Inter Press Service - August 23, 2001
Thalif Deen

All three issues, the U.S.-based groups said, have been marginalised in the agenda of the World Conference Against Racism, scheduled to begin next week in Durban, South Africa.

The coalition vowed to encourage the thousands of participants expected at the Aug. 31-Sep. 7 Durban conference to examine the issue of pervasive racism in U.S. drug enforcement policies.

"There is inherent racism in the enforcement of U.S. drug policy," the Campaign to End Race Discrimination in the War on Drugs stated.

In a letter to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the coalition of more than 100 religious, civic, and congressional leaders said that the "drug war is one of the most serious obstacles to achieving racial justice both in the United States and internationally."

According to Human Rights Watch, African-Americans accounted for about 62 percent of drug offenders sent to U.S. prisons in 1996, the most recent year for which statistics are available - although blacks made up only 12 percent of the U.S. population.

Turning to the issue of caste, Human Rights Watch faulted the United Nations for ignoring this pervasive and pernicious global phenomenon.

The New York-based rights group said that Dalits - the so-called "untouchables" of South Asia suffer from caste-based discrimination not only in India, as many are aware, but also in neighbouring Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.

"Caste-based discrimination blights the lives of hundreds of millions of people around the world, and the World Conference Against Racism should have the issue squarely on its agenda," it said.

"Apartheid may have ended in South Africa, but at least 250 million people worldwide are still living in a situation of segregation and servitude," Smita Narula, author of the report, said.

A 73-page draft Programme of Action, to be finalised at the Durban talks, does not make any reference to caste-based discriminiation.

Human Rights Watch accused the Indian government of trying to censor discussion of caste, both at the conference and at all preparatory meetings leading to it.

"India has used political and economic influence over other countries to pressure them into a partnership of silence."

"They have sent numerous people to non-governmental meetings who had clearly received a brief to argue the government's side, and have used influence within U.N. human rights bodies to sabotage any reference to caste in conference documents," it said.

India's official position was reflected in a statement made by Attorney General Soli Sorabjee who argued that caste is an internal matter.

The Indian government also has said that having the caste issue on the agenda would "dilute" U.N. efforts to eliminate racism.

This argument was put forward earlier this year by Indian Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh, who said: "There has regrettably been an attempt by some to dilute the focus of the conference by broadening its scope to bring all forms of discrimination within its ambit. An attempt is being made to ascribe racial connotations to caste."

He also said: "We must ensure that the conference does not lose sight of its focus on racism. Racism should not be confused with discrimination in general."

Meanwhile, the Washington-based NGO Africa Action said that the global AIDS pandemic must be seen as a matter of international racism.

"The AIDS crisis - whose epicentre is Africa - is the harvest for an international system of global apartheid, where the consequences of racism, slavery and colonialism have, five centuries on, impoverished the African continent and left it on its own to combat the worst plague in human history." AIDS, it said, is the black plague. So while AIDS is a global threats that knows no borders and does not discriminate by race, it is mainly killing black people.

Africa Action said the racism conference should recognise that the resolution of the global AIDS pandemic is directly dependent upon the international fight against racism.

"It is the devaluation of black life that has enabled the Western world to turn its eyes away from this global health crisis," it added. "Of all of the struggles against racism that we will discuss in Durban, none has farther reaching consequences for the immediate future of our common humanity."
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