US 'war on terror' eroded rights worldwide - experts

[sabra]

Source: Reuters

By Laura MacInnis GENEVA, Feb 16 (Reuters) - Washington's "war on terror" after the Sept. 11 attacks has eroded human rights worldwide, creating lingering cynicism that the United Nations must now combat, international law experts said on Monday.

Mary Robinson, who was the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights when al Qaeda militants flew hijacked planes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon in 2001, said the United States caused harm with some of the ways it responded.

"Seven years after 9/11 it is time to take stock and repeal abusive laws and policies," the former Irish president said, warning that harsh U.S. detentions and interrogations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantanamo Bay, Cuba gave a dangerous signal to other countries that could easily follow suit.

While new U.S. President Barack Obama has announced he will close Guantanamo to break from the practices of his predecessor George W. Bush, Robinson said sweeping changes needed to take place to ensure Washington abandons its "war paradigm".

"There has been severe damage and it needs to be addressed," she told a news conference in Geneva. "We are not more secure. We are more divided, and people are more cynical about the operation of laws."

Read more: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/LG633039.htm

[BumRushDaShow]

1. What she forgot to say

when she said this

"We are not more secure. We are more divided, and people are more cynical about the operation of laws."

was that also as a result, the military industrial complex has garnered wealth beyond their wildest dreams. :banghead:

[Wizard777]

2. "The war on terrorism will be a lot like the war on drugs." George Bush

Nothing has eroded American rights more that this treasonous war on Drugs. So why would this other miserably failed republican war be any different than the first miserably failed republican war?

[ixion]

3. gee, ya think?

end the so-called 'wars' on terror and drugs now, and restore our republic.