IN HIS second inaugural address, President Bush told the world: "All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know: The United States will not ignore your oppression or excuse your oppressors."
Well, lately there's been plenty of ignoring and excusing going on.
In fact, if you want to gain a full appreciation of the Bush administration's attitude toward human rights in the post-Sept. 11 era, you have to look at more than just the disappearances, torture, and murders for which the United States is directly responsible. You also must bear in mind how the White House sucks up to some of the world's worst human-rights abusers.
Let's consider the two most egregious examples. The first relates to the Darfur region of Sudan, where more than 300,000 people have died because of a genocide engineered by the Sudanese government.
After being silent about Darfur for nearly half a year, the president earlier this month reiterated former Secretary of State Colin Powell's assertion that a genocide is indeed occurring in the region and that the government of Sudan bears responsibility for it.
But Bush cheapens the word "genocide." He has done far too little to try to end Darfur's nightmare--even though the United States is a signatory of the international treaty requiring prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide.
But it gets even worse. Instead of pursuing its moral, if not legal, obligations, the Bush administration is busy courting some of the architects of the Darfur genocide.
As first reported in The Los Angeles Times, the CIA sent an executive jet to Khartoum in April to shuttle Sudan's intelligence chief, Maj. Gen. Salah Abdallah Gosh, to Washington to cement a partnership in the "war on terrorism."
Never mind that Gosh is suspected of committing the most heinous acts of terrorism against the people of Darfur.
Last June, several members of Congress sent a letter to President Bush naming Gosh as one of the Sudanese officials who had orchestrated the mass violence by the Sudanese military and its allies, the janjaweed militia, in Darfur.
A report in October by the federal government's nonpartisan Congressional Research Service said Gosh "reportedly has played key roles in coordinating the recruitment and training of the janjaweed and directing the security services in attacks against civilians in Darfur."
Which makes you wonder what the flight crew said to Gosh when they picked him up in Khartoum. "Welcome aboard, general. Today's flight time will be 14 hours and 28 minutes. Can we get you anything before takeoff--a cocktail, extra pillow, WetNaps for the blood on your hands?"
The CRS report said administration officials were worried that holding Gosh and other top Sudanese officials accountable for the genocide in Darfur "could disrupt cooperation on counter-terrorism issues." Yet the report goes on to say that "some observers have doubts about the value of the intelligence Khartoum may currently be offering."
In other words, the authors of the Darfur genocide are getting VIP treatment on Bush's Freedom Air, even if what they offer us in return is of questionable value.
The second telling example involves Uzbekistan. The White House is eager to secure long-term use of a military base in the Central Asian nation, which borders Afghanistan.
Trouble is, Uzbekistan is ruled by Islam Karimov, one of the world's most brutal dictators. More than 5,000 people languish in his prisons for political or religious reasons, according to the U.S. State Department, which characterizes Karimov's human-rights record as "very poor."
Torture is widespread in Uzbekistan, but this apparently doesn't stop the CIA from sending detainees to the country as part of its "rendition" program. Last month, The New York Times reported that Uzbekistan's role as a surrogate jailer (and torturer?) for the United States was confirmed by a half-dozen current and former intelligence officials.
(One of the methods Uzbekistan's torturers have used in recent years is boiling people alive--a practice that gives whole new meaning to the phrase "rendering prisoners.")
On May 13, Karimov's security forces gunned down hundreds of unarmed protesters in the city of Andijan.
One woman who survived the massacre told Human Rights Watch: "They pointed their weapons at us and started firing without warning. People in the front rows fell to the ground, killed or wounded, and the rest of us lay on the ground. The shooting continued for almost two hours with brief breaks. "
Some American officials believe U.S.-trained security forces may have taken part in the slaughter. That may be hard to prove, but in recent years the United States has trained numerous Uzbek military units. In addition, Uzbekistan has received tens of millions of dollars' worth of U.S. arms transfers since 2001, according to the World Policy Institute.
In light of recent developments, many
Ariel Cohen, a Eurasia analyst with the arch-conservative Heritage Foundation, has written that the administration must reassess its relationship with Karimov, given that his reliance on violence and repression "pushes Uzbeks, out of desperation, to resort to violence, and possibly embrace Islamic radicalism."
After completing a recent fact-finding trip to Uzbekistan, Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona told The Washington Post that "efforts to bring about democracy have hit a wall and are going backwards." He said the United States has an interest in "restricting our relations with brutal governments," adding that Karimov "must understand" that the Andijan killings "come with real consequences."
But so far, the Bush administration has given a free ride to Karimov, as it does (literally) to Sudan's genocide suspects.
It's hard not to wonder whether we're going to wake up one day and realize that we're being taken for a ride--by tyrants and gangsters who have figured out that the people governing our country are willing to trash our principles for next to nothing.
ON THE NET: Human Rights Watch on Uzbekistan: hrw.org/english/docs/2005/06/07/uzbeki11077.htm
Congressional Research Service on Darfur: fas.org/man/crs/RL32643.pdf
RICK MERCIER is a writer and news editor