US Ignores Own Human Rights Record in Annual Report

US Ignores Own Human Rights Record in Annual Report
Fecha de publicación: 
14 April 2016
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The United States State Department released their annual human rights report today, and it alleges that leftist Latin American countries are guilty of numerous abuses.

"The Human Rights Reports spell out our concerns on every continent," Secretary of State John Kerry said today.

According to Spanish national news agency EFE, one of the major concerns the U.S. for Ecuador, Nicaragua and Bolivia is the use of bureaucracy to impede civil society.    

However, other than saying that every country, including the U.S. "has the ability to improve" in the area of human rights, the State Department has completely ignored the U.S.' own failings.    

Many of these were highlighted last year during the United Nations Human Rights Council's (UNHRC) review of the U.S.    

The UNHRC adopted a recommendation by Sweden, urging the U.S. "halt the detention of immigrant families and children, seek alternatives to detention and end use of detention for reason of deterrence," which have increased every year that Obama has been in office, and rose from the Bush era high of 358,886 to 414, 481 in 2014, according to Reuters.    

The U.S. report also condemns torture, but fails to mention the infamous Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, where torture is known to have occurred.    

Although President Barack Obama ran on a platform to close the military base on occupied Cuban soil, and issued an executive order to close it soon after assuming office in 2009, Guantanamo remains in operation, housing prisoners who have not been charged through years of detainment.    

Another serious concern is the situation of the largely African-American community of Flint, Michigan, who has been living with lead-tainted water since 2014, when a government-appointed official decided to cut corners and take water from the corrosive Flint River.    

The situation began to receive national attention when lead started showing up at toxic levels in children's blood.    

Police killings and racial profiling towards minorities also went under the radar.    

At the UNHRC review of the U.S., Mexico recommended that the U.S. "adopt measures at the federal level to prevent and punish excessive use of force by law enforcement officials against members of ethnic and racial minorities, including unarmed persons, which disproportionately affect African-Americans and undocumented migrants."    

If "President Obama really cares about his human rights legacy, he should direct his administration to adopt a plan of action with concrete benchmarks and effective implementation mechanisms that will ensure that the U.S. indeed learns from its shortcomings,"Jamil Dakwar, the director of the American Civil Liberties Union, said last year.

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