Free Republic

A foreign policy adviser to President Obama said this evening that the Administration has "rehabilitated" the concept of human rights, tarnished by the Iraq war, in a way that laid the groundwork for international collaboration. Samantha Power, a senior director on the National Security Council best known for her human rights advocacy before she entered the White House, spoke at Columbia University in New York City two hours before the president's planned speech in Libya tonight. Obama "has used his pulpit and a number of speeches ... to kind of clear the brush that had gathered around the norms in...

To: justiceseeker93 Israel stands alone In human rights and tolerance, Jewish state far superior in its regionBy MICHAEL COREN, QMI AgencyLast Updated: March 12, 2011 2:00amI will defend all of my beliefs, but one of the ideas I most proud of is Zionism. No apologies, no hiding, no doubts.Zionism is arguably the most successful example of the restoration of an indigenous people to their rightful homeland in human history. It is a liberation struggle, a story of the creation of a light on a hill, that light being the Jewish state in the Middle East.I write this now in...

This is probably the most important ongoing revolt in the Middle East right now. If Assad were to fall, it would reverberate all over the region, and greatly weaken the Iranian regime. Typically, it is getting far less coverage than the other “crises,” but we’ll follow it here. Latest updates: Dara’a. According to eyewitnesses, the whole city (Population: ~100,000) is up in arms. Tens of thousands are on the street demanding freedom and liberty. Many are aware that the French Foreign Ministry, the US State Department, and the world is watching what they’re doing. This video shows Syrian security men...

Displaying crucifixes in schools in Italy does not breach the rights of non-Catholic families, the European Court of Human Rights has ruled.

The United States on Friday disavowed torture and pledged to treat terror suspects humanely, but set aside calls to drop the death penalty, as the United Nations carried out its first review of Washington’s human rights record. As part a groundbreaking commitment to improvement under the Obama administration, the U.S. joined the 47-nation Human Rights Council in 2009. And in doing so, submitted to more international scrutiny. He said the U.S. would agree to improvements in areas ranging from civil rights to national security to immigration, including intolerance of torture and the humane treatment of suspects at the Guantanamo Bay...

What happened to protesters in Tahrir Square on International Women’s Day is a microcosm of the women’s movement in the Middle East and North Africa generally: A few hundred women and some men – not the “the million-woman march” hoped for – publicly voiced demands for inclusion in building a democratic Egypt. They were met by a counterprotest of men who attacked and groped them. “Go home, go wash clothes,” yelled some of the men, according to a Monitor story. “This is against Islam,” said others. ...nearly 50 percent of women in Egypt say they are sexually harassed daily in...

Here's an interview with UN Watch's Hillel Neuer on al-Jazeera English slamming Libya and the United Nations' treatment of Libya.

Watchdog Group Demands Removal Of Libyan Human Rights Investigator By: Brian Teegarden | “AP/Foxnews.com U.N. Watch, an organization that monitors the world body, says Libyan envoy Najat Al-Hajjaji should be the ‘last person’ investigating human rights abuses, as Libyan jets drop bombs on rebel forces in her homeland. A watchdog group is asking the U.N. to immediately remove a Libyan envoy from her post as an investigator on human rights violations by mercenaries, saying that as a mouthpiece for a regime that’s “deploying hired guns to massacre its own people” it’s “outrageous” to have her in that position. But it’s...

Islamists' Inhumane "Human rights" SystemMarch, 2011Erdoğan and the ‘Al-Gaddafi Prize’ February 28, 2011 12:00 A.M Everything you need to know about the Turkish prime minister, in one act. The slogan of the “Al-Gaddafi International Prize for Human Rights” is, “As the sun shines for everyone, freedom is a right for everyone.” Lovely, no? Especially at a moment when Qaddafi’s warplanes are raining down death and destruction on his own subject people, and when foreign mercenaries are brutalizing the population? [...]Past recipients of the prize have included... Louis Farrakhan (1996), Fidel Castro (1998), and Hugo Chávez (2004). But it’s the current...

MANAGUA, Nicaragua -- Nicaragua's leftist President Daniel Ortega says he has telephoned Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi to express his solidarity. Ortega says he has called several times this week because Gadhafi "is again waging a great battle" to defend the unity of his nation. Human rights groups say more than 200 people have died as Libyan security forces crack down on protesters. Ortega has long been an ally of the Libyan leader, based in part on a shared distrust of the United States. Ortega says that "it's at difficult times that loyalty and resolve are put to the test."

JACKSON, MS (WLBT) - Immigration rights advocates claim federal ICE agents violated the human rights of immigrants during a recent raid in central Mississippi. Dozens of broken families flooded the Mississippi Immigrants Rights Alliance headquarters Wednesday after the four day federal immigration raid. Many claimed their loved ones were cursed and physically abused before being arrested and possibly deported. "They had their guns out and they was running around the apartments with guns out and one guy that jumped from the window trying to get away from them they had their gun to his head on the ground with knees...

In 1915, the US Marines invaded Haiti, occupying the country until 1934. US officials rewrote the Haitian constitution, and when the Haitian national assembly refused to ratify it, they dissolved the assembly. They then held a "referendum" in which about 5% of the electorate voted and approved the new constitution – which conveniently changed Haitian law to allow foreigners to own land – with 99.9% voting for approval. The situation today is remarkably similar. The country is occupied, and although the occupying troops wear blue helmets, everyone knows that Washington calls the shots. On 28 November an election was held...

The Obama administration is claiming that the president has been out in front of the crisis in Egypt. The facts prove otherwise. He has been behind the curve and has badly damaged American interests -- perhaps irretrievably so. Barack Obama's campaign was built on spin and speeches. His presidency has used these tools to present a false image. In this case, his chief spin maestro, David Axelrod, has been peddling the story that Barack Obama has been "out ahead of this" ("this" being the crisis in Egypt). Politico Journalist Josh Gerstein was skeptical and fact-checked Axelrod's boastful claim. Press Secretary...

The Teheran regime has hanged 66 individuals since the end of 2010, according to France 24 International News. Among them was a 46-year-old Iranian-born, Dutch national Sahra Bahrami, who was hung on January 29 on drug-smuggling charges. Holland's Foreign Ministry said it was "shocked, shattered by this act by a barbaric regime," according to Agence France Presse. Bahrami's sister dismissed the Iranian charges, which she contended were fabricated. "She doesn't even smoke cigarettes, let alone possessing drugs. How could someone who participates in election gatherings and endangers her life, engage in such actions against her country?" she is quoted as...

WASHINGTON -- Hope and Change, it turns out, is all relative. They are a sweet elixir when you are talking about electing as president a smooth-talking street organizer with a fistful of vague promises and no governing experience. But Hope and Change become a noxious gas when you are talking about a popular uprising by freedom fighters shaking loose the iron grip of a 30-year dictatorship. At least that is how President Obama sees it. From the moment he took office, Obama has misread the situation in Egypt and sided with the convenience of tyranny over the untidiness of freedom....

In the first nine months of last year more than 300 immigrants defeated Home Office attempts to deport them. The full-year total is expected to top 400. Among those allowed to stay were killers, rapists and multiple offenders, along with a woman whose appeal was backed by an immigration judge even though he accused her of "manufacturing" evidence. Critics claimed that as a result of the court rulings, the Home Office was reducing its efforts to deport migrants due to the strong likelihood that it would face successful legal challenges on human rights grounds. In January The Sunday Telegraph revealed...

For the past several years, the buzz among those who take more than passing interest in world affairs has been about the meteoric rise of Communist-controlled China as the new global power. There are those around the world who view China’s emergence as a certainty, long anticipated, and deserving celebration. For them, this historic development is also indicative in some ways of the diminishing importance of the West, and in particular the decline of the U.S. from its pre-eminent superpower status. Among the many voices who have thrown caution to the wind in embracing China’s rise as inevitable and good...

Every week new articles come out from left-leaning journalists about how great Sharia law is and how we have nothing to fear. Yet we at NewsReal have written on many sad cases of how children are treated under Sharia all over the world. You don’t hear the whole story of the dangers of Islamic law unless you see how it affects women. This past week in Pakistan, for example, two women were falsely accused of blasphemy and almost beaten to death.

President Obama is planning to refocus attention on China's record of suppressing free speech and political freedom in the coming weeks, despite the risk of further destabilizing an important relationship after a contentious year. Since elevating human rights as a guiding principle of his foreign policy at the United Nations last fall, Obama has been looking for ways to engage China's leaders on the issue without undermining his efforts to enlist their help in dealing with Iran and North Korea, and in reviving the world economy. Senior administration officials say he is exploring ways to better reach Chinese citizens directly,...

Prominent Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh is reported to have been sentenced to 11 years in jail in a case considered as part of a broader crackdown on human rights lawyers and activists in Iran. Sotoudeh's husband said she was also banned for 20 years from working as a lawyer and from leaving the country.