Amnesty: Human Rights A 9/11 Victim

The United States and governments around the world have used the post-Sept. 11 war on terrorism to erode human rights and stifle political dissent, Amnesty International said Tuesday.

In its annual state-of-the-world report, the organization said emergency anti-terrorist legislation and changes to trial and detention procedures had contributed to an atmosphere of repression and undermined universal principles of human rights.

"What happened on Sept. 11 was a crime against humanity, a gross human rights violation of thousands of people," said Amnesty's secretary-general, Irene Khan.

However, she said, "in the days, weeks and months that followed, governments around the world eroded human rights in the name of security and anti-terrorism."

Among the worrying developments, Amnesty said, were a U.S. proposal to try some terrorist suspects before military tribunals and new laws in several nations — including the United States, Britain and Canada — making it easier to deport or detain foreign suspects.

The London-based rights group said countries from India and Pakistan to Malaysia and Singapore had introduced repressive security legislation in the aftermath of Sept. 11.

"Human rights were traded away in almost all parts of the world," Khan said. "Democratic states jumped on the bandwagon almost as rapidly as authoritarian regimes."

The report, which records human rights abuses in 152 countries during the year 2001, said Sept. 11 had spawned an atmosphere in which countries like the United States were unwilling to criticize anti-terrorist allies with poor human rights records.

"Countries like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Russia escaped international scrutiny, undermining the universality of human rights," Khan said.

Khan said the United States was setting a poor example by refusing to class Taliban and al Qaeda suspects held at the U.S. Navy's Guantanamo Bay base in Cuba as prisoners of war, which would grant them rights under the Geneva Conventions.

"A very dangerous message is sent when the pillars (of human rights) are attacked," she said. "The edifice could crumble."

The United States says its tough measures are necessary to smash al Qaeda and prevent future terrorist attacks like those in New York and Washington.

In the aftermath of Sept. 11, U.S. authorities gained new powers of search, detention and surveillance. More than 1,100 people, mostly Arab or Muslim men, have been detained as part of an effort to find links to terrorists. Some have been held in solitary confinement.

Britain also has detained a small number of people under laws that allow some suspects to be held indefinitely without charge or trial.

"One option is to call Sept. 11 a fluke and to live in a dream world that requires us to do nothing different," U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft told a Senate committee earlier this year. "The other option is to fight back."

Amnesty also said the United States and its allies "may have breached the rules of war" by bombing civilians during the military campaign in Afghanistan, and said the United States and Britain "rode roughshod" over human rights by not investigating abuse allegations.

Amnesty said many rights violations around the world had been overlooked "in the glare of Sept. 11," from extrajudicial killings in Colombia and massacres by Islamic militants in Algeria to the mistreatment of asylum seekers in Europe and Australia.

The group said many countries had reported a racist backlash against Arabs and Muslims in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks, and a rise in attacks on Jews as the Middle East crisis worsened.

Amnesty did find some reason for optimism. The number of countries that impose the death penalty fell from 40 in 1997 to 27 last year.

Amnesty said there was evidence of confirmed or possible extrajudicial killings by government forces or groups in 47 countries last year, down from 61 a year earlier.

The group found cases of torture and ill-treatment in 111 countries, down from 125 in 2000.

By JILL LAWLESS