As published several days ago in NP, just because truth is important:
South Sudan Clarity
Re: ‘Selfish’ UN is picking on Quebec, June 19
Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, complains that the Quebec legislature’s move to rein in massive street protests and campus blockades by students is an example of human rights abuses similar to those committed by North Korea, Zimbabwe, and South Sudan.
As most people know, this is bizarre in the extreme. However, to add South Sudan to North Korea and Zimbabwe reveals an astounding ignorance of world affairs. Sadly, there are human rights abuses in South Sudan, but to say that South Sudan is a human rights violator, belonging to a triumvirate of violators, is not right.
Shortly after South Sudan seceded from Sudan, the new president, Salva Kiir Mayardit, warned the military and police that rape, torture, and other human rights violations carried out by armed personnel would be considered criminal acts and prosecuted aggressively by the Ministry of Justice. The mostly Christian and Animist South Sudan seceded from Sudan largely to escape human rights violations perpetrated by Sudan.
George van Popta
Ottawa
