UN Looking at U.S. 'Racism'

Human Events, Jun 16, 2008 by North, Oliver

When the mainstream media don't want you to know something they simply spike the story-meaning they don't cover it. That's what's happened to the good news from Iraq. American heroes in flak jackets and helmets and their Iraqi counterparts are asserting rule of law for millions of grateful Iraqi civilians once tyrannized by Al Qaeda terrorists and Shiite militias. In short, we are winning. That's the good news that isn't news.

Then there is the bad news that isn't news. This includes stories about the United Nations' interfering in U.S. domestic politics, and Iranian nuclear ambitions and what the UN isn't doing about it. In case you missed these "non-stories," here's the short form of what didn't make the cut for the major newspapers or network evening news-and it's UN-believable.

First there's the strange case of Doudou Diene, the United Nations "Special Rappor1 teur" on "contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and related intolerance." He's a lawyer from Senegal, traveling first class on a UN ticket-and he arrived in the U.S. on May 19, for a three-week-long "fact finding trip."

According to the UN Human Rights Council, Mr. Diene is here to investigate alleged American human rights violations. His itinerary includes visits to New York, Chicago, Omaha, Los Angeles, New Orleans, Miami and San Juan, Puerto Rico "to gather firsthand information on issues related to racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and related intolerance." You couldn't make this stuff up.

Mr. Diene will submit his "report and recommendations" at the second "UN World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia, and Related Intolerance," in April 2009. Dubbed "Durban Ð"-it's a sequel to a 2001 gathering. The UN decided to hold next year's America/Israel bashing gabfest in Geneva instead of Durban because South Africa is being rocked by xenophobia and racial violence. If this were fiction, no one would believe it. It gets better.

It turns out that Mr. Diene-widely discussed as the next UN High Commissioner for Human Rights-has "written extensively" about "Islamophobia" since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. In a report to the UN Human Rights Council, he described Islamophobia as today's "most serious form of religious defamation."

To help make the phobia go away, the UN Committee on the Humiliation of Racial Discrimination has called for an end to "racial profiling" of Americans of Arab, Muslim and South Asian descent, referring to the practice as "mistreatment of immigrants and non-nationals." Somehow, Mr. Diene and his colleagues seem to have missed the fact that a black American of Muslim descent is a leading candidate for President of the United States.

Apparently, the pursuit of phobias, dis- . crimination and intolerance has distracted the UN from doing any real work-like that of reining in Iranian efforts to acquire nu- * clear weapons. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN security Council's toothless "nuclear watchdog," reported they cannot determine whether Iran has or ever had a nuclear weapons program.

The IAEA notes that "substantive explanations are required from Iran to support its statements on the alleged studies and on other information with a possible military dimension." The report observes, "alleged studies on the green salt project, high explosives testing and the missile re-entry vehicle project remain a matter of serious concern.

The "green salt" reference pertains to crystals of uranium hexafluoride, a radioactive material that can be refined in a gas centrifuge to produce U-235-the essential ingredient for one type of nuclear weapon. According to the IAEA, Iran has 3,500 uranium-enrichment centrifuges operating at its Natanz underground nuclear facility..

None of this was deemed by the potentates of the press to be front-page news. Neither was the Iranian reaction to the IAEA report. AIi Larijani, Iran's former "nuclear negotiator" and now the speaker of Parliament, said that the UN report was "deplorable" and suggested "new limits on cooperation with the IAEA." His comments were greeted with chants of "God is great" and "Death to America." That's not UN-believable-just UN-reported.

Lt. Col. North (Ret.) is a nationally syndicated columnist and the author of the FOX News/Regnery books, " War Stories: Opfration Iraqi Freedom," "War Stories II: Heroism in the Pacific and "War Stories III: The Heroes Who Defeated Hitler."