Nicole Gruszka

Peng Yu
Intro to Diplomacy
October 5, 2015
Question 1
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights came from the
desire for a clear and explicit document that would act as an
international bill of rights to prevent atrocities like the ones
perpetrated during World War II from reoccurring. The drafting of this
historic document was ultimately put in the hands of a drafting
committee consisting of members of the Commission from eight
States, selected with due regard for geographical distribution and
headed by Eleanor Roosevelt (History of the Document).
The desire for such a document was ultimately a result of the
seemingly infinite new possibilities for the expansion of human rights
after the adoption of the United Nations Charter (Lauren 2011, pg.
195). This, in addition to the convictions of Nazi war criminals at the
Nuremberg Trials resulted in a climate where national sovereignty
was no longer the central guiding doctrine, but instead, the
prevention of future atrocities was (Lauren 2011, pg. 198-9).
As the idea of an inherent responsibility of all individuals
towards certain international duties to their fellow humans began to
replace that of national sovereignty (Lauren 2011, pg. 202), delegates
to the United Nations began to attempt to define these duties. While
widespread disagreement on what these duties were existed, (Lauren

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2011, pg. 203-4), the resulting consensus was that these rights were
to be both ends in themselves as well as means towards larger
security, peace, and justice (Lauren 2011, pg. 204). It is with this
central ideal in mind that the drafting committee composed the
Declaration, which was adopted by the General Assembly on
December 10th, 1948 (History of the Document).
Question 2
Despite nearing the 67th anniversary of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights, rampant human rights violations and
abuses continue to occur on a global scale.
The self-proclaimed Islamic State, also referred to as ISIL
(Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant), has garnered international
attention and become a veritable threat to both international security
and international human rights. The militant group has committed a
plethora of atrocities, some of which may constitute genocide, crimes
against humanity, and war crimes as they target Yezidis, Christians,
Turkmen, Sabea-Mandeans, Kakae, Kurds and Shia, minority groups
within Iraq, with the motivation of extermination towards the Yezidis
(Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights [OHCHR] 2015,
pg. 5). These brutalities have provoked a rare response from the
United States, with President Obama commenting that the August
2014 slaughter of innocent Yezidi men, women, and children may
constitute a potential act of genocide (qtd. in Wilson Center 2015).

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The actions of the Islamic State and other conflicts in the Middle
East have led to massive consequences outside of the region: 137,947
people have become displaced due to the conflicts and are now
seeking asylum in Europe (United Nations Human Rights Council
[UNHRC] 2015), leading to an international refugee crisis ("Global
response to terrorism vital for solving refugee crisis, European
leaders tell UN", 2015) which has been deemed by UN High
Commissioner for Refugees Antnio Guterres as beyond irreparable
(qtd. in Grant, 2015). This emergency has provoked a variety of
responses; some where the rights guaranteed by the UDHR namely
those of security of person, freedom of movement, and asylum from
persecution (United Nations 1948, art. 3, 13, 14) have been
honored, and some where these rights have been violated, such as in
Hungarys widely condemned response, where refugees were
detained and harassed (Kounalakis 2015). The widespread and welldocumented nature of the crisis has forced the international
community to attempt to act as one, to, in the words of Swedish prime
minister Stefan Lfvn, come together to ensure that those fleeing
war and repression are treated in a safe, orderly and dignified way
(qtd. in "Global response to terrorism vital for solving refugee crisis,
European leaders tell UN", 2015).
Question 3

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Statements by the United States regarding the progression and
protection of human rights tend to center around global instances of
violation and abuse, as exemplified by one of the latest U.S.
statements at the general debate of the Human Rights Council, where
Ambassador Keith Harper drew attention to the human rights
violations caused by the conflict in Yemen and those perpetrated by
the Thai government (Harper, 2015). However, discussion at the
recently concluded annual Human Dimension Implementation
Meeting (HDIM) has led to both additional American commentary on
international abuses, and commentary on the ongoing issues within
the United States borders.
The HDIM for Organization for Security and Co-operation in
Europe (OSCE) member states, partners, and relevant
nongovernmental organizations (OSCE 2015) featured a working
session titled Combating hate crimes and ensuring effective
protection against discrimination, which United States attended. At
this session, David J. Kramer, the head of the American delegation,
remarked on the especially timely nature of the session due to the
recent racially-motivated mass shooting at a traditionally Black South
Carolina church, the murder conviction of the perpetrator of an antiSemitic killing outside a Jewish community center, and the increase in
anti-Muslin and anti-perceived Muslim hate crimes within the United
States. Kramer acknowledges the painfully apparent reality that the

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U.S. continues to wrestle with the heavy legacy of racism and
discrimination, the ugly reality of hate, and the terrible human cost of
hate crimes. Rather than propose new solutions for this age-old
problem, Kramer highlights the current policies of the United States
regarding these hate crimes, as well as the United States promotion
of anti-discriminatory measures abroad. Predictably, Kramer moves on
to a condemnation of international human rights abuses, such as
those facing LGBTI individuals in the Near East, as well as antiMuslim and anti-Semitic violence in Europe (Kramer 2015).
At a later HDIM session, this time titled Rights of persons
belonging to national minorities; Preventing aggressive nationalism,
racism and chauvinism, however, U.S. Ambassador Daniel B. Baer
lacked Kramers introspection, instead focusing on abuses within
OSCE states. Baer condemned the discrimination against ethnic
Ukrainians, Jews, Catholics, Orthodox Christians outside the
jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate, and members of the
Crimean Tatar community in Russian-occupied Crimea. Baer
similarly criticizes the abuses faced by ethnic Georgians in the
occupied regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia and the lack of
Latin-script education for children in Moldovas Transniestrian
region. In his concluding statements, Baer offers a hopeful reminder
of the Helsinki Final Acts 40th anniversary and a somber one of the

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20th anniversary of the genocide at Srebrenica, which he calls its
worst single transgression (Baer 2015).
Question Four
The American criminal justice system is plagued by police
brutality, poor prison conditions, racial and class bias, harsh
sentencing, and overly severe sentences for children (Amnesty
International 2015). These crippling problems ultimately create a
system where justice is rare, and those least able to defend their
rights in court or through the political process are the people most
likely to suffer abuses (Human Rights Watch 2015). The failures of
this system are best illustrated through the case of Michael Brown.
The shooting death of Brown, an unarmed black teenager, at the
hands of a white police officer sparked widespread protest, a right
guaranteed by both the U.S. constitution (Philadelphia Convention
1789, amend. 1) and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
(United Nations 1948, art. 20). Rather than this right being respected,
the police force responded with the use of heavy-duty riot gear
military-grade weapons and equipment rubber bullets, tear gas and
other aggressive dispersal tactics in order to intimidate protesters
(Amnesty International, 2015), ultimately resulting in community
unease and distrust towards law enforcement.
The United States has also faced scrutiny for its policies
regarding immigration. From October 2013 through September

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2014, US Customs and Border Protection apprehended 68,541
unaccompanied children from Central America and Mexico who had
fled to the US fearing for their lives ("World Report 2015: United
States", 2015). Ultimately, the majority of these children were
detained for days or weeks in insanitary facilities and without
access to legal counsel, translators or proper medical attention
(Amnesty International, 2015) prior to their deportation. Despite the
right to asylum guaranteed in the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights (United Nations, 1948 art. 14), the United States has been
known to deny [asylum seekers] release on bond even when [they
are found] to have a credible fear of returning to their countries
(Human Rights Watch, 2015).
Arguably, the most atrocious infringement by the United States
government on human rights and international law is the illegal
torture, detainment, and enforced disappearance of countless
individuals in the name of counter-terrorism, as revealed by a 499page redacted executive summary of a 6,700-page report on the
Central Intelligence Agencys (CIA) detention and interrogation
program released by the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee (Human
Rights Watch, 2015) detailing the enforced disappearances and
torture rampant in the program (Amnesty International 2014).
Through this program, the U.S. has violated countless rights
mentioned in the UDHR, including the right to be free from torture

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or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, arbitrary arrest,
detention or exile, and the right to a standard of living adequate for
the health and well-being of himself and of his family (United Nations
1948, art. 9, 5, 25). Additionally, the enforced disappearances of the
victims of this program are in blatant violation of the International
Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced
Disappearance, which states that [n]o one shall be subjected to
enforced disappearance, and [n]o exceptional circumstances
whatsoever may be invoked as a justification for enforced
disappearance (International Convention for the Protection of All
Persons from Enforced Disappearance 1992, art. 1), rendering the
American justification of national security threat (Amensty
International, 2014) ultimately irrelevant in the eyes of the law.

Works Cited
Amnesty International. Report 2014/15: United States. 2015.
Amnesty International World Report.
Amnesty International. USA: We tortured some folks: The Wait
for Truth, Remedy, and Accountability Continues as Redaction Issue
Delays Release of Senate Report on CIA Detentions. 2014. Amnesty
International.

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Global Response to Terrorism Vital for Solving Refugee Crisis,
European Leaders Tell UN. 2015. UN News Center.
Grant, Harriet. 2015. UN Agencies 'Broke and Failing' in Face
of Ever-Growing Refugee Crisis. The Guardian.
Harper, Keith. 2015. U.S. Item 10 General Debate Statement
At Human Rights Council. US Mission Geneva.
History Of the Document. The Universal Declaration of
Human Rights .
Human Rights Watch. US: For-Profit Probation Tramples Rights
Of Poor. 2014. Human Rights Watch.
Human Rights Watch. World Report 2015: United States.
2015. Human Rights Watch.
Kramer, David J. 2015. Session 12 - Combating Hate Crimes
and Ensuring Effective Protection against Discrimination. U.S.
Mission to the OSCE.
Lauren, Paul Gordon. 2011. Proclaiming a Vision: The
Universal Declaration Of Human Rights. In The Evolution of
International Human Rights: Visions Seen, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania:
University of Pennsylvania Press, 195211.
Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human
Rights. Report Of the Office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Human Rights on the Human Rights Situation in

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Iraq in the Light of Abuses Committed by the so-Called Islamic State
in Iraq and the Levant and Associated Groups. 2015. United Nations.
Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe. Human
Dimension Implementation Meeting 2015. 2015. OSCE.
United Nations. The United Nations And the Human Person:
Universal Declaration of Human Rights. 1948. Champaign, Illinois:
Project Gutenberg.
United Nations Human Rights Council. UNHCR Syria Regional
Refugee Response. 2015. United Nations.
Wilson Center. Report: ISIS Human Rights Abuses In 2014.
2015. Wilson Center.