Posted on 02/03/2006 5:42:28 PM PST by Indy Pendance
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is being asked to explain why the United States sided with Iran, Zimbabwe and other repressive regimes in excluding two gay rights groups from membership on a U.N. panel.
'I had hopes for better from you,' Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., said in a letter to Rice this week.
Frank told Rice he was 'deeply troubled to learn that the U.S. Government, presumably at your direction, sided with some of the most undemocratic, anti-human rights regimes in the world' in voting against the two gay groups.
Rice has not yet responded, Frank said in an interview.
'To refuse them status, what else is it except an act of bigotry?' Frank said. Frank is openly homosexual.
Human Rights Watch, the gay rights group Human Rights Campaign and other gay rights organizations also complained in a letter to Rice shortly after the Jan. 23 membership vote for the U.N. Economic and Social Council.
The U.N. panel is a think tank of non-governmental agencies from around the world. The Brussels, Belgium-based International Lesbian and Gay Association sought inclusion in May, along with the Danish National Association of Gays and Lesbians. Nearly 3,000 organizations hold 'consultative status' with the body, meaning they can participate from within in discussions among United Nations member states.
The United States abstained on a vote that would have allowed the debate on the groups' inclusion to continue. It then voted to reject their applications.
According to Human Rights Watch, states that joined the United States in voting against the applications were Cameroon, China, Cuba, Iran, Pakistan, Russia, Senegal, Sudan and Zimbabwe. Chile, France, Germany, Peru and Romania voted for inclusion. Colombia, India and Turkey abstained and the Ivory Coast was absent.
Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Zimbabwe are among nations regularly criticized by the State Department for repression and human rights abuses. The United States has also criticized China's human rights record, and made milder recent statements about the continuation of military rule in Pakistan and increasingly undemocratic moves by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
State Department spokesman Edgar Vasquez confirmed receipt of Frank's letter.
'We're working on providing a response in the near future,' he said. 'You can be sure that we're looking into this issue very carefully.' He would not comment further on the reason for the U.S. vote, or on whether it represents a change in policy.
In 2002 the United States voted to support the International Lesbian and Gay Association's request to have its status reviewed. U.S. officials have not explained the change.
'We hope you will provide the reasons for this reversal,' Human Rights Watch and about 40 other groups wrote to Rice. The letter asked whether it is now U.S. policy to oppose panel membership for any gay rights group.
The State Department documents abuses based on sexual orientation in annual country-by-country reports on human rights practices.
A report on Iran two years ago noted that Iranian law punishes homosexual conduct between men with the death penalty. Human Rights Watch said it has documented four cases of arrests, flogging or execution of gay men in Iran since 2003.
'We find it incomprehensible that the U.S. government would recognize these human rights abuses while denying the people subject to them the right to make their case, alongside other respected human rights organizations, before the U.N.,' the Jan. 25 Human Rights Watch letter said.
The groups noted that three other international gay rights organizations have pending applications before the U.N. Economic and Social Council, known as ECOSOC.
'We urge you to support these applications. In this week's vote, the U.S. ranged itself on the side of severely repressive governments. As U.S.-based organizations working in the fields of human rights and sexual rights, we are dismayed and we expect better,' the letter said.
You gotta be kidding me. These people are useless.
gotta love guilt by association. Why do you breathe the same air that osama bin laden breathes!
"Iranian law punishes homosexual conduct between men with the death penalty."
Wow! Who'd a thunk that Iran would come up with the cure for AIDS. lol
Barney "Fag" Frank needs to go to Iran and hold his protest there. (pretty please)
Looks like one for the list; the second article about this. Funny, I tried to add another two keywords (slightly jocular) and they wouldn't get added. I guess someone doesn't appreciate my humor.
Yeah, we've noticed that about you Barn'.
Hmm, now they're on. Fingers, computer, and bitespersecond are not all on the same speed.
Ish
Good to see you, little jeremiah. How are you?
I say, let them in the U.N where they belong, and let the US get out.
"Don't you think it is more important that they are pulling people off the street and killing them because they don't like them?"
Exactly! I'm praying for an Iranian revolution. NOW! But BJFrank in Iran might perk me up a little.
It seems to me that nature has also been doing a pretty good job of punishing homosexual conduct between men with death.
Freepmail sent.
Too bad, Barney.
Nature eliminates that which is not fit.
Funny, in more ways than one.
Boston Blackie.
LoL!
Great nomenclature.
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