Tutu makes comparisons to apartheid

[bbloke]

There was an interesting article on the BBC site, where Archbishop Desmond Tutu has made comparisons between current trends within the USA and UK, and the situation in South Africa during the days of apartheid. He has called for the closure of the camp at Guantanamo Bay and he has voiced concerns about detention periods in the UK.

Speaking on the BBC's Today programme, Archbishop Tutu said he was alarmed that arguments used by the South African apartheid regime are now being used to justify anti-terror measures.

"It is disgraceful and one cannot find strong enough words to condemn what Britain and the United States and some of their allies have accepted," he said.

The respected clergyman said the rule of law had been "subverted horrendously" and he described the muted public outcry - particularly in America - as "saddening".

Archbishop Tutu also attacked Tony Blair's failed attempt to hold terrorist suspects in Britain for up to 90 days without charge.

"Ninety days for a South African is an awful deja-vu because we had in South Africa in the bad old days a 90-day detention law," he said.

Under apartheid, as at Guantanamo, people were held for "unconscionably long periods" and then released, he said.

"Are you able to restore to those people the time when their freedom was denied them? If you have evidence for goodness sake produce it in a court of law," he said.

"People with power have an incredible capacity for wanting to be able to retain that power and don't like scrutiny."

Archbishop Tutu's comments add to the mounting international pressure on US President Bush to close the detention centre at Guantanamo Bay.

The UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan, said on Thursday that America must close the camp "as soon as is possible".

I thought the comparison was interesting, and another reminder that we must not sleepwalk into an unpleasant state of home affairs.

 

[CaptainQuark]

…not to mention the apartheid practised by the Israelis against Palestinians, who are as much 2nd or 3rd class citizens in Israel as Africans were in South Africa!

 

[bbloke]

…not to mention the apartheid practised by the Israelis against Palestinians, who are as much 2nd or 3rd class citizens in Israel as Africans were in South Africa!

I won't disagree with you, that Palestinians have been very badly treated indeed! This is perhaps a different can of worms, though!

With the issues of detention without trial, one also has to look at other things going on, around us and see the general events and possible trends. For instance, just from a very quick look at the BBC site today one can see evidence of: US government requests to snoop on people's web searches,the reclassification of information to make things secret that used to be open to the public, US officials seemingly not appreciating freedom of speech after all when new images of abuse were released, and allegations of deaths in US custody in Iraq and Afghanistan, including possible deaths through torture.

Although the examples above are mainly to do with the USA, I don't mean to target one nationality. For example, I don't like the way the British press "excused" British troops of the beatings of the Iraqi youths recently, and yet were quick to pounce on the American military for the new images of abuses in custody. I'm using these examples to show that freedom is not something one should take for granted, otherwise it can be taken away more easily than we think. Governments need to have an eye kept on them, too!