Pubdate: Mon, 27 Aug 2001 Source: Guardian, The (UK) Copyright: 2001 Guardian Newspapers Limited Contact: http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardian/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/175 RACE CONCESSIONS FAIL TO APPEASE U.S. UN Organisers Drop Controversial Proposals On Zionism And Slavery Reparations But Americans May Still Boycott World Racism Summit The United States says it may still boycott the UN world conference against racism which opens in South Africa this week despite the dropping of proposals to equate Zionism with racism and the abandoning of demands for reparations for slavery and colonialism. President George Bush said his administration is still undecided because the tone of the conference documents on Israel remains "pretty discriminatory" and that the US is not prepared to allow the meeting "to isolate our friend and strong ally". "We have made it very clear through [the US secretary of state] Colin Powell's office that we will have no representative there so long as they pick on Israel," Mr Bush said. "We will not participate in a conference that tries to isolate Israel and denigrates Israel." The issue has undermined western backing for the conference as have demands from African nations for an admission that the trans- Atlantic slave trade was a crime against humanity and calls for reparations - both of which have now been dropped. The controversy has also angered the human rights organisations and special interest groups which open a parallel conference in Durban tomorrow, ahead of the start of the main meeting on Friday. Non-governmental organisations plan to push a host of issues, from accusations that America's 'war on drugs' is racist because it targets blacks and Latinos to demands by a group representing former Gurkha soldiers that the British government give them better treatment. Landless groups in southern Africa also plan to use the crisis in Zimbabwe to argue that ownership of land is a race issue. But activists warn that other important issues that affect millions of people are being overshadowed by the issues of Zionism and reparations, and helping governments to stifle public criticism of racism and discrimination in their own back yards. "Governments have been very unwilling to allow any discussion of things that will affect them," Smita Narula of the Human Rights Watch delegation said. "Most governments are coming to the table with an anti-agenda rather than an agenda, things they want to keep from discussion. The fomenting of ethnic tensions in countries like Indonesia and in so many African countries are not on the agenda. "There's also been a lot of horse-trading between the US, EU and others over issues like reparations; a lot of horse-trading by governments that want to keep the racial problems in their own back yard off the agenda." India has worked hard to sideline the issue of caste discrimination, which condemns about 250m people in south Asia to a life of degradation, abuse and even to murder. New Delhi's campaign has been so effective that the word caste does not appear anywhere in the conference documents. Instead, it is referred to euphemistically as "work and descent", on the grounds that under the caste system a person's descent decides their work. Switzerland proposed a clause for debate at the conference that would commit India and other governments to combat caste discrimination. But even though the Swiss paragraph was accepted at preparation meetings it was "inadvertently omitted" from the draft agenda. It has been put back on, but India is campaigning vigorously against its acceptance. "We believe that the caste issue is not linked to the main subject of this conference, which is racism. You cannot equate casteism with racism," said India's foreign minister, Omar Abdullah. However, even the Indian government's own statutory human rights commission says it is wrong. India largely got its way through a combination of Asian solidarity, the bullying of smaller nations such as Barbados, which initially agreed to sponsor scrutiny of the issue and then withdrew under pressure, and from horse-trading with the US and UK over the reparations issue. Initially the Indians sounded out the African delegations with a proposal for New Delhi to back the call for compensation for slavery in return for an African pledge to vote down any proposals that would embarrass India. But then the Indians got a better deal from the Americans, with the British tagging along. The US would shun the caste issue if the Indians opposed reparations. In a shameless about-face, New Delhi dumped the Africans for Washington. However, last week Nepal said it will defy India and press for the abolition of caste discrimination. The Chinese have worked as hard to keep Tibet off the agenda, with nearly as much success. The words Tibet, racism and human rights will appear on the UN documents but the issue will not receive much attention. China also succeeded in getting the New York-based organisation Human Rights in China barred from the conference. Beijing uses much the same arguments as New Delhi has in dismissing scrutiny of its treatment of Tibetans, by saying that political oppression is not racism, and it is purely an internal matter. But Ngawang Drakmargyapon of the Tibetan government in exile sees it very differently. "We believe we are suffering from a racist communist military occupation of Tibet," he said. "This sense of superiority in the minds of the Chinese authorities results in oppression of Tibetans. "Unfortunately much of the debate in the preparation process has been overshadowed by the reparations and slavery and colonialism, and the Zionism. No governments have said they will take up the issue of Tibet. Generally they don't." - --- MAP posted-by: Beth