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BIANCA THE TORTURE EXPERT

 
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cyrus
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PostPosted: Fri Dec 09, 2005 7:35 pm    Post subject: BIANCA THE TORTURE EXPERT Reply with quote

BIANCA THE TORTURE EXPERT

by Amir Taheri
New York Post
December 9, 2005

http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/58481.htm

December 9, 2005 -- IT had all started as a rather pleasant, if not exciting evening. We had heard a speech from British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw once again trying to "explain" the evil of Islamofascim in pseudo-theological, rather than political, terms. But that had been compensated by the recitation of a poem of the great mystic poet Roumi by Iranian journalist Nazanin Ansari.

Apart from the usual contingent of "the great and the good," most of the 800 or so people present were media people and their friends, come to cheer or boo as the Foreign Press Association in London distributed its annual prizes.

The evening was of special interest to me not only because I had been one of the judges but also because so much of the news stories, articles, and radio and TV programs submitted for consideration dealt with issues that, in one way or another, had something to do with Islam and the Middle East. In fact almost two-thirds of the prizes eventually awarded went to items dealing with those issues.

But there was an even bigger reason why I was interested in the occasion. The FPA had decided to award its very first prize for a dialogue of cultures to Akbar Ganji, an Iranian investigative reporter who is on a hunger strike in Tehran's Evin Prison.

Together with several colleagues, I had been trying for months to persuade the Western media to take an interest in Ganji, a former Khomeinist revolutionary who is now campaigning for human rights and democracy. But we never got anywhere because of one small hitch: President Bush had spoken publicly in support of Ganji and called for his immediate release.

And that, as far as a good part of the Western media is concerned, amounts to a kiss of death. How could newspapers that portray Bush as the world's biggest "violator of human rights" endorse his call in favor of Ganji?

To overcome that difficulty, some of Ganji's friends had tried to persuade him to make a few anti-American, more specifically anti-Bush, pronouncements so that the Western media could adopt him as a "hero-martyr." Two years ago, similar advice had been given to Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian lawyer who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. She was made to understand one stark fact of contemporary life: You will not be accepted as a champion of human rights unless you attack the United States.

Ebadi had accepted the advice and used her address during the prize ceremony in Oslo to launch a bitter attack on the United States as the arch-violator of human rights. To the surprise of many Iranians, she had eulogized the 400 or so alleged terrorists held in Guantanamo Bay, but made no mention of the thousands of political prisoners, including some of her own friends and clients, who languish in mullah-run prisons throughout Iran.

Would Ganji adopt a similar tactic in order to get media attention in the West? The answer came last January and it was a firm no.

The result was that Ganji, probably the most outspoken and courageous prisoner of conscience in the Islamic Republic today, became a non-person for the Western media. Even efforts by the group Reporters Without Frontiers, and the International Press Institute, among other organizations of journalists, failed to change attitudes towards Ganji.

Hundreds of editorials have been published in major Western publications in sympathy with the prisoners in Guantanamo Bay or Abu Ghraib. But, to my knowledge, there has been none in support of Ganji or the thousands of political prisoners held by the mullahs.

So, it was heart-warming to see the FPA honor Ganji as a champion of freedom. An audio-message from Ganji's wife, smuggled out of Iran, was broadcast, creating the evening's highest moment.

But then things went pear-shape as a petite middle-aged lady dressed all in black was invited to come on stage to make a symbolic offer of the award to an absent Ganji. (The mullahs had not even allowed Ganji's wife to travel to London to attend the occasion.)

The lady in question was introduced as one Bianca Jagger, whose title is UNICEF Ambassador. What her day job is, however, is a mystery to me.

She started by telling us about her recent trips to Tehran and Damascus, presumably the two capitals of human rights that she likes best, and how she had been told "by officials and others" that she and other Westerners had "no moral authority" to talk about human rights and freedom.

She then proceeded by saying it is all very well to remember Ganji but that should not prevent us from remembering "those held in Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib, and all other secret prisons" that the United States is supposed to be running all over the world.

The rest of the little speech had nothing to do with Ganji and everything to do with the claim that the United States is drawing an almost sadistic pleasure by practicing torture. I couldn't believe my ears.

There was this caricature of a "UNICEF ambassador" equating Ganji — a man who has fought only with his pen — with men captured armed in hand on the battlefields of Afghanistan and Iraq.

Those men at least had access to lawyers and could be visited by the Red Cross. Ganji's lawyer, however, had himself become a prisoner after trying to defend his client.

Nor is the Red Cross, or anybody else, allowed to visit Ganji.

I was also surprised that the "UNICEF Ambassador" had no difficulty in equating the United States, which, after all, is a democracy with checks and balances, with the Islamic Republic in which a self-styled "Supreme Guide" claims to rule on behalf of God.

In his "Nichomachaean Ethics," Aristotle warns against any confusion of categories when it comes to good and evil. Translated into modern discourse, this means that imposing a moral equivalence in the name of multiculturalism — or the Nietzschean scheme of transcending good and evil — is a sign of crass immorality.

Having swallowed my anger, I gave the "UNICEF Ambassador" a piece of my mind. She seemed surprised. No one had ever told her such things, especially not in a polite society of dinner jackets and long robes. "Is Ganji the same as the alleged terrorists in Guantanamo Bay?" I asked.

"Well, yes, I mean no, I mean yes," she mumbled. "But they are all prisoners, aren't they?"

Having witnessed the verbal altercation, a colleague from the BBC filled me in on the background of the "UNICEF Ambassador." It seems that she had once been married to a British pop singer. And that, of course, is enough to qualify you as a "UNICEF Ambassador" touring the world, attacking Western democracies and flattering the tyrants of Tehran, Damascus and Havana among others.

Well, it had been a good evening. In the end, however, as the lady's husband had once crooned: I could get no satisfaction.
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asher



Joined: 03 Mar 2004
Posts: 305
Location: Portland, Oregon

PostPosted: Sun Dec 11, 2005 12:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Wow. And wow again.

The Western "news" media never cease to amaze me, even when I think I'm finally past the point of being amazed.

Well, it's interesting now to see the real story behind Shirin Ebadi's speech! It all makes sense now.
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