Why the Silence on Tunisia?

The American government has only one method of evaluation human rights violations: is the government in question pro or anti-American? The United States, for the most part, engaged in opportunistic criticism of human rights.

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If the regime is submissive and friendly, its human rights record is neither of concern nor ever subject to lengthy State Department reports. But if the regime is, for whatever reason, hostile to American goals in a specific region, all of a sudden America waxes poetically about how intolerable such abuses are and how the regime needs to start respecting human rights. And, if the regime is lucky, it will be singled out for “liberation” all in the ostensible name of human rights.

And the U.S. media does not exercise and independent judgement in this realm, but takes its cues from its government. So Saddam during the ’80s is a “moderate” and a “pro-Western” leader, but then overnight he is “Hitler revisited”. Ditto with Qadafia. Neither of these men behaved any differently toward their people, but their posture toward American empire changed and thus the change in perceptions which negates or amplifies human rights abuses for political convenience.

This explains why the United States feigns concern over human rights in Syria but does not utter a word about the far worse and atrocious abuse in the Kingdom of Horrors a.k.a Saudi Arabia.

And why the United States is silent about the courageous uprising in Tunisia by youth, lawyers and the lay people.

Neglected by Western governments in their annual human rights reports, Tunisia is arguably one of the most repressive regimes in the Arab world and - in some areas - one of the worst international offenders.

Annually named by NGOs as one of the Top 10 enemies of press and internet freedom, the state heavily censors any dissident in the domestic press (even resorting to rounding up foreign newspapers if their daily issue features some criticism of the regime), the ministry of the interior was recently discovered to have been running several seemingly independent newspapers and magazines by proxy, and any daring publications were suffer constant harassment until they are finally shut down directly or left no other choice. The internet is equally heavily censored. So much so that the Twitter accounts of dissidents are also targeted. And Tunisia, this seemingly liberal place, has locked up more journalist since 2000 than Syria, Saudi Arabia or any other Arab country despite have one of the small populations in the region.

Any dissidence, no matter how trivial, is immediately clamped down on.

And, finally, there has been a popular uprising which started in concerns over stubborn abiding unemployment, especially for college graduates, but has become a general movement of protest against an authoritarian and thoroughly corrupt regime.

But no word from Washington which offered crocodile tears to the Iranian Green Movement:

"Not even torture, which is rampant or live bullets which the Tunisian authorities are using with greater frequency stop them. [...] The United States State Department remains silent in face of the Tunisian protests. Since the protests began on December 17, 2010, there has been little media coverage in the mainstream US media, virtually nothing on mainstream television, nothing in the New York Times or Wall Street Journal, or for that matter even Democracy Now!"

But I expected no different from the lousy imperial leaders. They do not disappoint.