Well it seems the UN Human Rights Commission has a new set of leaders. According to this column, Cuba and Zimbabwe have been granted seats on the commission. I thought the whole point of having a Human Rights Commission was to promote Human Rights.
If you call the "Workers Paradise" of Cuba a guarantor of human rights, then I have a bridge to sell you in Arizona. Countless years have gone by where Castro and his hench-men have imprisoned and executed countless individuals who spoke out against the regime or proposed the move towards democratic reforms. Currently, the Cuban regime has 75 individuals in prison because they either wrote articles critical of the regime, gathered with fellow intellectuals and had contact with individuals who Cuba deems an enemy(US and Europe). Based on reports, the average jail sentences imposed on each of these dissidents was 19 years. Such an enormous arrest and horrific jail terms prompted Jim Cason, mission chief at the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, to adorn his building with an enormous Christmas display with a large 75 in a show of solidarity to the freedom seeking people of Cuba. While Jimmy Carter and the Hollywood crowd might voice applets to the regime, the people of Cuba know what kind of hell that Castro has put them through. Check here, here, here and here.
Another member is Zimbabwe, which is under the care of Robert Mugabe. Under Mugabe, Zimbabwe has slowly but surely fallen into a deep state of failure. In an effort to increase his power, Mugabe enacted a crazy law that took all the farms from the white farmers and doled it out to his friends. Such an act removed the farms from the experienced farmers and gave it to people who didn't have a clue on how to raise crops. Thus the breadbasket of Africa has begun to dry up thus resulting in massive starvation. Even when food is shipped into Zimbabwe to releave the blight of the people, the government either confiscates or hordes it for the rulers. Mugabe and his ruling ZANU-PF party have also locked up so much power that he has imprisoned his political opponent or found ways to prevent the people from choosing their rightful leaders. Even worse, Mugabe and his felllow thugs have either killed, tortured or displaced some 70,000 citizens during his 25 year rule of this nation. While Mugabe takes down the nation, he's geting fat of the teet. When the nation battling starvation, Mugabe is spending millions on his 25 room house, see here. See below.
If the UN nations continue to appoint nations like these onto the Human Rights Commission, the whole idea of "human rights" will become pointless. If your nation commits overwhelming human rights violations at the extent that Cuba and Zimbabwe have, then how can you judge others on the actions. The UN needs some reform and a spine to condem these nations rather than award them. When will this World body live up to the principles it started with some 60 years ago?
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