US’ DOUBLE STANDARDS, HYPOCRISY

A self-proclaimed leader in upholding human rights, the US government is once again at it – trying to bully Rwanda. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Rwanda on August 10-11, where he will meet with senior government officials and civil society members to discuss shared priorities, including peacekeeping, the Department of State announced.

 

As noted, Blinken will focus on the role the government of Rwanda can play in reducing tensions and ongoing violence in eastern DRC. 

 

“He will also raise democracy and human rights concerns, including transnational repression, limiting space for dissent and political opposition, and the wrongful detention of U.S. Lawful Permanent Resident Paul Rusesabagina,” states the US Department of State.

 

The US government’s hypocrisy as regards the case of the terror convict called Rusesabagina has been expounded by many.

 

In a statement welcoming Blinken to Rwanda, Kigali noted that: “On the case of Rwandan citizen Paul Rusesabagina, on which we had engaged the United States for more than a decade, Rwanda welcomes the opportunity to once again make clear that his arrest and conviction for serious crimes against Rwandan citizens (alongside 20 other accomplices in the same trial), while residing in the United States, were lawful under both Rwandan and international law.”

 

For now, let’s dissect the element of how a US government official would dare raise democracy and human rights concerns with officials in a country like Rwanda, or any other democracies around the world.

 

US officials are like loose cannons with their double standards and hypocrisy in lecturing and pillorying other countries’ human rights shortcomings as if  the US has the moral and ethical superiority on this matter.

 

Their country is NOT the world’s human rights judge and role model.  

 

The US hardly befits a nation that is a role model of democracy and human rights to be emulated by other countries. Relative to its size and power, the US, at the moment, is the most brazen and impertinent guilty party in the international human rights community.

 

However, it is not ashamed to castigate other countries across the world for their human rights deficiencies as if it has the moral ascendancy and credibility to do so, given that it does not practice what it preaches. 

 

The US is far from being righteous given its blatant dismal human rights record within its borders and beyond. Blinken lecturing Rwandan officials on democracy and human rights is a farce. The US doesn’t have the moral ascendancy and integrity given its gloomy human rights record.

 

Note that the US is the only major world power that failed to fully adhere to any of the significant human rights instruments introduced by the UN or other rights bodies.

 

The US claims to be the champion of international human rights, yet it failed to ratify crucial human rights documents, such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights – part of the International Bill of Human Rights, and the American Convention on Human Rights.

 

The US has not ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), and has not ratified the first Optional Protocol of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

 

The US did not sign the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).

 

The US is not a state party to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (Rome Statute), which founded the International Criminal Court (ICC) in 2022 as a permanent international criminal court to bring to justice perpetrators of the worst crimes such as war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide when national courts are unable or unwilling to adjudicate these crimes.

 

While it is hasty to denounce and rebuke human rights violations beyond its borders, the US' human rights record is definitely far from ideal and in some cases, beyond belief.

 

Take the case of 26-year-old Patrick Lyoya who was shot in the head. On April 4, 2022, Lyoya, a refugee from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, was fatally shot in the back of the head by Officer Christopher Schurr of the Grand Rapids Police Department during a scuffle between the two in Grand Rapids, Michigan, US.

 

The young man was shot in the head while pinned down on the ground facing away from the police officer. There is video footage of the incident. The white police officer did not shoot the “black” man in self-defence.

 

There are similar cases of police brutality against men and women of colour in the US. The likes of George Floyd, Michael Brown, Breonna Taylor, and Jacob Blake were all killed although they were unarmed and defenseless at the time.

 

Between 2013 and May 2021, American police killed over 9,000 people; not counting the post-May 2022 incidents of police brutality in the US. In 2021 alone, at least 1,124 people died from police brutality in the US. Most victims committed non-violent crimes or no crime at all.

 

America is the country with the highest number of cases of police brutality.  

US gun violence-related crimes have risen in recent years. In 2022 alone, the US witnessed 21,000 people killed or injured due to gun violence, of which more than 14,000 were minor shootings while more than 130 were mass shootings. In 2021, there were 693 mass shootings, 10.1 percent higher than in 2020. More than 44,000 people were killed in gun violence.

 

The public security situation in the US has gone downhill. Incidents happen almost every day, and the human rights situation in the US is worsening by the day. Rwandan officials need to raise these issues with Blinken.

 

The atrocities against African Americans and Native Americans who are subjected to police abuse, including non-lethal force, arbitrary arrests, detentions, and harassment, at higher levels than Whites are on the rise daily.

 

The wars waged by the US in countries like Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria alone have caused so many deaths and caused more than 20 million people to become either refugees or migrants. 

 

During the US withdrawal of its troops from Afghanistan, a US drone killed 10 members of an Afghan family, including seven children, among which the youngest was only two years old.

 

To date, the US still holds 39 detainees at the Guantanamo high-security prison. The facility, according to the UN, is a site of “unparalleled notoriety” and its continued operation is a stain on the US government’s commitment to the rule of law.

 

“Twenty years of practising arbitrary detention without trial accompanied by torture or ill treatment is simply unacceptable for any government, particularly a government which has a stated claim to protecting human rights,” said independent experts, appointed by the UN Human Rights Council.

 

When will the US stop lecturing other countries and instead, look in a mirror, and take responsibility and address its dismal human rights record within its borders and beyond? Instead of lecturing other countries on their human rights shortcomings, the US should first address its human rights situation. Consequently, the US is in no position to criticize Rwanda for any shortcomings, if there are any.

 

Rwandans are by far the best judge on their country’s democracy and rights situation. Consequently, US leaders cannot teach Rwanda anything about democracy and human rights. Any attempt by Blinken, or any other Western or US politician, to try lecture Rwanda on human rights and democracy is utter disrespect, and a violation of Rwanda’s sovereignty. Rwandan officials must NOT allow it.

 

Every country has its contextual realities. Rwanda must never subscribe to Western democracy. Rwanda chose consensual democracy, and its own home grown solutions because of its context and history. Rwanda’s formula has worked for Rwandans.

 

As regards human rights, Rwanda does not violate human rights. Blinken should, instead, focus his energy at his country’s  very poor human rights record.

 

Limiting space for dissent and political opposition is another topic Blinken will pretend his country is a model. Here the US just wants to impose on Rwanda criminals intent on pushing foreign interests. The likes of Rusesabagina and Victoire Umuhoza Ingabire are good examples. The latter are not worth being called ‘political opposition’. They are tools of Western imperialism. Again, in Rwanda, there is no room for ethnic division – which was the root cause of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. And there is no room for promotion of genocide ideology and hate speech.

 

The US knows that its ‘agents’ such as the likes of Ingabire, Rusesabagina and some so-called ‘social media influencers’, are determined to promote the ills Rwanda is fighting against. The reason former US President Donald Trump was suspended, permanently, from using social media platforms, is the same reason why the likes of Ingabire find themselves at odds with Rwandan law.

 

In 2021, Twitter suspended Trump from its platform due to the risk of incitement of violence. It took an assault on Congress for Facebook and Twitter to draw a line on Trump. Twitter's decision followed two tweets by Trump that would end up being his last. The tweets violated the company's policy against glorification of violence, Twitter said.

 

“Rwanda looks forward to a robust exchange of views on governance and human rights, as has always been the case in the Rwanda-U.S. bilateral relationship,” reads part of the Rwandan government statement announcing and welcoming Blinken’s visit.