Source: http://www.ajc.org/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=ijITI2PHKoG&b=849241&ct=6808719 http://www.ajc.org/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=ijITI2PHKoG&b=849241&ct=6808719
Date: March 2, 2009

AJC Denounces UN High Commissioner's Effort to Stifle Durban Criticism
March 2, 2009 – New York – AJC denounced the statement of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navanethem Pillay today that criticism of the Durban Review process constitutes a “disparaging media and lobbying campaign” by those with “narrow, parochial interests.”
AJC Executive Director David A. Harris released the following statement:
This is an attempt to smear those who want the UN to protect human rights rather than inexcusably single out and demonize Israel.
Shame on the High Commissioner for implying that friends of Israel only care about Israel – though we make no apology for our concern for Israel’s fair treatment in the international community.
Perhaps she could use a reminder that her position of UN High Commissioner for Human Rights was first proposed by former AJC President Jacob Blaustein in his 1963 Dag Hammarskjold Lecture at Columbia University. Or that, according to Columbia Professor James Shotwell, the “inclusion of a human rights provision in the UN Charter was due to the brilliant leadership of the American Jewish Committee.”
Just last week, the U.S. said it would not participate in a Durban process guided by the current draft text, which stifles free speech and prejudicially singles out Israel. Several other nations, including Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom, have all publicly criticized the process. Does the High Commissioner really believe that these countries are a ‘lobby’? If so, perhaps she’d like to specify just what kind of ‘lobby’ she means.
The High Commissioner says that countries need to set aside ‘narrow, parochial interests’ for the process to succeed. So why isn’t she criticizing, first and foremost, those who hijacked the global struggle against racism in Durban in 2001, and who now wish to do so again? Why isn’t she condemning Iran and Syria for violating UN General Assembly Resolution 61/255 by questioning the Holocaust, or the Organization of the Islamic Conference for its obsession with delegitimizing Israel?
How sad when a UN official creates straw men by going after those with a long record of devotion to human rights and the struggle against racism, while blithely giving the worst human rights violators a free pass.