Thursday, September 23, 2010

EU shares responsibility for PA persecution of its people


By Khalid Amayreh in Ramallah

"The European Union (EU) is considered the main donor and bankroller of the Palestinian Authority (PA), an entity that more or less lives off European' tax payers. Hence, the EU is supposed to have certain leverage on PA domestic policies, including the extent to which the Ramallah-based government is committed to human rights and civil liberties.

Unfortunately, the EU has done next to nothing in terms of urging the PA to conform with internationally-observed human rights standards. The fact that the PA, a virtual police state without a state, continues to be a serious human rights violator, shows that the EU may not really be sufficiently concerned about the status of human rights violations in the occupied Palestinian territories.

In recent months and weeks, the PA seriously stepped up its human rights violations, including arbitrary arrests, provocative raids on homes and business of ideological rivals, and torture....."

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