{"id":121165,"date":"2021-12-13T19:15:14","date_gmt":"2021-12-14T02:15:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=121165"},"modified":"2021-12-13T19:15:14","modified_gmt":"2021-12-14T02:15:14","slug":"sri-lanka-cambodia-and-bangladesh-under-us-sanctions-the-limits-of-the-uss-decision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/12\/13\/sri-lanka-cambodia-and-bangladesh-under-us-sanctions-the-limits-of-the-uss-decision\/","title":{"rendered":"Sri Lanka, Cambodia And Bangladesh Under US Sanctions: The Limits Of The US’s Decision"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jubeda Chowdhury\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

The couple and their family members\nwill be deemed ineligible to travel to the United States. The United States has\nimposed sanctions on two Sri Lankan government officials for alleged human\nrights abuses. The couple and their family members will be deemed ineligible to\ntravel to the United States. The two accused Sri Lankan officials from the\nUnited States are Navy officer Chandana Hettiarachchi and former Army Sergeant\nSunil Ratnayake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chandana Hettiarachchi\nwas involved\nin human rights abuses against at least eight Tamil civilians between 2006 and\n2009, the US government said in a statement on Friday. Sunil Ratnayake, on the\nother hand, is accused of extrajudicially killing at least eight civilians in a\nTamil village in 2000. He was also convicted in the country’s courts. The court\nsentenced him to death. However, President Gotabaya pardoned him last year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nU.S. state department in 2020 has also sanctioned the current Sri Lankan Army\nchief Gen. Shavendra Silva on allegations of war crimes committed during the\nfinal phase of the armed conflict with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam\n(LTTE) in 2009.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\nSri Lankan Army denies the charge, claiming it as a humanitarian operation to\nrid the Tamils of LTTE’s control. On the other hands, The United States has recently imposed\ntravel bans on officials from China, Belarus, North Korea, Myanmar and\nBangladesh for alleged human rights abuses. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On\nthe other hand, the US on December 08, imposed an arms embargo on Cambodia,\nciting concerns about human rights and corruption in the southeast Asian nation\nas well as China\u2019s activities there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In\nNovember, Washington sanctioned two Cambodian officials for corruption allegations\nlinked to a US-funded naval base. But Prime Minister of Cambodia Hun Sen has\nrepeatedly denied his country would host the Chinese military at the base. Cambodia\u2019s longtime leader is one of\nChina\u2019s closest partners in Asia, and his government has been allegedly dismantling\nfacilities at the Ream base that were built partly with American money and\nhosted to US exercises. The Sihanoukville-base on the Gulf of Thailand has been\na running sore in US-Cambodia relations in recent years, with Washington suspecting\nit is being converted for use by China. But Cambodia denies the US allegations.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Bangladesh is working to ensure\nthe security for the region including Indian North Eastern part from terrorism,\nextremism, separatism etc., a recent inappropriate decision by US can hamper\nthe situation. When Bangladesh\u2019s law enforcement and security agencies are\nworking to curb the extremism, terrorism, separatism to bring peace in the\nregion, The US has imposed sanctions on Bangladesh high officials at this time\nwhich is very inappropriate. The contribution of Bangladesh\u2019s security and law\nenforcement agencies are well known to the world. Bangladesh ensured the region\nincluding Indian North Eastern part from terrorism, extremism, separatism etc. Bangladesh\nsecurity and law enforcement agencies has established an example in the whole\nworld to deal or counter with separatism, terrorism and extremism (ULFA\nterrorists and separatists, Holy Artisan incidents, JMB terrorists for the\nregion). On the occasion of International Human Rights Day, the US Treasury\nDepartment has announced the imposition of sanctions on the assets of 15\nindividuals and 10 organizations in various countries for serious human rights\nviolations. The United States has also imposed sanctions on Bangladesh’s\nSpecial Police Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) and six of its officers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Extrajudicial killings are taking\nplace even in many countries but we do not see any such action against those\ncountries. Why not those countries? Because US needs those countries to serve\nits vested interest in Afghanistan. But Why Bangladesh, Sri Lanka? They have chosen a few countries to\nshow that they want to work with democracy. It is clear that their biased\npolicies to some countries totally are baseless. They targeted a peaceful\ncountry in the South Asia like Bangladesh, Bangladesh is a role model of\ncounter terrorism, extremism and separatism. They targeted small country like\nSri Lanka. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bangladesh has expressed\ndissatisfaction over the US sanctions. The US ambassador to Dhaka, Earl R.\nMiller, had been summoned to the State Department today to express his\ndissatisfaction.\nMillion\u2019s people go missing in the United States each\nyear, but the US government does not know how. \nThe US police kill thousands of people every year in the line of duty.\nThe United States should be informed. So, the sanction of this America on other\ncountries isn\u2019t appropriate. In fact, the countries that develop, the\ngovernments that do-good work are often attacked. If you do good then the\nproblem is. In the case of Bangladesh, Security forces may fire several times\nto save lives when terrorists fire their weapons. There might have been some\nseparatist incidents. But what a US punishment in reaction to those! The US\nmight have very ill motives behind this.  The US wants to sign two defence agreements\nwith Bangladesh as the latter is seeking to buy advanced equipment from the US\nas part of its goal to modernize the military by 2030.  But Bangladesh didn\u2019t show interest to sign\nthe \u2018General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA)\u2019 and the\n\u2018Acquisition Cross-Servicing Agreement (ACSA)\u2019 agreement with USA. It may be an\nissue for Bangladesh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The sanction of the US is very\nproblematic in the case of Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, Cambodia in this regard., Myanmar\nand North Korea cases may be totally different.  It is the bad universal\nhabit of the USA to counter the rising power. It imposed sanctions upon anyone\nat any time anywhere in the name of serving human rights worldwide when it can\nunderstand that its interest isn\u2019t serving. (Iran, Venezuela, Iraq, etc.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s talk about the human rights\nsituation in the USA. recent 918 people have been shot and killed by police in\nthe USA in the past year. This isn\u2019t my data. This is the data of the \u2018Washington Post.<\/a>\u2019 Protests over the 2020 Black Lives\nMatter, revived by the extrajudicial killing of George Floyd<\/a> by three Minneapolis police\nofficers, indicate the largest protest movement in U.S. history. <\/strong>The US should look at the human\nrights situation in its territory first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On February 26 this year, UN<\/a> human rights experts called on the\nUS government to end police torture and racial discrimination in the United\nStates. According to reports of Western media outlets such as The Guardian, BBC<\/a>, there are serious violations of\nhuman rights in the USA. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

An article in the Lancet<\/a> titled \u2018Fatal police violence by\nrace and state in the USA, 1980\u20132019: a network meta-regression on October 2,\n2021, shows the horrific pictures of human rights violation in the USA. The\nreport stated that between 1980 and 2018, many people died in police custody in\nthe United States. Fifty-five percent of these deaths were unreported or\nmiscellaneous, meaning the exact cause of death was not disclosed. Although\nonly 10 percent of the population is black, the death rate of blacks in police\ncustody is three and a half times that of whites.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Can the US answer the\nquestion of Abu Ghraib prison, Guant\u00e1namo Bay prison abuses? The world hasn\u2019t forgotten the\nincidents of the USA\u2019s \u2018Enhanced interrogation and waterboarding\u2019 cases?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The world has not forgotten the\ntragic scene of a black man being strangled to death by the police on the\nstreets of the United States last year. Not only that, when Palestinian\nchildren hurled stones at the Israelis who attacked their homes, Israeli forces\nfired indiscriminately at them. The United States has not imposed sanctions on\nthe Israelis. On the contrary, if a country proposes condemnation of this human\nrights violation at the United Nations, the United States vetoes it. So, their\nsanction is motivated, one-sided, and ineffective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to Human Rights Report\n2021<\/a>,\nCovid-19’s grossly disproportionate impact on black, brown, and indigenous\npeoples, associated with chronic inequalities in health, education, and\neconomic conditions, has highlighted the lasting effects of past clearly racist\nlaws and policies and the continuing obstacles to equality. The series of\npolice killings of George Floyd and other police killings of blacks in May gave\nrise to widespread and extensively peaceful protests, which in many cases were\nmet with brutality by local and federal law enforcement agents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is the human rights situation\nin the USA. The self-proclaimed promoter of world peace, human rights,\ndemocracy worldwide, the US always speaks about the human rights violation in\ntheir targeted country.  There may have been an ill motive behind this. In\nthe name of protection of human rights in many countries, the US tries to serve\nits vested interest. We know the incident of the Iraq war, the war in\nAfghanistan, etc. The US authority should look at the human rights situation in\nits country first. The United States is involved in human rights abuses,\nincluding killings, disappearances, and abductions, not just in its own\ncountry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The democratic forces of the world\nare well aware of the fact that they are now talking about strengthening the\n“world democracy” and holding a conference to regain the lost ground\nafter failing to establish a single world order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The United States, meanwhile, claims\nthat an average of 1,100 people are victims of law enforcement killings each\nyear in the United States. Even in their country, six lakh people go missing\nevery year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Former United States Senator Robert\nReich tweeted a few days ago. He said there were 984<\/a> extrajudicial killings in the\nUnited States in 2020. According to various US media reports, at least 6,700\npeople have been extrajudicially killed by law enforcement in the United States\nsince 2015. That means an average of 1,000 people die without trial each year\nin the United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, the United States has\nsanctioned seven people, including a Bangladeshi police chief and a RAB DG, in\nthe United States. Allegedly, that was extrajudicial killing. The number of\nextrajudicial killings in the United States is higher each year than in Bangladesh.\nMoreover, there are several countries in South Asia where extrajudicial\nkillings are taking place. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is clear that their biased\npolicies to some countries totally are baseless.  When Bangladesh Security\nagencies starts to curb extremism, terrorism in the region, the US has imposed\nsanctions upon Bangladesh this time. It is a biased, one-sided step of the US. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the other hand, it is very\ndisappointing to see that Sri Lanka, Bangladesh has been put in the line with\nstates like North Korea or Myanmar which significantly stands different, both\nin terms of human rights records and political standing on the global, regional\nand domestic scale. North Korea and Myanmar should be another issue? Thus, it\nis clear to say that the recent US sanctions upon Bangladesh, Sri Lanka are\nvery problematic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jubeda Chowdhury\u00a0 The couple and their family members will be deemed ineligible to travel to the United States. The United States has imposed sanctions on two Sri Lankan government officials for alleged human rights abuses. The couple and their family members will be deemed ineligible to travel to the United States. The two accused Sri […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-121165","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-forum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121165","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121165"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121165\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}