Klaus Hart Brasilientexte

2008 is the 60th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights. According to the Guinness Book of Records, it is the document which has been translated into the largest number of languages “ approximately 330. It is also the least respected worldwide.
In 2009 it will be 220 years since the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, proclaimed by the French Revolution in 1789.Between 1898 and 1994 the USA who pose as the champions of democracy and accuse other countries of not respecting human rights, overthrew 48 governments in Latin America, amongst which Brazil™s Joáo Goulart in 1964. (Do you know why there has never been a coup in the US? – because there is no American Embassy there).

http://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2009/12/12/folter-ohne-ende-tortura-sem-fim-brasiliens-soziologiezeitschrift-sociologia-uber-folter-unter-der-lula-regierung/

Ever since September 11 the Bush government has authorised the kidnapping and torture of persons suspected of terrorism and transported in secret flights from Europe to the naval base at Guantanamo in Cuba where they are kept prisoner.The base was occupied by American troops during the war between USA and Cuba in 1898. In 1903 it was rented for a little over US$5000 a year but Havana has never cashed the cheques sent by Washington. An agreement in 1934 says that the 116 square kilometres™ area can only return to Cuban sovereignty after negotiations between the two countries whose diplomatic relations have been broken since 1961 when the Kennedy government failed to overthrow the new revolutionary regime by sending 10,000 mercenaries to the Bay of Pigs.Until June 2008 the Guantanamo prisoners had no access to the elementary principles of Law, such as habeas corpus, an institution which dates back to 1215. Luckily, the Supreme Court has defeated Bush and pulled the prisoners in Guantanamo out of the judicial limbo they had been in.In 2002 lawyer Jonathan Fredman, a CIA advisor, recommended that the Pentagon authorise the torture of terrorism suspects with methods such as simulated drowning, deprivation of the senses, forced nudity and exploitation of phobias which the then secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld accepted.When questioned the following year, Janis Karpinski, commander general of the Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad, admitted that ”Rumsfeld authorised these specific techniques. In February 2007 Alberto Gonzales who was then Bush™s secretary for justice declared that ”perhaps the Geneva Convention (which prohibits torture) has become obsolete. In February 2008 when called to testify in Congress, Michael Hayden, director of the CIA, blatantly admitted that ”simulated drowning was only used on three prisoners.Although considered a crime which is hideous and for which bail is denied, torture continues to be practised in Brazil, especially by the civil and military police. Do they learn anything about human rights in their training, which is sponsored by the government?

*Frei Betto is a writer, author of ”Sobre a Esperança (About Hope) (Papyrus) written together with Mario Sergio Cortella. http://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2008/05/16/kirchliche-menschenrechtsaktivisten-brasiliens-enttauscht-uber-angela-merkel-keine-offentliche-stellungnahme-zu-folter-und-todesschwadronen-terror-und-gewalt-gegen-umwelt-und-menschenrechtsaktivist/ACAT – Christliche Aktion zur Abschaffung der Folter – „Folter wie im Irak“: http://www.ila-web.de/brasilientexte/menschenrechte.htmhttp://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2008/03/09/jeder-vierte-brasilianer-wurde-verdachtige-foltern-neue-meinungsumfrage/http://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2008/08/08/ther-comes-the-fourth-fleet-befreiungstheologe-frei-betto/

http://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2008/02/02/medien-und-sozialexperten-brasilien-noch-kein-zivilisiertes-land/

http://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2008/08/17/gerald-steinacher-uber-ns-kriegsverbrecher-und-westliche-nachrichtendienste-nazis-auf-der-flucht/

http://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2008/08/14/adolf-hitler-und-georgien-heute/

http://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2008/07/24/50-jahre-bossa-nova-und-hitler-mussolini-die-ultrarechte-wo-standen-die-bossa-nova-stars-politisch/

http://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2008/04/23/weit-verbreitete-gleichgultigkeit-gegenuber-der-situation-in-lateinamerika-bischof-erwin-krautler-im-orf/

http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/sendungen/religionen/1201698/

http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/sendungen/religionen/1124312/

http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/sendungen/religionen/919048/

http://www.dradio.de/dkultur/sendungen/religionen/879347/