The Obama administration has decided “with regret” to boycott a U.N. conference on racism next week over objectionable language in the meeting’s final document that could single out Israel for criticism and restrict free speech, the State Department said Saturday.
The decision follows weeks of furious internal debate and will likely please Israeli and Jewish groups that lobbied against U.S. participation but upset human rights advocates and some in the black community, who hoped President Obama, as the nation’s first black president, would send an official delegation.
The administration had wanted to attend the April 20-25 meeting in Geneva, although it warned in late February that it would not go unless significant changes were made to the draft text.
Some revisions - including the removal of specific critical references to Israel and problematic passages about the defamation of religion - were negotiated.
But the State Department said the text retains troubling elements that suggest support for restrictions on free speech and an affirmation of the findings of the first World Conference Against Racism, held in Durban, South Africa, in 2001 that the U.S. cannot endorse.
“Unfortunately, it now seems certain these remaining concerns will not be addressed in the document to be adopted by the conference next week,” State Department spokesman Robert Wood said in a statement. “Therefore, with regret, the United States will not join the review conference.”
Concern is high that the meeting may descend into the heated attacks on Israel that marred the last such gathering eight years ago, especially since Iran’s president - who has called for Israel’s destruction - will attend.
The United States and Israel walked out of the 2001 meeting in Durban over attempts to liken Zionism - the movement to establish a Jewish state in historic Palestine - to racism. The reference was later dropped, but concerns about anti-Semitism remained in the final text.
Plans to reaffirm the 2001 document were of particular concern to the Obama administration. The document “singles out one particular conflict and prejudges key issues that can only be resolved in negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians,” Mr. Wood said.
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee applauded the boycott decision, saying it “underscores America’s unstinting commitment to combating intolerance and racism in all its forms and in all settings.”
But Rep. Barbara Lee, California Democrat and chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus, said the group was “deeply dismayed” by the boycott, which she said would make it “more difficult for [the administration] to play a leadership role on the U.N. Human Rights Council as it states it plans to do. This is a missed opportunity, plain and simple.”
Please read our comment policy before commenting.