[R-G] Unanswered Phone Calls in Venezuela: Human Rights Watch Exposes Hugo Chavez Yet Again
Anthony Fenton
fentona at shaw.ca
Sun Oct 12 09:11:15 MDT 2008
October 10th, 2008
Unanswered Phone Calls in Venezuela: Human Rights Watch Exposes Hugo
Chavez Yet Again.
By: Joe Emersberger - HaitiAnalysis.com
Human Rights Watch (HRW) recently published a 230 page report on
Venezuela entitled "“A Decade Under Chávez: Political Intolerance and
Lost Opportunities for Advancing Human Rights in Venezuela,”
In a press release about the report, HRW's Americas director, Jose
Miguel Vivanco stated that "rather than advancing rights protections"
the Chavez government has "moved in the opposite direction,
sacrificing basic guarantees in pursuit of its own political agenda. "
One of the report's findings is so explosive that it deserves to be
quoted at length:
“Government officials routinely deny or fail to respond to requests
for information by journalists. According to an investigation by
Últimas Noticias, a generally progovernment newspaper, journalists
have encountered obstacles in obtaining information from the police on
crime statistics, judges and court officials, hospitals, state
enterprises such as PDVSA, the comptroller general’s office, and
various ministries…
According to a log publicized by the newspaper El Mundo, only 37.5
percent of the officials responded to requests for official
information made by its investigative reporters in 2007. The average
wait for a reply was 38 days, almost twice the legal maximum. For
example, a reporter approached the Ministry of Planning and
Development to get information about the salaries of public employees.
It took seven months, three letters, and a change of vice-minister
before a reply was received. “ [1]
My heart goes out to those journalists who have not received replies –
or have had to endure waits of up to seven months before receiving
one. Apologists for Chavez may point out that HRW was not talking
about inquiries into horrific atrocities like the ones carried out by
the US backed government in Colombia, and that nothing like that is
mentioned in the report, but such people don’t understand the agony of
being ignored. I know because I have been writing and telephoning HRW
for years and have never received a reply. I have a zero percent
success rate – much worse than El Mundo’s – so I can feel their pain.
[2]
HRW also found that “Venezuela still enjoys a vibrant public debate in
which anti-government and pro-government media are equally vocal in
their criticism and defense of Chávez”. It said that the Chavez
government has greatly expanded funding for community broadcasters and
that a “...large majority of community radio stations are supportive
of the Chávez government. However, they are not politically
homogeneous, and by no means uncritical”. None of that, of course,
should distract us from the suffering of those journalists waiting for
replies about government salaries.
Now that HRW has blown the lid off the grave human rights abuse of
unanswered questions, perhaps they can finally respond to these
questions:
1) When a coup deposed Chavez for 2 days in 2002, why did HRW’s public
statements fail to do obvious things like denounce the coup, call on
other countries not to recognize the regime, invoke the OAS charter,
and (especially since HRW is based in Washington) call for an
investigation of US involvement?
2) Very similarly, when a coup deposed Haiti’s democratically elected
government in 2004, why didn't HRW condemn the coup, call on other
countries not to recognize the regime, invoke the OAS charter, and
call for an investigation of the US role? Many of these things were
done by the community of Caribbean nations (CARICOM). A third of the
UN General Assembly called for an investigation into the overthrow of
Aristide. Why didn’t HRW back them up?
3) Since 2004, why has HRW written about 20 times more about Venezuela
than about Haiti despite the fact that the coup in Haiti created a
human rights catastrophe in which thousands of political murders were
perpetrated and the jails filled with political prisoners? Haiti’s
judiciary remains stacked with holdovers from the coup installed
regime. The lingering impact of the coup is revealed by a recent
ruling by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR) in favor of
Yvon Neptune. Haiti has ignored the IACHR order that it dismiss the
case against Neptune and pay damages for his illegal two year
imprisonment. [3] HRW has not publicly urged the Haitian government to
obey the ruling, nor has it applied any public pressure on the
government to investigate the disappearance of Lovinsky Pierre
Antoine, a leading human rights activist.[4]
4) Why did HRW never write a word in support of Father Gerard Jean-
Juste, Haiti’s most prominent political prisoner after the coup? Even
after Amnesty International named him a “prisoner of conscience” and
participated in an international campaign to have him released to
receive treatment for cancer, HRW said absolutely nothing. Instead HRW
has repeatedly objected to law suits brought against Venezuelan “civil
society” leaders like Maria Corina Machado, who has never been jailed
despite signing the infamous Carmon decree which briefly abolished
Venezuelan democracy.[5]
5) Why hasn’t HRW called for a full disclosure of US funding of the
opposition in Bolivia given the murders recently perpetrated in Pando
by anti-government groups? HRW has called on the OAS to investigate
the Colombian government’s allegations that the Chavez assists the
FARC. In contrast, HRW has not urged the US government to cooperate
with the Freedom of Information Act requests made by Jeremy Bigwood
regarding US activity Bolivia.[6]
HRW has routinely ignored critics who have shown that it has
increasingly become a tool of US imperialism. Ed Herman, David
Peterson and George Szamuely wrote an very extensive and damning
assessment of HRW's role as a "campaigner for the NATO Wars in the
Balkans". Michael Barker has produced detailed criticism. Jonathan
Cook, Norman Finkelstein and Sara Founders have highlighted flagrant
imperial bias in HRW statements involving Israel. HRW did repy to one
article by Joanthan Cook but only after distorting what he had
written. Cook pointed out in response
"If this is how one of the directors of HRW distorts my arguments and
evidence when I carefully set out my case in black and white on the
page, one has to wonder how faithfully she and her organisation sift
the evidence in the far trickier cases relating to human rights, where
things are rarely so black and white."
Cook did not hear from HRW again.[7]
In a press release of 2006, HRW stooped to denying Palestinians the
right to non-violent self defence. The outcry against the absurdity of
it was so overwhelming that HRW published a retraction. [8] Much more
typically, as in the case of Kevin Pina's open letter to Jose Miguel
Vivanco, HRW has simply stayed silent.[9]
With the exception of Jonathan Cook, nowhere on HRW's website does one
find any mention of the critics cited above. However, one can easily
find a lengthy reply to Michael Spagat whose attempt to depict HRW as
soft on the Colombian FARC rebels was comically inept.[10]
Now I admit I've exaggerated the sympathy I feel for Venezuelan
journalists sitting by their phones or refreshing their inboxes
awaiting replies from the Chavez government. A certain callousness
sets in when one recalls what the US and its allies have achieved in
Haiti - and hope to achieve in Venezuela. And though I disagree with
HRW being expelled from Venezuela I find it difficult to see why it
should bother anyone more than unanswered phone calls to reporters
(which I also disagree with). HRW has, at the very least, a close
relationship with the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a barely
disguised branch of the US government devoted to undermining
democracy. [11] Needless to say, if the Venezuelan government had
funded groups who had briefly overthrown the US government, and then
sabotaged the US economy, a Caracas based group would not be attending
press conferences in Washington criticizing the US government.
Venezuela would be lucky to exist as a country at all.
I've long ago ceased to expect much from Human RIghts Watch. I put
questions to them, and urge others to do so, knowing that replies from
them are unlikely - and unnecessary. The important thing is to spread
awareness of the role they have increasingly come to play as a group
that marshals support among liberals for very nasty imperial projects.
No one should be fooled, at this point, by the fact that it publishes
some criticism of the US and its clients.
Joe Emersberger can be reached at jemersberger at aol.com
NOTES
[1]See page 107 of report available at http://hrw.org/reports/2008/venezuela0908/
[2] Many letters to HRW (and Amnesty International) are archived on
the Medialens website http://www.medialens.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=842&sid=ffba5225b31cbaafa2ca8d1d62ccea74
[3] See "Haiti and Human Rights Watch" http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/4131
for comparison of quatity and quality of what HRW has written about
Haiti and Venezuela. The disparity in quantity is now much worse than
stated in the article above which is from 2006
About Neptune case see http://www.haitianalysis.com/2008/7/23/four-years-of-political-persecution-for-yvon-neptune-and-counting
[4] Kevin Pina "Fears of a Cover up Grow in the Case of Missing Human
Rights Activist in Haiti" http://haitiaction.net/News/HIP/8_20_8/8_20_8.html
[5] Jonah Gindin "Democracy vs Bush-o-cracy in Venezuela" http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/1160
[6] U.S. Ties to Bolivian Opposition 'Shrouded in Secrecy' http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/18869
[7] Ed Herman, David Peterson, George Szamuely; "Human Rights Watch:
In Service to the War Party" http://www.electricpolitics.com/2007/02/human_rights_watch_in_service.html
Michael Barker "Hijacking Human Rights" http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/14804
Sara Flounders, 'Massacre in Jenin, Human Rights Watch and the Stage-
Management of Imperialism', CovertAction Quarterly, Fall 2002. http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/articles/article0003220.html
Jonathan Cook, 'The Israel Lobby Works its Magic, Again: How Human
Rights Watch Lost its Way in Lebanon', Counterpunch, September 7,
2006. http://www.counterpunch.org/cook09072006.html
Sarah Leah Whitson;(Middle East and North Africa director)"Hezbollah's
Rockets and Civilian Casualties: A Response to Jonathan Cook" http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/09/22/lebano14262_txt.htm
Jonathan Cook, 'Human Rights Watch: Still Missing the Point: Should We
Deny Lebanon the Right to Defend Itself?', Counterpunch, September 25,
2006. http://www.counterpunch.org/cook09252006.html
[8] Jonathan Cook, 'Palestinians are Being Denied the Right of Non-
Violent Resistance?: Would HRW Have Attacked Martin Luther King,
Too?', Counterpunch, November 30, 2006. http://www.counterpunch.org/cook11302006.html
Norman G. Finkelstein, 'Human Rights Watch Must Retract its Shameful
Press Release: Rush to Judgment', Counterpunch, November 29, 2006;
HRW, 'Human Rights Watch Statement on our November 22 Press Release',
Human Rights Watch, December 16, 2006. http://www.counterpunch.org/finkelstein11292006.html
HRW "Human Rights Watch Statement on our November 22 Press
Release" (i.e. the retraction) http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/11/22/isrlpa14652.htm
[9] Kevin Pina Open Letter to Human Rights Watch http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/6254
[10] HRW Response to CERAC Charges about our Colombia Work Human
Rights Watch responds to the serious yet groundless charges made about
our work in Colombia by University of London Professor Michael Spagat http://hrw.org/doc/?t=americas&document_limit=140,20
[11]According to NED "China’s Olympic promises were also the topic of
a June 19 event cosponsored by NED and Human Rights Watch highlighting
the publication of China's Great Leap: The Beijing Games and Olympic
Human Rights Challenge, edited by Minky Worden." http://www.ned.org/publications/newsletters/080508.html
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