U.N. official calls for “urgent” actions in Syria as death toll far exceeds 4,000

U.N. official calls for “urgent” actions in Syria as death toll far exceeds 4,000

In an emergency meeting held by the United Nations Human Rights Council, Navi Pillay, U.N. High Commission for Human Rights, called on the international community to take “urgent and effective measures” to protect Syrian civilians and pushed for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to be tried before the International Criminal Court. The meeting was called by the European Union, and supported by the United States and Saudi Arabia, following an independent commission of inquiry report that found evidence of security forces committing crimes against humanity. Meanwhile, the Free Syria Army is gaining strength as Syrian army defections escalate, with forces believed to number between 1,000 and 25,000. While initially the group acted primarily to protect unarmed civilians and protesters, offensive actions taken by the FSA have increased, evidenced today in an attack on a Syrian air force intelligence base. Navi Pillay, characterized the declining situation as a civil war and placed an estimate of the number of people killed in the nine month long uprisings at 4,000. However, she stated, “the information coming to us is that it’s much more.”

Headlines  

• Initial Egyptian poll results are delayed for a second time due to complications resulting from the unexpectedly high voter turnout.
• At least 12 people were killed in clashes between security forces and opposition tribesmen in Yemen’s southern city of Taiz after an agreement on the composition of a unity government.
• The U.S. military handed over Camp Victory, which housed 46,000 soldiers at its peak, to Iraqis as part of the U.S. troop withdrawal to be completed by the end of December.
• The European Union increased sanctions on Iran after an attack on the British Embassy while the U.S. Senate unanimously supported imposing sanctions on the Iranian Central Bank.
• Jordanian Prime Minister Awn Khasawneh widely won a parliamentary vote of confidence. However, protesters continue to demand reforms.

Daily Snapshot

Anti-military rule protestors shouts slogans during a demonstration at Tahrir square in Cairo on December 2, 2011. Egypt awaited the delayed publication of results for the opening phase of its first elections since the overthrow of veteran president Hosni Mubarak which are expected to confirm an Islamist sweep (ODD ANDERSEN/AFP/Getty Images). 

Arguments & Analysis

‘Egypt’s election: Islamists of every stripe to the fore’ (The Economist)

“Since the revolution, the Muslim Brotherhood, keen for elections to go ahead, has assiduously wooed the generals, posing as a centrist force for stability in contrast to leftist rowdies and the Salafists’ bearded hotheads. If the highly disciplined 80-year-old movement, which has been a wellspring of Islamist streams across the region, does indeed end up with some 40% of parliamentary seats, it may then have to choose either to align with secular forces or be pulled to the right by the Salafists. All this is plainly bad news for Egypt’s secularists.”

‘The Muslim Brotherhood’s democratic dilemma’ (Nathan Brown, The National Interest)

“The Brotherhood may one day regret its influential political status. If it does win a majority in parliament, either alone or with its remaining allies, it will find itself face-to-face with the military rulers who have shown a strong desire to retain a permanent supervisory role for themselves and an exemption from civilian oversight. The most politically astute leaders of the Brotherhood tried to avoid precisely such a situation throughout the Mubarak years. But with the president’s authority exercised now by a military council, the Islamists risk falling into such a tense rivalry. The two sides squared off publicly less than a week ago overthe process for writing the constitution. The Brotherhood may find that other political actors do not rush to its side in any showdown, preferring a prolonged military role over a Brotherhood-led polity.” 

‘The man to watch in Iran?’ (Kambiz Tavana & Arash Karami, Tehran Bureau)

“With the publication of the new IAEA report and the West’s imposition of increasingly severe sanctions, Salehi may be the best act Khamenei has to follow up the provocative Ahmadinejad. Cables made public by WikiLeaks show that some Western diplomats were “optimistic” when he was assigned to head Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization. According to one cable from the U.S. mission in Vienna, which covers the IAEA, the consensus among his Western counterparts is that he is an “intelligent and skilled interlocutor and [they] prefer dealing with him than some other Iranian officials.” As the volume of accusations about Iran’s nuclear program rises, the well-informed, soft-spoken Salehi offers either the best chance to sell the world on the idea of a nuclear Iran, which seems next to impossible, or at the very least to explain his country’s position without the bellicosity that has colored Ahmadinejad’s defiant speeches.”