Over more than a decade, the rise of the left in Latin American governance has led to remarkable advances in poverty alleviation, regional integration, and a reassertion of sovereignty and independence. The United States has been antagonistic toward the new left governments, and has concurrently pursued a bellicose foreign policy, in many cases blithely dismissive of international law.<\/p>\n
So why has Human Rights Watch (HRW)\u2014despite proclaiming itself \u201cone of the world\u2019s leading independent organizations\u201d on human rights\u2014so consistently paralleled U.S. positions and policies? This affinity for the U.S. government agenda is not limited to Latin America. In the summer of 2013, for example, when the prospect of a unilateral U.S. missile strike on Syria\u2014a clear violation of the UN Charter\u2014loomed large, HRW\u2019s executive director Kenneth Roth speculated as to whether a simply \u201csymbolic\u201d bombing would be sufficient. \u201cIf Obama decides to strike Syria, will he settle for symbolism or do something that will help protect civilians?\u201d he asked on Twitter. Executive director of MIT\u2019s Center for International Studies John Tirman swiftly denounced the tweet as \u201cpossibly the most ignorant and irresponsible statement ever by a major human-rights advocate.\u201d1<\/sup><\/p>\n HRW\u2019s accommodation to U.S. policy has also extended to renditions\u2014the illegal practice of kidnapping and transporting suspects around the planet to be interrogated and often tortured in allied countries. In early 2009, when it was reported that the newly elected Obama administration was leaving this program intact, HRW\u2019s then Washington advocacy director Tom Malinowski argued that \u201cunder limited circumstances, there is a legitimate place\u201d for renditions, and encouraged patience: \u201cthey want to design a system that doesn\u2019t result in people being sent to foreign dungeons to be tortured,\u201d he said, \u201cbut designing that system is going to take some time.\u201d2<\/sup><\/p>\n Similar consideration was not extended to de-facto U.S. enemy Venezuela, when, in 2012, HRW\u2019s Americas director Jos\u00e9 Miguel Vivanco and global advocacy director Peggy Hicks\u00a0wrote\u00a0a letter to President Hugo Ch\u00e1vez arguing that his country was unfit to serve on the UN\u2019s Human Rights Council. Councilmembers must uphold the highest standards in the promotion and protection of human rights, they maintained, but unfortunately, \u201cVenezuela currently falls far short of acceptable standards.\u201d3 <\/sup>Given HRW\u2019s silence regarding U.S. membership in the same council, one wonders precisely what HRW\u2019s acceptable standards are.<\/p>\n One underlying factor for HRW\u2019s general conformity with U.S. policy was clarified on July 8, 2013, when Roth took to Twitter to congratulate his colleague Malinowski on his nomination to be Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (DRL). Malinowski was poised to further human rights as a senior-level foreign-policy official for an administration that convenes weekly \u201cTerror Tuesday\u201d meetings. In these meetings, Obama and his staffers deliberate the meting out of extrajudicial drone assassinations around the planet, reportedly working from a secret \u201ckill list\u201d that has included several U.S. citizens and a 17-year-old girl.4<\/sup><\/p>\n Malinowski\u2019s entry into government was actually a re-entry. Prior to HRW, he had served as a speechwriter for Secretary of State Madeline Albright and for the White House\u2019s National Security Council. He was also once a special assistant to President Bill Clinton\u2014all of which he proudly listed in his HRW biography. During his Senate confirmation hearing on September 24, Malinowski promised to \u201cdeepen the bipartisan consensus for America\u2019s defense of liberty around the world,\u201d and assured the Foreign Relations Committee that no matter where the U.S. debate on Syria led, \u201cthe mere fact that we are having it marks our nation as exceptional.\u201d5<\/sup><\/p>\n That very day, Obama stood before the UN General Assembly and declared, \u201csome may disagree, but I believe that America is exceptional.\u201d Assuming that by \u201cexceptional\u201d Obama meant exceptionally benevolent, one of those who disagreed was Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff, who had opened the proceedings at the same podium by excoriating Obama\u2019s \u201cglobal network of electronic espionage,\u201d which she considered a \u201cdisrespect to national sovereignty\u201d and a \u201cgrave violation of human rights and of civil liberties.\u201d Rousseff contrasted Washington\u2019s rogue behavior with her characterization of Brazil as a country that has \u201clived in peace with our neighbors for more than 140 years.\u201d Brazil and its neighbors, she argued, were \u201cdemocratic, pacific and respectful of international law.\u201d6 <\/sup>Rousseff\u2019s speech crystallized Latin America\u2019s broad opposition to U.S. exceptionalism, and therefore shed light on the left\u2019s mutually antagonistic relationship with HRW.<\/p>\n *<\/p>\n Malinowski\u2019s background is but one\u00a0example of a larger scenario. HRW\u2019s institutional culture is shaped by its leadership\u2019s intimate links to various arms of the U.S. government. In her HRW biography, the vice chair of HRW\u2019s board of directors, Susan Manilow, describes herself as \u201ca longtime friend to Bill Clinton,\u201d and helped manage his campaign finances. (HRW once signed a letter to Clinton advocating the prosecution of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic for war crimes; HRW made no case for holding Clinton accountable for NATO\u2019s civilian-killing bombings despite concluding that they constituted \u201cviolations of international humanitarian law.\u201d)7 <\/sup>Bruce Rabb, also on Human Rights Watch\u2019s Board of Directors, advertises in his biography that he \u201cserved as staff assistant to President Richard Nixon\u201d from 1969-70\u2014the period in which that administration secretly and illegally carpet bombed Cambodia and Laos.8<\/sup><\/p>\n The advisory committee for HRW\u2019s Americas Division has even boasted the presence of a former Central Intelligence Agency official, Miguel D\u00edaz. According to his State Department biography, D\u00edaz served as a CIA analyst and also provided \u201coversight of U.S. intelligence activities in Latin America\u201d for the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.9 <\/sup>As of 2012, D\u00edaz focused, as he once did for the CIA, on Central America for the State Department\u2019s DRL\u2014the same bureau now to be supervised by Malinowski.<\/p>\n Other HRW associates have similarly questionable backgrounds: Myles Frechette, currently an advisory committee member for the Americas Division, served as Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Latin America and the Caribbean from 1990-93, and then became U.S. Ambassador to Colombia from 1994-97. Frechette subsequently worked as the executive director of a \u201cnonprofit\u201d group called the North American-Peruvian Business Council, and championed the interests of his funders in front of Congress. His organization received financing from companies such as Newmont Mining, Barrick Gold, Caterpillar, Continental Airlines, J.P. Morgan, ExxonMobil, Patton Boggs, and Texaco.10<\/sup><\/p>\n Michael Shifter, who also currently serves on HRW\u2019s Americas advisory committee, directed the Latin America and Caribbean program for the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), a quasi-governmental entity whose former acting president Allen Weinstein told The Washington Post <\/i>in 1991 that \u201ca lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA.\u201d11 <\/sup>Shifter, as current president of a policy center called the Inter-American Dialogue, oversees $4 million a year in programming, financed in part through donations from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the embassies of Canada, Germany, Guatemala, Mexico and Spain, and corporations such as Chevron, ExxonMobil, J.P. Morgan, Microsoft, Coca-Cola, Boeing, and Western Union.<\/p>\n To be sure, not all of the organization\u2019s leadership has been so involved in dubious political activities. Many HRW board members are simply investment bankers, like board co-chairs Joel Motley of Public Capital Advisors, LLC, and Hassan Elmasry, of Independent Franchise Partners, LLP. HRW Vice Chair John Studzinski is a senior managing director at The Blackstone Group, a private equity firm founded by Peter G. Peterson, the billionaire who has passionately sought to eviscerate Social Security and Medicare. And although Julien J. Studley, the Vice Chair of the Americas advisory committee, once served in the U.S. Army\u2019s psychological warfare unit, he is now just another wealthy real-estate tycoon in New York.<\/p>\n That HRW\u2019s advocacy reflects its institutional makeup is unremarkable. Indeed, an examination of its positions on Latin America demonstrates the group\u2019s predictable, general conformity with U.S. interests. Consider, for example, HRW\u2019s reaction to the death of Hugo Ch\u00e1vez. Within hours of his passing on March 5, 2013, HRW published an overview\u2014\u201cVenezuela: Ch\u00e1vez\u2019s Authoritarian Legacy\u201d\u2014to enormous online response. In accordance with its headline\u2019s misleading terminology, HRW never once mentioned Ch\u00e1vez\u2019s democratic bona fides: Since 1998, he had triumphed in 14 of 15 elections or referenda, all of which were deemed free and fair by international monitors. Ch\u00e1vez\u2019s most recent reelection boasted an 81% participation rate; former president Jimmy Carter described the voting process as \u201cthe best in the world.\u201d12 <\/sup>The article neglected to cite a single positive aspect of Ch\u00e1vez\u2019s tenure, under which poverty was slashed by half and infant mortality by a third.<\/p>\n In contrast, HRW\u2019s August 21, 2012 statement regarding the death of Ethiopian leader Meles Zenawi was decidedly more muted: \u201cEthiopia: Transition Should Support Human Rights Reform,\u201d read the headline. Leslie Lefkow, HRW\u2019s deputy Africa director, urged the country\u2019s new leadership to \u201creassure Ethiopians by building on Meles\u2019s positive legacy while reversing his government\u2019s most pernicious policies.\u201d Regarding a leader whose two-decade rule had none of Ch\u00e1vez\u2019s democratic legitimacy (HRW itself documented Ethiopia\u2019s repressive and unfair elections in both 2005 and 2010), the organization argued only that \u201cMeles leaves a mixed legacy on human rights.\u201d13 <\/sup>Whereas HRW omitted all mention of Ch\u00e1vez-era social improvements, it wrote, \u201cUnder [Meles\u2019s] leadership the country has experienced significant, albeit uneven, economic development and progress.\u201d<\/p>\n The explanation for this discrepancy is obvious: as a New York Times <\/i>obituary reported, Meles was \u201cone of the United States government\u2019s closest African allies.\u201d Although \u201cwidely considered one of Africa\u2019s most repressive governments,\u201d wrote the Times<\/i>, Ethiopia \u201ccontinues to receive more than $800 million in American aid each year. American officials have said that the Ethiopian military and security services are among the Central Intelligence Agency\u2019s favorite partners.\u201d14<\/sup><\/p>\n *<\/p>\n HRW has taken its double standard to\u00a0cartoonish heights throughout Latin America. At a 2009 NED Democracy Award Roundtable, Jos\u00e9 Miguel Vivanco described Cuba, not the United States, as \u201cone of our countries in the hemisphere that is perhaps the one that has today the worst human-rights record in the region.\u201d As evidence, he listed Cuba\u2019s \u201clong- and short-term detentions with no due process, physical abuse [and] surveillance\u201d\u2014as though these were not commonplace U.S. practices, even (ironically) at Guant\u00e1namo Bay.15 <\/sup>Vivanco was also quoted in late 2013, claiming at an Inter-American Dialogue event that the \u201cgravest setbacks to freedom of association and expression in Latin America have taken place in Ecuador\u201d\u2014not in Colombia, the world\u2019s most dangerous country for trade union leaders, or in Honduras, the region\u2019s deadliest country for journalists (both, incidentally, U.S. allies).16<\/sup><\/p>\n Latin America scholars are sounding the alarm: New York University history professor Greg Grandin recently described HRW as \u201cWashington\u2019s adjunct\u201d in The Nation magazine.17<\/sup> And when Vivanco publicly\u00a0stated that \u201cwe did [our 2008] report because we wanted to show the world that Venezuela is not a model for anyone,\u201d over 100 academics wrote to the HRW\u2019s directors, lamenting the \u201cgreat loss to civil society when we can no longer trust a source such as Human Rights Watch to conduct an impartial investigation and draw conclusions based on verifiable facts.\u201d18<\/sup><\/p>\n HRW\u2019s deep ties to U.S. corporate and state sectors should disqualify the institution from any public pretense of independence. Such a claim is indeed untenable given the U.S.-headquartered organization\u2019s status as a revolving door for high-level governmental bureaucrats. Stripping itself of the \u201cindependent\u201d label would allow HRW\u2019s findings and advocacy to be more accurately evaluated, and its biases more clearly recognized.<\/p>\n In Latin America, there is a widespread awareness of Washington\u2019s ability to deflect any outside attempts to constrain its prerogative to use violence and violate international law. The past three decades alone have seen U.S. military invasions of Grenada and Panama, a campaign of international terrorism against Nicaragua, and support for coup governments in countries such as Venezuela, Haiti, Honduras, and Guatemala. If HRW is to retain credibility in the region, it must begin to extricate itself from elite spheres of U.S. decision-making and abandon its institutional internalization of U.S. exceptionalism. Implementing a clear prohibition to retaining staff and advisers who have crafted or executed U.S. foreign policy would be an important first step. At the very least, HRW can institute lengthy \u201ccooling-off\u201d periods\u2014say, five years in duration\u2014before and after its associates move between the organization and the government.<\/p>\n After all, HRW\u2019s Malinowski will be directly subordinate to Secretary of State John Kerry, who conveyed the U.S. attitude toward Latin America in a way that only an administrator of a superpower could. In an April 17, 2013 House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, a member of Congress asked Kerry whether the United States should prioritize \u201cthe entire region as opposed to just focusing on one country, since they seem to be trying to work together closer than ever before.\u201d Kerry reassured him of the administration\u2019s global vision. \u201cLook,\u201d he said. \u201cThe Western Hemisphere is our backyard. It is critical to us.\u201d19<\/sup><\/p>\n NOTES:<\/b><\/p>\n 1. Kenneth Roth, followed by John Tirman\u2019s response, Twitter, August 25, 3013, http:\/\/twitter.com\/KenRoth\/status\/371797912210407424<\/a>.<\/p>\n 2. Greg Miller, \u201cObama preserves renditions as counter-terrorism tool,\u201d Los Angeles Times<\/i>, February 1, 2009.<\/p>\n 3. Jos\u00e9 Miguel Vivanco and Peggy Hicks, \u201cLetter to President Chavez on Venezuela\u2019s Candidacy to the UN Human Rights Council,\u201d Human Rights Watch, November 9, 2012.<\/p>\n 4. Jo Becker and Scott Shane, \u201cSecret \u2018Kill List\u2019 Proves a Test of Obama\u2019s Principles and Will,\u201d The New York Times<\/i>, May 29, 2012.<\/p>\n 5. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, \u201cStatement for the Record by Tom Malinowski,\u201d September 24, 2013.<\/p>\n 6. \u201cText of Obama\u2019s Speech at the U.N.,\u201d The New York Times<\/i>, September 24, 2013. Statement by H.E. Dilma Rousseff, United Nations, September 24, 2013.<\/p>\n 7. Human Rights Watch, \u201cMajor Rights Groups Oppose Immunity for Milosevic,\u201d October 6, 2000. HRW, \u201cNew Figures on Civilian Deaths in Kosovo War,\u201d Februrary 8, 2000.<\/p>\n 8. Human Rights Watch, \u201cBoard of Directors,\u201d www.hrw.org<\/a>, accessed November 16, 2013.<\/p>\n 9. U.S. Department of State, \u201cFranklin Fellows Alumni,\u201d September 8, 2011, http:\/\/careers.state.gov\/ff\/meet-the-fellows\/franklin-fellows\/miguel-diaz<\/a>, accessed November 16, 2013.<\/p>\n 10. Ways and Means Committee, \u201cStatement of Myles Frechette, the North American Peruvian Business Council,\u201d U.S. House of Representatives, May 8, 2001.<\/p>\n 11. David Ignatius, \u201cInnocence Abroad: The New World of Spyless Coups,\u201d\u00a0The Washington Post<\/i>, September 22, 1991.<\/p>\n 12. Keane Bhatt, \u201cA Hall of Shame for Venezuelan Elections Coverage,\u201d\u00a0Manufacturing Contempt\u00a0<\/i>(blog), nacla.org, October 8, 2012.<\/p>\n 13. Human Rights Watch, \u201cEthiopia: Government Repression Undermines Poll,\u201d May 24, 2010.<\/p>\n 14. Jeffrey Gettleman, \u201cMeles Zenawi, Prime Minister of Ethiopia, Dies at 57,\u201d The New York Times<\/i>, August 22, 2012.<\/p>\n 15. National Endowment for Democracy, \u201cJos\u00e9 Miguel Vivanco: 2009 NED Democracy Award Roundtable,\u201d Youtube.com, Jun 29, 2009.<\/p>\n 16. Eva Saiz, \u201cInd\u00edgenas de Ecuador denuncian en EEUU la norma de libre asociaci\u00f3n de Correa,\u201d El Pais<\/i>, October 28, 2013.<\/p>\n 17. Greg Grandin, \u201cThe Winner of Venezuela\u2019s Election to Succeed Hugo Ch\u00e1vez Is Hugo Ch\u00e1vez,\u201d The Nation<\/i>, April 16, 2013.<\/p>\n 18. Venezuelanalysis.com, \u201cMore Than 100 Latin America Experts Question Human Rights Watch\u2019s Venezuela Report,\u201d December 17, 2008.<\/p>\n 19. Committee on Foreign Affairs, House of Representatives, \u201cHearing: Securing U.S. Interests Abroad: The FY 2014 Foreign Affairs Budget,\u201d April 17, 2013.<\/p>\n This article has been revised to reflect the following correction: Although Tom Malinowski was confirmed by the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations to serve as Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor\u00a0in September 2013, as of publication, he and 70 other Obama appointees have\u00a0yet to be approved<\/a>\u00a0by the Senate.\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n _______________________________<\/p>\n Keane Bhatt is a regular contributor to the Media Accuracy on Latin America (MALA) section of NACLA Report and the creator of the Manufacturing Contempt blog on nacla.org.<\/i><\/p>\n