PARIS, 30 December 2002 — At home and abroad, US President George W. Bush’s “war on terror” was facing mounting criticism yesterday over fears that fundamental human rights and freedoms were being eroded.
Actors, writers, lawyers, politicians, and millions of ordinary people worldwide have in recent weeks all questioned the no-holds-barred US policy which many fear will be counterproductive.
Huge anti-war demonstrations have taken place in cities across the globe and more are planned for the new year, including a major one in Washington on Jan. 18.
Spain’s top anti-terror judge became the latest to add his voice to the growing chorus of critics, warning yesterday of “the risk of a false system of security being put in place to the detriment of freedoms and rights. “The case of terrorists held in Guantanamo (the US base in Cuba), Afghanistan and Pakistan proves that security is trumping every other principle of justice or rights,” said Baltasar Garzon said.
Garzon, who has fought against Basque separatists in Spain, made a world name for himself when he led international efforts to prosecute former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet for war crimes.
In Germany, where anti-US sentiment is at its highest level since the euro-missile crisis of the 1980s, Nobel prize-winning author Guenter Grass called Bush’s response to the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States as “truly dangerous” and a major threat to world peace.
He compared the US president to a Shakespearean character who wants only to appear before his father, a dying king, and tell him: “Look, I have accomplished what you wanted.” German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder narrowly squeaked home in recent elections after saying his country would not join any US-led strike on Iraq.
That declaration angered Washington, straining relations already damaged by comments from a former justice minister comparing Bush’s methods on Iraq to those of Hitler. Nearer home, Bush faces opposition from Hollywood to Havana. Film and rock stars have protested his policy in Iraq and human rights groups his treatment of Al-Qaeda and Taleban prisoners.
US star and filmmaker Sean Penn led Hollywood’s dissent with a high-profile three-day visit to Baghdad earlier this month. Penn may have taken the most militant stand, but other stars, such as Susan Sarandon, Tim Robbins, Barbra Streisand and Robert Redford, have also lined up against the Texan president.
The 65-year-old Redford wrote to Bush in an open letter published in the Los Angeles Times, attacking his environmental policy and suggesting that Washington should not intervene in Iraq. Redford’s public hostility came after a constellation of other top Hollywood celebrities appeared at anti-war demonstrations or signed peace petitions in recent weeks.
Martin Sheen, who plays the US president in the hit television series “The West Wing,” branded Bush’s campaign against Iraq a “personal feud,” alluding to the 1991 Gulf War waged by Bush’s father against Saddam. (AFP)
