different source, similar story:
Don't sit and watch Syria implode: HRW to IBSA
Posted on 10/16/2011 5:34:24 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
India, Brazil, and South Africa are not leveraging their rising global influence to help stop the bloodshed in Syria, Human Rights Watch said today. Leaders of the three countries should use their two-day Heads of State and Government Dialogue Forum, hosted by President Jacob Zuma on October 17, 2011, to categorically demand that the Syrian government end its widespread and systematic attacks on antigovernment protesters and activists. Syria should also grant access to UN investigators and human rights monitors, Human Rights Watch said.
The "IBSA" forum in Pretoria brings together India, Brazil and South Africa, all of whom currently hold non-permanent seats on the United Nations Security Council. In August, an IBSA delegation went to Syria and met with the president and foreign minister.
"IBSA leaders shouldn't sit by and watch as Syria implodes," said Nadim Houry, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. "Their efforts at private dialogue have achieved nothing, and hundreds more Syrians have died in the meantime."
...Rather than relying on what have proven to be unreliable assurances from Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, South Africa, India, and Brazil should focus on the facts and information about the widespread abuses ongoing in the country. They should spearhead efforts in the UNGeneral Assembly to ensure that the Syrian government immediately halts all unlawful use of lethal and excessive force against demonstrators.
The IBSA countries should sponsor a General Assembly resolution to call on the Syrian government to end the arbitrary arrest and torture of detainees, account for all those who have been subject to enforced disappearances, cooperate with the UN Commission of Inquiry, and grant access to human rights monitors, humanitarian organizations, and independent journalists.
(Excerpt) Read more at allafrica.com ...
Don't sit and watch Syria implode: HRW to IBSA
While the insensitivity to struggles for human rights is understandable from China and Russia, it is puzzling in the case of democracies like South Africa, which gained freedom from oppression in part due to external interventions... Much is at stake here because if these three countries join hands with Russia and China against democracy promotion, the future of value systems, the most widely admitted terms of reference since 1945, may be in jeopardy... the BRICS may refuse to support UN-related foreign intervention in Syria because they resent how the West used Resolution 1973 for regime change. After a few weeks, it became clear, indeed, that the goal of the war in Libya was to replace Gaddafi. Optimists, therefore, may assume that after the dust settles, the emerging countries may once again view democracy-related foreign interventions in a better light.
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