged spiritual mentor of the Christmas Day Detroit plane bomber.

Amnesty’s work with Cageprisoners took it to Downing Street last month to demand the closure of Guantanamo Bay. Begg has also embarked on a European tour, hosted by Amnesty, urging countries to offer safe haven to Guantanamo detainees. This is despite concerns about former inmates returning to terrorism.

Sahgal, who has researched religious fundamentalism for 20 years, has decided to go public because she feels Amnesty has ignored her warnings for the past two years about the involvement of Begg in the charity’s Counter Terror With Justice campaign.

“I believe the campaign fundamentally damages Amnesty International’s integrity and, more importantly, constitutes a threat to human rights,” Sahgal wrote in an email to the organisation’s leaders on January 30. “To be appearing on platforms with Britain’s most famous supporter of the Taliban, whom we treat as a human rights defender, is a gross error of judgment.”

Amnesty is the world’s biggest human rights organisation with 2.2m members and a galaxy of celebrity supporters, including Bono, John Cleese, Yoko Ono, Al Pacino and Sinead O’Connor. Its decision to work with Begg poses liberal backers with a moral dilemma and raises questions about the direction in which Amnesty has travelled since it was set up in 1961 to support “prisoners of conscience”.

“As a former Guantanamo detainee it was legitimate to hear his experiences, but as a supporter of the Taliban it was absolutely wrong to legitimise him as a partner,” Sahgal told The Sunday Times.

So out of some misguided fear at being called Islampophoe and racist they decide to join up with a terror supporter. How idiotic are these people? Of course if you criticize them for this they'll call you racist Islamophobes.

Under My Bus: Amnesty International 'Shocked' By Hillary

You believed us, suckers

The latest to be served up on the platter are the useful idiots from Amnesty International, who never utter a peep while there's a Democrat in the White House. Bought, paid for and heck, they'll park cars if you ask.

Or so we thought. Now here they are, a month to the day of the Dawning of the Age of Obama, and thump, thump, is that the bus running over them already?

Suckers!

Amnesty International and a pro-Tibet group voiced shock Friday after US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton vowed not to let human rights concerns hinder cooperation with China.

Paying her first visit to Asia as the top US diplomat, Clinton said the United States would continue to press China on long-standing US concerns over human rights such as its rule over Tibet.

"But our pressing on those issues can't interfere on the global economic crisis, the global climate change crisis and the security crisis," Clinton told reporters in Seoul just before leaving for Beijing.

Everything's a crisis, apparently.

T. Kumar of Amnesty International USA said the global rights lobby was "shocked and extremely disappointed" by Clinton's remarks.

How naive are these people? They're disappointed?

What exactly did they expect? Don't they realize mythical climate change is much more important than human rights?

"The United States is one of the only countries that can meaningfully stand up to China on human rights issues," he said.

"But by commenting that human rights will not interfere with other priorities, Secretary Clinton damages future US initiatives to protect those rights in China," he said.

I hope he realizes he's on his own. Expect little help from this administration.

Hate to put it this way, but this is Mrs. Clinton's likely reaction.

New York Times Shocked By Chinese Censorship

Useful idiots are always the last ones to figure it out.

They're aghast that Communists would actually lie to them!

Man, they're stupid.

Western journalists working at the Main Press Centre in Beijing say they could not access the website for Amnesty International on Tuesday, a claim that officials with the International Olympic Committee say they are investigating, according to Reuters.

The website’s unavailability came a day after Amnesty International issued a harsh report criticizing China for failing to live up to promises that it would improve its human rights record ahead of the Olympics. Kevan Gosper, chairman of the I.O.C.’s Press Commission, also said he would look into reports of slow Internet access at the Centre, which by the time the Games begin on August 8 is expected to welcome 20,000 accredited journalists.

Sam Zarifi, Amnesty’s Asia Pacific director, said he began hearing about the problem after he directed reporters working at the Main Press Centre to his website to view the recently released report. “It is really disappointing,” he said in a telephone interview. The Chinese government’s “one big, begrudging promise was that foreign media would have free access on all issues, everywhere.”

Always a stunner when those Communists go back on their word, isn't it, Sam?

Next thing you know they'll figure out they're being spied on.

39 Mutants "Disappear"

Let's all fret and worry that 39 creatures are alleged to have disappeared.

Have the "human rights" groups checked any caves in Waziristan?

Six human rights groups urged the U.S. government on Thursday to name and explain the whereabouts of 39 people they said were believed to have been held in U.S. custody and "disappeared."

The groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, said they filed a U.S. federal lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act seeking information about the 39 people it terms "ghost prisoners" in the U.S. "war on terror."

"Since the end of Latin America's dirty wars, the world has rejected the use of 'disappearances' as a fundamental violation of international law," professor Meg Satterthwaite of the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at New York University's School of Law said in a statement.

UPDATE: Also at Pat Dollard.

Guardian Weighs In On Danny Glover's New Best Friend

Whoever it is that's doctoring the water at al-Guardian, keep up the good work.

The closure of Venezuela's popular, independent television channel RCTV signals a move towards authoritarianism for Hugo Chavez's regime.

I'd call it confirmation, but al-Guardian has taken a step in the right direction.

For the past week Venezuela's streets have filled with rage against the demise of a television channel. Thousands of university students have taken to blowing whistles, banging pots and playing air raid sirens. Barricades have been erected, fires lit and rocks thrown. The police have responded with tear gas, rubber bullets and mass arrests. Around the world, watching the bedlam, governments, commentators and activists have wondered: is President Hugo Chavez crushing free speech?

But . . . but . . . he's a Hero of the Revolution and . . . and . . . he was so-o-o-o nice to Mama Moonbat, too!

It is an explosive question. If the answer is yes, many of the social progressives who embrace the Venezuelan leader as an exciting and charismatic challenger to George Bush would be disillusioned. If the answer is no, they can take heart that their champion's democratic credentials remain intact and that his revolution is on track.

The Chilean senate, the European Union, the US administration and a host of non-governmental organisations, such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders, have expressed varying degrees of concern about the implications for free speech in Venezuela.

What? No Media Matters? Papa Soros won't allow a second front group to go against Komrade Hugo??

The tens of thousands of people who demonstrated in the capital Caracas and several other cities tended to put it more strongly. "We have to make a stand," a teenage girl shouted in Plaza Brion, her face coated in sweat and grime from a smouldering barricade. "Otherwise we're on the road to communist dictatorship, to Cuba." The staff of RCTV were just as dramatic. "This is the end of democracy in Venezuela," said Moirah Sanchez, a lawyer for the channel.

But just as you begin to believe that al-Guardian is serious about ridding itself of nitwits . . .

But its fate should not be equated with democracy's. Chavez has won three consecutive landslides since being elected in 1998 and remains extremely popular, largely for converting oil revenues into cheap food, free medical care and other social programmes aimed at the poor majority.

Nonetheless, Koslamistan's Propaganda Ministry is silent.

As is the DNC, Shrillary, Obama, Kucinich, Schmuck Schumer and presidential front-runner Ron Paul.

More Drivel From Amnesty International

Here we go again with the anti-Israel nonsense.

Amnesty International: Israel destroying hope of Palestinians

A new Amnesty International Report on the West Bank has charged Israel with the "destruction of hope" of Palestinians. The report, "Enduring Occupation: Palestinians under siege in the West Bank," released Monday morning, contains a litany of accusations against Israel, including "unlawful land grabs," causing the deaths of Palestinians with medical emergencies who wait at checkpoints, and "using excessive and unwarranted force" against "international peace activists demonstrating against the fence/wall/."

Strange, but I figured the terrorist gangs running amok in Palestine were doing more damage than Israelis defending themselves.

More Idiocy from Amnesty International

Surely many of the lazy drive-by media outlets today will be breathlessly repeating the nonsense from this Amnesty International press release, completely disregarding the agenda-driven scare-mongering which, ironically, claims fear-mongering and divisive politics are creating a more dangerous world.

(London) Powerful governments and armed groups are deliberately fomenting fear to erode human rights and to create an increasingly polarized and dangerous world, said Amnesty International today as it launched Amnesty International Report 2007, its annual assessment of human rights worldwide.

"Through short sighted, fear-mongering and divisive policies, governments are undermining the rule of law and human rights, feeding racism and xenophobia, dividing communities, intensifying inequalities and sowing the seeds for more violence and conflict," said Irene Khan, Secretary General of Amnesty International.

"The politics of fear is fuelling a downward spiral of human rights abuse in which no right is sacrosanct and no person safe."

"The 'war on terror' and the war in Iraq, with their catalogue of human rights abuses, have created deep divisions that cast a shadow on international relations, making it more difficult to resolve conflicts and protect civilians."

What a pile of nonsense. Fear-mongering, divisive politics and xenophobia? Where, pray tell, does this go on most openly? In the Gulf states, Iran, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. But are they condemned for any of this?

Of course not!

The absurdities continue.

The divide between Muslims and non-Muslims deepened, fuelled by discriminatory counter-terrorism strategies in western countries. Incidents of Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, intolerance and attacks on religious minorities increased worldwide.

Really? Where is the evidence of worldwide incidents of Islamophobia? If you're going to make such a claim, present some facts, please. They're certainly correct about anti-Semitism, since that's pretty much state-sponsored in many places around the globe.

Of course, this America-hating cabal saves the most condemnation for the United States, the beacon of freedom in the world. Ironic, no?

Five years after 9/11, new evidence came to light in 2006 of the way in which the US administration treated the world as one giant battlefield for its 'war on terror', kidnapping, arresting, arbitrarily detaining, torturing and transferring suspects from one secret prison to another across the world with impunity, in what the US termed 'extraordinary renditions'.

"Nothing more aptly portrayed the globalization of human rights violations than the US-led 'war on terror' and its programme of 'extraordinary renditions' which implicated governments in countries as far apart as Italy and Pakistan, Germany and Kenya," said Ms. Khan.

"Ill-conceived counter-terrorism strategies have done little to reduce the threat of violence or ensure justice for victims of terrorism but much to damage human rights and the rule of law globally."

Don't make me laugh.

Finally, what would best conclude this screed than to bring up--yes--global warming!

"Just as global warming requires global action based on international cooperation, the human rights meltdown can only be tackled through global solidarity and respect for international law."