UN screws up big time: appoints Saudi Arabian diplomat as head of human rights panel

September 21, 2015 • 11:00 am

UPDATE: For a summary of Saudi Arabia’s abuses, the egregious UN action described below, and the scheduled beheading and subsequent crucifixion of a 20-year old, read the Gatestone Institute’s piece, “Saudi Arabia: World’s Human Rights Sewer.” The country has already executed 79 people this year—every one a “criminal”. (Political prisoners aren’t executed.)

____________

This, as reported by The Independent, is all ye need to know:

The executioners also have the duty to amputate limbs, feet and hands—other barbaric punishments leveled by this supposedly modern country.

UK lawyer David Allen Green, who writes as the Jack of Kent, has a tw**t on the subject. Read the list of punishments carefully.

(The information, which is chilling, comes from here.)

The UN is already soft on anti-blasphemy laws, and now it’s getting soft on human rights. Talk about the fox guarding the henhouse!

90 thoughts on “UN screws up big time: appoints Saudi Arabian diplomat as head of human rights panel”

  2. “It’s a travesty that Saudi Arabia, which has one of the worst human rights records in the world, is given any responsibility to monitor other countries. ”

    Perhaps we can count on hypocrisy….

  3. I think it’s well worth noting that the current Saudi regime is every bit as horrific and barbaric as Saddam Hussein’s Iraq…save, of course, that Iraq was actually less barbaric. Women in Iraq could drive and go to school and have positions of authority, the government was more or less secular, Al Qaeda was nowhere near, and so on.

    Pretty much gives the lie to any notion that we went into Iraq to somehow liberate Iraqis from their oppressive government. Indeed, it’s damned hard to see our invasion there as anything other than a mercenary act on behalf of Saudi Arabia itself.

    b&

    1. We’ve played SA’s lackey for decades now. It is disgusting. And even if you set aside the ethical issues with the US BFFing with SA, it is just plain stupid for just about any other pragmatic self interest reasons you can think of.

      The Bush II administration really demonstrated this after 9/11. The perfect score of bumbling from one stupidiest-decision / action-possible to another in response to 9/11, leading to the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, a new generation of war-mutilated young people in the US, huge numbers of people killed by the US, complete devastation of the US’s reputation around the entire planet, dangerous reshaping of the balance of power within the US government in favor of the executive branch, institutionalizing the use of torture by the US . . . all of that makes perfect sense if you just assume that the Bush II administration was working for the Saudi’s.

      Osama bin Laden achieved his stated goal, and then some. Because we had an idiot surrounded by some truly evil assholes, Cheney I’m looking right at you, in the Whitehouse when the shit hit the proverbial fan.

      1. The scary part?

        Bin Laden was a Saudi prince. Whether or not the disowning and the like was legitimate, he still did far more to enhance the power and stature of Saudi Arabia than anybody else in history, and simultaneously was the impetus behind the destruction of Saudi Arabia’s biggest rivals. And, oh-by-the-way, DAESH is very closely ideologically and religiously aligned with Saudi Arabia, even if, again, on paper, they’re enemies.

        Saudi Arabia is making out like bandits in all of this. Conspiracy or no, they couldn’t have planned anything better.

        …and it’s not like intrigue is unknown in the land of the 1,001 Arabian Nights….

        b&

      2. Yeah, the House of Saud and the Bush family are tighter than ticks, owing to their joint, and sometimes mutual, interest in the (as they say in Texas) “ahl bidness.”

        Our close allies the Saudis — close solely because they buy our fighter jets and keep the oil spigots open. The Saudi royal family is the pits, with a human-rights record perennially at or near the worst in the world.

        Problem is, the Saudi royals have poured so much petro money for so long into funding Wahhabism (the bribe they’ve paid the mullahs to keep terrorism off their own turf) that the Saudi population is now so virulently Islamist and anti-American that it serves as a poison pill preventing the West from calling for any type of meaningful democratic reform.

          1. The good news?

            They’re going to start running out of oil in a decade or three.

            The bad news?

            They’re going to start running out of oil in a decade or three…and so will everybody else….

            b&

          3. Alas, no mere humanitarian nor sociopolitical concern can compare with the almighty dollar. As long as oil is cheapest, oil will sell. And Saudi Arabia doesn’t have to do any more exploration; they just have to keep pumping what they’ve got left, so they’re pretty much always going to have the lowest overhead.

            If you want the cheapest cost per mile for your driving and you don’t drive more than 70 miles in a single day, get an used Nissan Leaf for under $14,000 and put enough solar panels on your roof to charge it. The fact that that’s a true statement may be our only hope…because solar and electric vehicles are already cost-competitive and are rapidly getting cheaper, whereas fossil fuels are only going to get more expensive.

            If we’re very, very, very lucky, that simple economics will power a natural transition of the passenger fleet to electric at a pace that matches the inevitable and impending decline in petroleum production. If that happens, the transition to solar will accelerate and overtake the rest of the fossil fuels before they start to run out, too…and before we’ve pumped all that carbon into the air.

            …but only if we’re extra special lucky….

            b&

          4. “Do I feel lucky?”
            “Well, do ya, punk?”

            I’d say the battleship of the U.S. economy is beginning to turn. I won’t hold my breath, but…

    2. With friends like these … it’s no wonder that we have so many enemies … but it’s weird how some of the enemies are friends with the friends.

  4. This is not the UN (Union of Nitwits?) screwing up, but rather business as usual. Oil is just part of the equation, but UN also in thrall to the 50+ Islamic states, thus the appalling softness of blasphemy laws.

    1. I agree its business as usual, though IMO its not due to corruption. The HRC is relatively powerless, and leadership regularly gets handed out to nasty regimes as a sort of ‘booby prize.’ IOW, the UN gives the bad actors this position so they don’t feel slighted when not given any position of actual power.

      In a perfect world, even with powerless UN positions would be filled by those worthy of them and capable of making them into something meaningful. But in this pragmatic world, the UN organization must create some “B Ark” positions specifically to give out to members as honoraria, and sadly, human rights has become one of them.

      1. To me, whether or not the position has power is less important than the symbolism. This is a kick in the teeth for every women’s rights campaigner on the planet, especially as many of the most egregious examples of abuse are happening in Muslim-majority countries.

        It’s also an attack on atheists, secularists, advocates of freedom of speech, and anti-slavery campaigners.

        Helen Clark, who has been head of the UN Development Programme since 2009 (#3 in UN seniority) is a possible for next Secretary-General. She’s an atheist, so I’m hoping this disgusting appointment will help her – people might favour her to make up for or to counter his appointment.

        1. We deal with them because of oil, and we don’t just need oil for transport and heating – but for a great many of the products we produce chemically including plastics, paint, synthetic textiles etc. As someone commented the Bush family were as “close as ticks” with the Saudi Royals due to their oil interests, tho i suspect the actual Iraq invasion was mainly to do with neocon lobby. In 2006 Saudi Arabia supplied 40% of the world’s oil and the gulf states as a whole 55%. A few years ago Obama approved a huge arms deal with the Saudis.
          Really to cut the Saudi’s power base the west as a whole needs to cut oil consumption by encouraging alternatives such as solar and electric or hybrid cars,by large subsidies if necessary. We also need to reduce waste/increase recycling. We need to encourage the rest of the world (non Muslim at least) to follow suit sufficiently that we can all tell them where to go because they are a major security threat to the world as a whole (perhaps especially other Muslims).

          The Organisation of the Islamic Cooperation is led by the Saudis. If they can push through “defamation of religion” provisions to the ICCPR, this may start to affect “soft law” interpretations of international law even in the West and one good appointment from outside the UN Council won’t make a difference. Meanwhile they seek to evangelise their horrible sect throughout the Muslim world. The Taliban have switched from Haifa to Wahabi school and the Saudis have built numerous mosques in Pakistan and recently offered to build 200 mosques in Germany for the refugee intake. One of their Princes just recently announced he will spend his fortune of 29 Billion US $ on “charitable works” around the world.

          1. The US only gets about 8% of its oil from SA. Their biggest customers are China. There are other reasons there’s so much appeasement of SA in the US, and they’re mainly diplomatic imo. Whatever else it is, SA is stable and on the surface at least, a friend to the West.

        2. It may be a symbolic kick in the teeth to all the groups you mention, but the point is that if they ended up on the Security Council (a real possibility) or in charge of a committee that had a lot of funds to distribute, they’d be helping to decide who gets real kicks in the teeth instead of symbolic ones.

          I’m not arguing this was an outcome anyone should be proud of. What we’re seeing here is clearly the downside of political compromise. However, if all we get is two more years of lopsided complaints about Israel’s human rights violations…meh. We’ve seen that before. Many times. If that’s the cost of keeping SA out of UN positions with real power, its not a bad price to pay.

    2. A lot of conservatives distrust the UN because it it is becoming an overarching world government, subsuming local authority at the same time giving too much influence to demands of backward member states. I think liberals should distrust it for exactly the same reasons.

      1. On the other hand, I sure as hell didn’t trust local authorities to count votes properly in Florida in 2000. Handing it over to a platoon of UN election monitors might have been a real good idea.

  5. “The executioners also have the duty to amputate limbs, feet and hands—other barbaric punishments leveled by this supposedly modern country”

    By “modern country” I think they mean the amputations are done by surgeons trained in medical science. At least that’s what I’ve seen reported. Modern indeed.

  6. so, we’re admitting that rights are a fiction now?

    the concept of rights is not possible in a religious worldview

    the UN is no longer a traffic cop on valium as Robin Williams observed, it’s complicit

    given the reports of UN aid workers demanded sex from children to get the aid……

  7. Saudi Arabia has never been a “supposedly modern country,” although America’s sheik-aligned press frequently portrays it that way.

    1. Hey, you can be lashed for “insulting Islam through electronic channels”. Can’t get any more modern than that!

  8. The problem is they believe their human rights record is perfect and consistent with their barbaric belief system while the western world are bigger sinners and cursed for eternity for once practicing slavery.

    1. The Arab nations practised slavery with considerable vigour for far longer than the ‘western world’, and ISIS still (for example) does. Arab slave traders in North Africa were one of the main sources of slaves for the Atlantic slave trade.

      1. See also Malaysian workers being worked to death on a regular basis as they build soccer stadiums in Qatar.
        http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/series/modern-day-slavery-in-focus+world/qatar
        This has got to be considered another example of a western organization, this time FIFA, ignoring the appalling human rights record of an oil rich gulf state.
        Whoever commented that prioritizing oil & oil profits over people is business as usual at the UN is, I fear, absolutely right.

        1. Yes. And there is evidence of it happening in SA too. Wealthy Saudis get house staff from places like Pakistan, then take their passports so they can’t get home when they realize they’re not getting what they were promised.

          1. That’s very similar to the stories I’ve read about workers in Qatar. Their employers control when and if they can leave the country. It’sreally very dire. Memorial services at the airport terminal which ships deceased workers back to Malaysia are apparently becoming a routine occurrence.

          2. There was a documentary about it on CNN International a while back, but I missed it. I hope they play it again. There’s stuff on Al Jazeera English too, but I don’t watch that much so I miss that too.

      1. They are a panel on the UN Human Rights Council – they will be appointing experts that shape interpretations or report violations – in the areas of human rights, arbitrary arrest and arbitration by judges according to UN Watch

    1. Now THAT deserves some kind of medal. I’m curious, how were you able to get into the city? I know they have checkpoints on the roads outside of Mecca and Medina, but I’ve long wondered what they do at these checkpoints to keep the infidels out.

      2. The security is more lax at Al-Medina and you can just drive through the ‘Muslims Only’ checkpoint, but I couldn’t get into Mecca this week because of Hajj. That’s the next mission!

      1. It’s absolutely stunning– google it. Or better yet, do as I did and ‘convert’ by saying a few magic words and you get free entry!

        1. Now that you’ve said those words, you’re officially an apostate, and eligible for all sorts of extra evil. Amazing!

          Looks like women aren’t allowed even with a spell?

    4. Wow & here I thought I was a bad ass atheist for asking for a civic oath when the notary brought out the bible! That is pretty brave!

    1. It was a Dutch UN peacekeeping force that left Srebrenica wide open for Mladic to commence his massacre in 1995. The Serbs were to be repelled by a UN airstrike which was called off becasue of a . . . wait for it . . . clerical error. 7,000-9,000 Bosniak Muslim men were allowed to be herded like cattle and systematically executed over the course of a few days by Serbian forces because the UN f’ed up the paperwork.

  12. I was thinking exactly that: the fox guarding the henhouse. It is a sad, sad, sad world we live in!!

    1. Sorry, should have read other comments (and the end of Jerry’s post) before posting. How about Donald Trump chairing a civil rights panel?

      1. He just said he loves Muslims! Not as president of course – you have to keep them in their place. (Sarcasm.)

  15. Extremely frustrating. This has been in the making for quite a while so it isn’t surprising but, damn.

    I’ve always liked the idea of the UN but the actuality of it has been rather depressing for pretty much my entire life.

  16. Despicable. An insult, particularly to Raif and those still living in the shadow of great dispair for what? for freedom of speech.

    Since Raif was given his first lashes (~January), I have swum a set of 50 x 25 butterfly every week. It is nothing compared to what he has to go through but it is a reminder to me of the frustration he must live through and the unconsolidated outpouring from the rest of humanity for not having him already released.

    Shame and disrespect is all the UN should feel for their abhorrent appointment.

  17. I absolutely agree that this decision is shocking, and calls into question the serious commitment of the UN to the defence of human rights.

    I think it is just worth pointing out that Saudi Arabia is not the absolute monarchy it is sometimes represented as. The system of ‘government’ is in effect a Faustian pact between the Al-Sauds (who get to run the state and get the oil revenues) and the Wahhabi religiots who run the ‘holy places’ as well as too much of the justice and education systems.

    The current king is the last eligible son of the first one, Abdul-Aziz (d. 1952). The next generation, mostly Western-educated, are only just getting their hands on the levers of power. I don’t expect many people here to agree with me; but I think there is a chance – maybe only a small one – that Saudi Arabia could change for the better in future.

    Until then, though, decisions like this need to be opposed – and mocked – as much as possible.

    1. The monarchy is more relatively liberal than the government. They’ve been trying to get some minor changes at least for years, although I think the new king might be closer in line with the government than the one who died recently.

      1. Yes, that’s right. But I don’t think King Salman will be too long in post. He is widely rumoured to have a form of dementia, and may end up having to concede authority to the Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Nayef, the first of the ‘3rd generation’ to get into a position of authority. We shouldn’t expect too much; but maybe some baby steps.

        1. I hope so. The Wahhabis in the background are the biggest cause of unrest in the ME, and if the Crown Prince can modernize things a bit, that could help more than anything else.

  19. From the British Embassy boilerplate:

    We are impartial; we are not here to judge you. We aim to make sure that you are treated properly and fairly in accordance with local regulations, and that you are treated no less favourably than other prisoners.

    With respect to Saudi Arabia, that doesn’t seem very comforting.

  20. Raif Badawis kids are adorable. Their father is being tortured by this decrepit medieval petro state. In 2015 a man is being tortured for simply writing a blog and unbelief.

    This is another travesty and another nail in the coffin of UN being any sort of defender of human rights. Theyve long ago been bought by oil money.

  21. All this criticism is proof of rampant islamophobia.

    (Although, if I was there I would be afraid, very afraid)

  22. Off topic a bit but food for law and order types who think ‘if you don’t do anything wrong you have nothing to worry about’

  24. I have seen this about and it deeply saddens me. The Saudis have also imprisoned and threaten to crucify the nephew of a Shia cleric. The Saudis and Pakistanis have also been running a campaign in the UN since the early 1990s to white ant the Covenant and Civil and Political Rights, following the Declaration of Islamic Human Rights in Cairo and the formation of the Islamic Conference.

    According to religlaw.org the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam was adopted at the 19th Islamic Conference of Foreign ministers in Cairo in 1990. In April 1999 at the urging of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference, Pakistan went to the United Nations High Commission on Human Rights to seek a resolution that would identify defamation of Islam as a violation of human rights. According to Wikipedia Organisation of Islamic Conference is now called Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, and has 56 states as members. Saudi Arabia is a key member of the Islamic Conference and was a founding member with the gulf states
    The 2007 General Assembly resolution added language, or attempted to add language to the ICCPR (The Covenant on Civil and Political Rights) saying that freedom of expression could be limited where it injured religion or belief. (Human Rights and Religion, The Spirit of Things, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 18 October 2009,)

    In March 2009, despite a petition of protest from over 200 civil society organizations, the voters in the General Assembly passed a Pakistan sponsored resolution 10/22 condemning “defamation of religion” as a human rights violation. The resolution included the request that:

    “The High Commissioner for Human Rights to report to the Council at its twelfth session on the implementation of the present resolution, including on the possible correlation between defamation of religions and the upsurge in incitement, intolerance and hatred in many parts of the world.”
    From “Human Rights Council Resolution: ‘Combatting Defamation of Religion’”, International Humanist and Ethical Union, 26 March 2009

    The Cairo Declaration on Human Rights includes the following statements

    ARTICLE 22:
    (a) Everyone shall have the right to express
    his opinion freely in such manner as would
    not be contrary to the principles of the
    Shari’ah.
    1.. Everyone shall have the right to advocate
    what is right, and propagate what is good,
    and warn against what is wrong and evil
    according to the norms of Islamic Shari’ah.
    (c) Information is a vital necessity to society.
    It may not be exploited or misused in such a
    way as may violate sanctities and the dignity
    of Prophets, undermine moral and ethical
    Values or disintegrate, corrupt or harm
    society or weaken its faith.

    The Saudis have been funding and spreading militant Islam and we let them from greed, ideological ignorance or sympathy to other faiths of the Book.
    Quran 3:54-59 Dawood translation published in Penguin
    They contrived, and God contrived. God is the supreme Contriver. God said: ‘Jesus, I am about to claim you back and lift you up to Me. I shall take you away from the unbelievers and exalt your followers above them till the Day of Resurrection. Then to Me you shall return and I shall judge your disputes. The unbelievers shall be sternly punished in this world and in the world to come: there shall be none to help them. …. This revelation and this wise admonition, We recite to you. Jesus is like Adam in the sight of God. He created him from dust and then said to him: ‘Be,’ and he was.
    Quran 8:30 Dawood ‘Remember how the unbelievers plotted against you (Muhammad). They sought to take you captive or to have you slain or banished. They schemed – but God also schemed. God is most profound in His machinations.’

      1. I just happened across Hitchens talking to Lou Dobbs on that UN resolution.

        The Koran (and its expression, Sharia) is the last and final word off god. There is no need for any more evidence or argument. In fact it is forbidden.

        The thrust of those moves at the UN were to make even the slightest doubt about that, not even criticism as such, just disagreement, some kind of crime.

        As indicated by the selected quotes above.

        It is indeed evil, and scary)

        And given the real world outcomes in evidence, it is evil and scary beyond compare.

        1. Terrifying really. Hitchens compared religion to “an unalterable, unchallengable, tyrannical, authority who can convict you of thought crimes while you are asleep.”
          This is the world Islam’s propagators promise. I’d say we should be ever vigilant and work against incremental moves toward such a future.

  25. PS the wikipedia site on organisation of the islamic conference that I used a few years ago doesnt exist any more. I also used sites on “blasphemy” and the covenant on civil and political rights on wikipedia years ago – still bring up stuff but very much watered down. Once gave detailed info on history of numerous attempts to equate criticism of religion with hate speech. . The organisation of islamic cooperation site i used a couple of years ago has been so changed as to be unrecognisable and an apologia for its stance. However the other sites I mention stand as good sources on attempts in UN to equate criticism of religion (esp Islam) with hate speech. Since UN special envoys and rapporteurs arbitrate on the process and have corrected these attempts to attack free speech in the past the elevation of Saudi Arabia to overseeing appointments of rapporteurs is very disturbing.

    1. At least it is somewhat reassuring to know they are no longer pushing so hard against free speech on the web sites. It’s sad that these nations are able to hold a gun (oil) to the heads of other nations via Saudi Arabia and the oil cartel.

      1. Actually what was on the Wikipedia websites was a detailed exposition of the measures the country members of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference had taken in the UN General Assembly to put forward and vote for preliminary versions of proposed amendments to the CCPR (covenant on civil and political rights) which would equate criticism of religion – especially Islam – with hate speech which would therefore not be covered by protection of freedom of speech and expression under the CCPR. By 2008 and 2009 some of these preliminary proposals had got majority backing – with countries like China and Russia backing them and many other non Islamic countries as well. However special rapporteurs of governing committees required reframing of the proposals in line with principles of the founding UN covenants and charters, so the amendments couldn’t proceed. This is why appointments like this are so worrying. These earlier detailed versions of information on Wikipedia – particularly filed under “Blasphemy – UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights” have been modified – and there used to be a bit of detail about it on the Wikipedia site for Organisation of the Islamic Conference.

        The references to Australian Broadcasting Corporation – Radio National “The Spirit of Things” program from a few years ago gives good info on this as does the other non Wikipedia site I mentioned.

  27. I can’t even begin to imagine what sort of process led the UN to make a decision like this. Who in their right mind could let this happen?!

    1. “Who in their right mind could let this happen?”
      Someone who wants their SUV filled at $2.00/gal.

  28. The six billion plus people in the world will simply ignore anything this this dubious character has to say.
    I don’t know the going rate for these “prestige” UN appointments, so I am wondering how much he bid compared to his rivals for the title?

    1. “I don’t know the going rate for these “prestige” UN appointments,”
      I don’t either, but whatever it is it’s measured in barrels of crude.

      (sorry to misplace this comment. for Tom 28)

  29. “I don’t know the going rate for these “prestige” UN appointments,”
    I don’t either, but whatever it is it’s measured in barrels of crude.

  30. Detailed information on attempts to water down the freedom of belief and expression provisions in the ICCPR by the now Organisation of Islamic Cooperation – formerly Organisation of Islamic Conference – consisting of 56 or so Islamic states – but with the Gulf states, particularly Saudi Arabia – at their core is now on Wikipedia under “Defamation of Religion and Human Rights in the United Nations”. In 2011 the UN Council on Human Rights changed its concept of protection of beliefs to protection of believers (individuals not abstract ideals, so positive) and the Human Rights Committee roundly reaffirmed its commitment to the original principles of ICCPR regarding freedom of belief and expression in a paper 54. So far, so good for now. However I remember reading a few years ago that rapporteurs had pushed for the change to protection of “believers” not “beliefs” earlier.

  32. I think it was Tom Lerher who said after Nixons Secretary of State Henry Kissinger got the Nobel Peace Price “Satire is Officially dead”, well this has buggered up any chance of its re-incarnation.

  33. Anti Defamation motions in the UN initiated by the (now) Organisation of Islamic Cooperation date back to 1999. In 2007 a UN General Assembly resolution added language, or attempted to add language to the ICCPR (The Covenant on Civil and Political Rights mentioned earlier) saying that freedom of expression could be limited where it injured religion or belief.
    In 2008, the UN Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, proposed that the longstanding focus on “defamation of religions” be changed to the legal concept: “incitement to national, racial or religious hatred,” which is grounded on international legal instruments. In March 2009, despite a petition of protest from over 200 civil society organizations, the voters in the General Assembly passed a Pakistan sponsored draft resolution condemning “defamation of religion” as a human rights violation. This was duly passed. Rapporteurs, however subsequently sought to change this to reflect existing international law, whereby individuals, rather than ideas are to be protected (former Wikipedia information on Defamation of Religion and the UN). The Saudis now will be appointing new rapporteurs on the UN Council.

    Historically in Western law, defamation is a legal concept applying to individuals but the continued acceptance by the United Nations of calls to curb “defamation of religion” equates defamation with something akin to blasphemy against religion. For many years now United Nations Special rapporteurs have reported that Muslim countries are using blasphemy laws against religious minorities in ways that silence them, restrict their religious practice, or generally make life difficult for the adherents of all religions except orthodox Muslim adherents of the relevant major branch of Islam (Sunni or Shia) in the country.
    Human Rights & Religion, The Spirit of Things, 18 October 2009
    http://www.abc.net.au/rn/spiritofthings/stories/2009/2712753.htm#transcript

    United Nations special rapporteurs on religious matters have repeatedly found that defamation laws in Muslim countries are actually being used to violate the right of religious minorities to religious freedom, even as Islamic countries have been seeking to pass religious defamation resolutions in the UN. Many Muslim countries are still using blasphemy laws to actively prosecute individuals that are deemed to have defamed Islam or are alleged to have committed apostasy. In Afghanistan individuals who forward articles on the rights of women in Muslim countries, and who translate the Qu’ran into another language without the original Arabic alongside it are given heavy jail sentences.
    Human Rights & Religion, The Spirit of Things, 18 October 2009

    The normalizing effect of repeated successful religious defamation motions, and the move to push this interpretation into customary (as opposed to written) international law, can have effects outside Muslim countries. Recently Crown Prosecutors of the province of British Columbia in Canada refused to prosecute Winston Blackmore, a Mormon who has 19 wives on the basis of freedom of religion, despite bigamy being a criminal offence in the province.
    Human Rights & Religion, The Spirit of Things, 18 October 2009

  34. I can only guess at how this appointment was made but preverse as this may seem and at the cost of all those who suffer under human rights infractions.. we may get to see just how committed the Saudi’s are to human rights internationally, so far it’s a fail but this could also be revealing as they are now under the full glare, what do they have to offer, anything?
    I tend to think this appointment is just a front for respectability, nothing more, nothing less.
    Lets hope the 4th Estate doesn’t let Mr Trad of the hook, someone may have the opportunity for a field day.

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