Free Republic

President Trump's verbal attacks on the media, saying his administration needs to promote a “vibrant” free press and stop going after journalists. David Kaye, the U.N.’s special rapporteur on freedom of expression, and Edison Lanza, special rapporteur of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, issued a joint statement on Thursday in response to Trump’s repeated attacks on the media. “His attacks are strategic, designed to undermine confidence in reporting and raise doubts about verifiable facts,” Kaye and Lanza said in the statement. “These attacks run counter to the country’s obligations to respect press freedom and international human rights law,” the...

With two of out every five member states of the United Nations not yet having paid their dues for 2018, the world body says it has never been so far behind in receiving contributions by this time of the year, and officials are looking for belt-tightening options. Among the 81 countries yet to pay, by far the biggest amount due is the United States’ contribution of $591.3 million, which comprises 22 percent of the total regular budget for 2018. Next up are Brazil ($102.7 million, or 3.8 percent of the budget), Saudi Arabia ($30.8 million, 1.14 percent) and Argentina ($23.9...

At a time when the Trump administration’s robust defense of Israel at the United Nations is shaking up an institution that has long been hostile to the Jewish state, the biggest bloc of developing nations at the U.N. has decided to bestow its presidency on the “State of Palestine.” The move looks likely to increase pressure on the U.S. and Israel in the U.N. General Assembly, where the U.S. already invariably loses Israel-related votes by heavily lopsided margins. There is no sovereign state of Palestine, but the self-rule Palestinian Authority chaired by Mahmoud Abbas has since 2012 enjoyed the status...

The UN special envoy to the Middle East Nickolay Mladenov on Tuesday urged U.S. President Donald Trump to resume funding he had cut to the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), the UN agency which assists “Palestinian refugees”. Addressing a UN Security Council meeting on the Middle East and quoted by Haaretz, Mladenov said that "UNRWA’s financial crisis remains a very serious concern. At present, UNRWA needs some $217 million to sustain its work in 2018. I urge the swift mobilization of support to enable the continuity of assistance and a maintenance of stability on the ground in the region."...

Recordings and summaries of emergency calls show Washington wildlife officials at first objected to an air rescue of a woman treed by wolves, or help from the Okanogan County sheriff. Washington wildlife managers initially opposed sending a helicopter or a search-and-rescue team to save a woman treed by wolves in the Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest, according to recordings and summaries of emergency calls. ... Notes from a call between DNR dispatcher Jill Jones and a wildlife officer summarized WDFW’s position, and her position, shortly before the helicopter launched. “No helicopter. Federally listed species. 3 WDFW personnel saying so,” according to DNR’s...

The U.S. is calling out China and Russia for helping North Korea violate United Nations sanctions as the regime smuggles in more oil than is allowed. The illegal transfers are now disrupting the U.S. talks with North Korea and its push for the regime to completely dismantle its nuclear weapons program, according to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley. Pompeo traveled to New York Friday to join Haley for a meeting with the U.N. Security Council representatives, including Chinese and Russian representatives, for what Haley called "frank talk." "We put pressure today...

France and Russia have agreed to send 50 metric tons of medical aid to government-controlled eastern Ghouta in Syria, French officials said on Friday. A Russian cargo plane arrived late Friday in Chateauroux in central France to take the aid, which includes medical supplies and other essential goods, to a Russian military base in northwestern Syria. It will then be transported to eastern Ghouta, which the Syrian government retook from rebel forces in April. Once in Syria, the cargo will be distributed by the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) with the help of the Syrian...

GENEVA (18 June 2018) – UN human rights experts* have made a fresh call to Iran to annul the death sentence imposed on Iranian Kurd Ramin Hossein Panahi, amid reports that he will be executed after the end of the holy month of Ramadan. The execution of Mr. Panahi was previously set for 3 May, but was postponed. It is understood that a request for a judicial review was rejected by the Iranian Supreme Court in late May, and the sentence against him was then referred to the office responsible for carrying it out.“The Iranian authorities must now halt the...

LIKE vinyl records and popped collars, rows between the United States and Europe over Russian energy are making a comeback. In the early 1980s Ronald Reagan’s attempts to thwart a Soviet pipeline that would bring Siberian gas to Europe irritated the West Germans and drove the French to proclaim the end of the transatlantic alliance. The cast of characters has shifted a little today, but many of the arguments are the same. In Nord Stream 2 (NS2), a proposed Russian gas pipeline, Germany sees a respectable project that will cut energy costs and lock in secure supplies. American politicians (and...

THE crisis in Ukraine has alarmed the rest of Europe—not just because of the prospect of war, or chaos on its borders, but because a row with Russia over Ukraine's unpaid gas bill threatens energy security in the rest of the continent. Europe could survive a short interruption of a few weeks to the pipelines across Ukraine, assuming that other Russian gas kept flowing. The European Union has built in more resilience since the last upset in Ukraine, in 2009. Now it is hurrying to reduce its reliance further. But measures such as better storage, more interconnectors and diversification of...

A series of maps of Judea and Samaria, focusing on the placement of Jewish communities and Israeli military facilities in the area, provoked a dramatic change in the Obama administration’s policies vis-à-vis Israel, a report by The New Yorker claims. According to the report Monday, a presentation by then-Secretary of State John Kerry to President Barack Obama in the waning days of the administration ‘shocked’ the president into taking a more aggressive stance towards Israel, withholding America’s veto on a United Nations Security Council resolution critical of Israeli policies in Judea and Samaria. The Obama administration, like its predecessors, had...

The failing NY Times Fake News story today about breast feeding must be called out. The U.S. strongly supports breast feeding but we don’t believe women should be denied access to formula. Many women need this option because of malnutrition and poverty.

A United Nations official is calling for an “ark” to save the world from global warming. Climate-change skeptic Marc Morano of the Climate Depot site noted Espinosa urged the world “to make the fundamental, transformative changes necessary” to fight “global warming.” The Vatican’s International Conference was titled “Saving our Common Home and the Future of Life on Earth.” “If we truly want to make the fundamental, transformative changes necessary to combat climate change, perhaps what we need then is not a physical ark, but an ark of ambition for #climateaction,” she said on social media. Espinosa echoed former U.N. climate...

Vatican City — The Vatican's secretary of state warned July 5 that humanity is facing a "possible collapse" in the Earth's ability to sustain life, as part of a two-day conference hosted by the Catholic Church to urge global leaders to mitigate the devastating impacts of climate change. In an address opening the "Saving Our Common Home" event, Cardinal Pietro Parolin said there is a "clear urgency" to the task and that people around the world, "as members of the common household, need to come together." The Vatican's Dicastery for Integral Human Development is hosting the July 5-6 event among...

Australia on Monday announced it had ended direct aid to the Palestinian Authority (PA) government over concerns the funds could be used to assist Palestinians convicted of political violence. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said Australia would no longer be giving its yearly funding of A$10 million (€6.9 million, $7.5 million) to the World Bank’s trust fund for Palestinian recovery and development. “I wrote to the Palestinian Authority on May 29, to seek clear assurance that Australian funding is not being used to assist Palestinians convicted of politically motivated violence,” Bishop said in a statement. “I am confident that previous Australian...

For the past two weeks, I’ve been attending the Third U.N. Conference to Review Progress Made in the Implementation of the Programme of Action to Prevent, Combat and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects — mercifully abbreviated as RevCon 3 for the PoA. In theory, the purpose of the PoA — which is a political instrument, not a treaty — is to encourage cooperation on the illicit international trade in small arms. If the PoA stuck to this, it might be modestly useful. It can only be modestly useful because far too...

Parents who share pictures of their children on social media are putting their human rights at risk, the United Nations has warned. The UN's special rapporteur Joseph Cannataci said that "strong guidelines" were needed to preserve the rights of children whose parents upload video and images of them. During a mission to the UK to assess the privacy situation he also found that kindergarten-age children were being surveilled using CCTV at school and in their bedrooms. At a press conference on Friday he suggested there could be a rising number of cases involving children who argue their rights have been...

The United Nations is gearing up for round two in the fight to disarm the American public. Last month, the United Nations’ International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA) held a week-long conference geared towards making gun control an international priority. Wanting world domination, the global elites are seeking to prevent Americans from being able to escape the slavery they have planned for everyone by enacting “global gun control.” According to Townhall‘s Beth Baumann, during RevCon3, the conference on the program of action on small arms and light weapons, the UN’s Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres had a message delivered on his...

Last month, the United Nations' International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA) held a week-long conference geared towards making gun control an international priority. Now, the UN's Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, is wanting to regulate and control small arms. During RevCon3, the conference on the programme of action on small arms and light weapons, Guterres had a message delivered on his behalf (emphasis mine):

Numerous international groups are trying to influence Ireland into legalising abortionThe great and the good internationally have a big interest in the outcome of Ireland’s looming abortion referendum, planned for next year. They want Irish voters to erase from their constitution the so-called Eighth Amendment, which gives the unborn child the same right to life as every other human being. Abortion is only permitted in Ireland when the life of the mother is at real and substantial risk. This amendment was inserted into the constitution following a referendum in 1983 which passed by a two-to-one margin. Ever since then secular...