The Wednesday Watch
Analysis and Commentary from UN Watch in Geneva
Wednesday, 20 October 2004
Issue 123
News: Jean Ziegler, the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to food,
announced at a UN conference last Thursday that he had written to Romano
Prodi, President of the European Commission, to demand suspension of its
trade accord with Israel. "Grave violations of the [Palestinians'] right to
food have been recorded, they are clear, this accord must be suspended."
Ziegler further declared that he will be writing again to the next
President, Jose Manuel Durao Barroso (who takes over next month), to repeat
his boycott demand.
Analysis: Jean Ziegler has been waging a public relations war against
Israel ever since his appointment four years ago, and now he has escalated
his efforts to a trade war. His demand that Europe boycott Israel follows a
similar demand sent in May to a major U.S. corporation. UN Watch has been
at the forefront of exposing Ziegler 's astonishing bias, and continues to
fight for an end to his cynical abuse of a noble position. (
http://unwatch.org/speeches/ZieglerFocus.html )
When he should be speaking out for the hungry of Burundi, Chad, or Liberia -
places that actually do rank as Food Emergencies - Ziegler is instead
preoccupied with vilifying Israel for, as he puts it, starving the
Palestinians. His accusations will resonate with certain audiences. Yet it
carries one minor flaw: whatever genuine problems do exist in the West Bank
and Gaza, starvation is simply not one of them. In fact, by any
comparative measure, Palestinians are eating far better than neighboring
populations. If one looks at the percentage of underweight children - the
most meaningful cross-country comparable indicator - the UN's 2003 Human
Development Report reports that the West Bank and Gaza has the lowest rate
(3%) compared with any state in the Arab Middle East, East Asia, the
Pacific, South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and Latin America (except Chile).
Yet a country like North Korea (60%) has never been targeted by a single
Ziegler boycott letter.
The truth about Ziegler, as a simple Google search will reveal, is that his
"right to food" activities are in fact initiated as part of orchestrated
political campaigns. Not coincidentally, Ziegler, who resides in
Switzerland, sent his May
www.unwatch.org/Removal_Proceedings/ZieglerBoycottLetter.pdf 2004 boycott
letter to Caterpillar three days after a political
http://www.urgencepalestine.ch/caterpillar_manif/index.htm "action" notice
was issued against this corporation by "Collectif Urgence Palestine" - a
Swiss group, dedicated to boycotting Israel, with which Mr. Ziegler has been
active. Mr. Ziegler's letter was then promptly posted on the website of
this group's boycott
http://www.urgencepalestine.ch/caterpillar_manif/index.htm campaign. How
many other boycott letters Ziegler has sent is a mystery. Their target is
not.
It was telling on Friday that when reporters in Brussels asked the European
Commission to respond to Ziegler's latest boycott demand, they innocently
described him as "the Special Rapporteur on Palestine" - not realizing this
position is properly held by another individual (John Dugard, no great Lover
of Zion he). Then again, Ziegler doesn't seem to realize that either.
In July, UN Watch filed a
www.unwatch.org/Removal_Proceedings/UN_WatchPetitionReZiegler.pdf brief
with the Chairman of the Commission on Human Rights requesting Ziegler be
removed for blatantly violating his obligations to act with impartiality,
non-selectivity and objectivity. The Commission has yet to reply. Meantime,
a UN Watch delegation led by its Chairman, Amb. Alfred H. Moses, met last
week with Louise Arbour, the new High Commissioner of Human Rights, to urge
that she do her part against Ziegler's wrongdoing.
But if the UN rights experts are independent, and accountable only to the
Commission's 53 member states, why should High Commissioner Arbour, who
presides over a department of professional staff, be required to play any
role here?
Two reasons. First, to ensure that her staff cease providing any support
related to Ziegler's unauthorized activities. That means her human rights
officers must be instructed to refuse to help Ziegler with his unauthorized
boycott campaign. Second, to clarify that while Ziegler sends his boycott
letters under the letterhead of "United Nations High Commissioner for Human
Rights," he in fact speaks for himself only. True, these are only two
small steps. But they would prevent the dangerous inference that the High
Commissioner supports Ziegler's unlawful activities. More, they would send
the right message that the world's human rights victims are owed nothing
less than the integrity of the UN mechanisms created for their benefit.
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