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DURBAN WATCH


By EyeOntheUN.org


November 20, 2007


Later today, November 20, 2007, the General Assembly's Third Committee is expected to vote on a resolution (reproduced below) intended to give Durban II preparations the General Assembly’s stamp of approval.  (Third Committee votes are subsequently rubber-stamped by the plenary of the General Assembly, since the “committee” is already composed of all 192 UN member states.)

The resolution is not expected to be adopted by consensus - provided a vote is called and at least some states vote against.  It is hoped either the United States or Israel will call for such a vote and vote against.  This would be an important statement of principle that the Organization of the Islamic Conference will not be able to plan another anti-Jewish, anti-Israel and anti-Western extravaganza in the name of human rights without opposition.

The resolution will welcome “the Report of the Preparatory Committee [PrepCom] … including its annexes and appendices, in particular the decisions adopted by the organizational session of the Preparatory Committee.”

Here is a refresher on some of what the General Assembly is expected to approve:

  • The next meeting of the PrepCom for a UN global conference on racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance will coincide with most of the 2008 Jewish Passover thus inhibiting Jews from attending.
  • Every NGO involved in Durban I, regardless of their extremist and racist behavior the first time around, will be permitted to participate in Durban II.
  • The subject matter of Durban II will include anything the Organization of the Islamic Conference declares are "contemporary manifestations of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance" - meaning a witchhunt for alleged Western Islamophobia.
  • The only UN human rights investigators specifically invited to provide Durban II with recommendations will be two specialists - one on Islamophobia and other forms of racism, and one on freedom of religion.
  • Questions sent to states about their records of protecting their own people from racial discrimination will be subject to the approval of the PrepCom Bureau - meaning Iran, Libya, Cuba and Pakistan, and company.  Answers will be reviewed by a body controlled by the Organization of the Islamic Conference.
  • A new UN body "to follow-up the work of the PrepCom, review additional written contributions and report thereon to the PrepCom" will be created to increase mass hysteria over allegations of global Islamophobia. This brings the total number of Durban follow-up bodies to six.

Also before the Third Committee is a second Durban follow-up resolution  similar to those of earlier years (A/C.3/62/L.65).  This resolution also welcomes the Durban II preparation process to date, demands enough money for the conference and the myriad meetings to be associated with it, and changes the name of the "Anti-Discrimination Unit" in the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to "Anti-Racial Discrimination Unit" so that non-stop Islamophobia-hunting will be its unimpeded pre-occupation. 

###
A/C.3/62/L.66


Angola:* draft resolution

Report of the Human Rights Council on the preparations for the Durban Review Conference

       The General Assembly,

       Taking note of its resolution 61/149 of 19 December 2006 and Human Rights Council resolution 3/2 of 8 December 2006,

       Recalling Human Rights Council decision 6/105 of 28 September 2007, in which the Council invited the Preparatory Committee for the Durban Review Conference to submit its reports to the General Assembly,

       Bearing in mind that the modalities of the Review Conference have yet to be finalized,

       1.     Welcomes the Report of the Preparatory Committee on its first session,[1] including its annexes and appendices, in particular the decisions adopted by the organizational session of the Preparatory Committee;[2]

       2.     Endorses the decisions adopted by the organizational session of the Preparatory Committee.


* On behalf of the States Members of the United Nations that are members of the Group of African States.
[1] A/62/375.
[2] Ibid., annex I.
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EYEontheUN is an independent UN monitor headquartered in New York and is dedicated to making transparent the UN's record on its fundamental promise-to identify, condemn, and protect against human rights violations and confront and respond to threats to international peace and security.  Anne Bayefsky, Editor of EYEontheUN, is a Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute and Director of the Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust.


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November 2007 News




Senator Tom Coburn's activity on the Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government Information, and International Security

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