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Euro-MP chastises Human Rights Watch Report |
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Friday, 01 July 2005 |
 I was absolutely taken aback, when the "Islamic Republic of Iran News
Network TV (2005/06/18, 10.30 AM) showed Mr. Gary Sick, presented as
"Adviser of Carter's administration" commenting on Iranian electoral
process.
Paulo Casaca
Member of European Parliament
Co-Chairman of the Iran Inter parliamentary Group "Friends of a Free Iran"
Brussels, 23 June 2005
Dear Mr. Kenneth Roth,
Although you did not bother to give me any reply yet to my previous
letters questioning the independence of your "inquiry" regarding the
main opposition organisation in Iran, the PMOI/MEK I have to admit that
your organisation does not cease to surprise me.
As we are all aware, the Iranian regime organised farcical "elections"
where only a handful of regime appointed candidates could stand, where
all international monitoring was forbidden and where massive fraud and
rigging took place.
Fortunately, some Western leaders were not afraid of loosing juicy
economic contracts from the Iranian regime and said loudly what
freedom, democracy and human rights believers think about this
disgraceful exercise, indeed in a very timely manner.
President George Bush, regardless of what we might think of him and his
policies, certainly deserves to be praised by his clear-cut
denunciations of the Iranian electoral farce and his support for
democracy and the rule of law in this country.
As we all know, the Iranian theocratic regime did not quite appreciate
these declarations, amongst other things, because it is not in a
position to jail, torture and murder its author contrarily to what it
does indoors with its fellow citizens.
I was absolutely taken aback, however, when the "Islamic Republic of
Iran News Network TV (2005/06/18, 10.30 AM) showed that Mr. Gary Sick,
presented as "Adviser of Carter's administration" said:
"Personally, I was very concerned that Bush chose such a timing for attacking Iran's political and electoral system".
"We were observing real competition between the candidates and Bush
must have talked wisely and not released a too-early statement".
This, of course, is a summing up of what the various Iranian theocratic
regime publicists said about President Bush declarations.
It is certainly important for anyone to understand where Mr. Gary Sick
political agenda lies. It should be only a problem of major concern for
American electors. However, it happens that this very same Mr. Gary
Sick is chairman of the Middle East Advisory Board of "Human Rights
Watch", the very same organisation that published a report attacking
the PMOI/MEK.
That is, "Human Rights Watch" commissioned, to a declared and engaged
militant for the cause of the Iranian regime, the supervision of a
report on the supposed human rights violations committed by the main
opposition to that very same regime.
It is no wonder that the report closely follows Iranian regime officials' briefings on this organisation.
We are therefore facing a declared violation of basic rules concerning
conflicts of interest, transparency and indeed human rights values
commitment from your organisation.
I consider your position inadmissible.
I believe you should have made a choice between being a political
engaged organisation to support political regimes (specially, when the
human rights records of these regimes are like the Iranian) or to be a
credible and objective organisation overseeing human rights, the
incompatibility between both being obvious.
I invite you to publicly disclose your political links to the Iranian
regime, so that we can better understand the reasons of your report.
(Paulo Casaca)
Co-Chairman, Friends of a Free Iran (Inter parliamentary Group) |
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