Malignant Tumor of American Society – Racism, Racial Discrimination

http://www.mfa.gov.kp/view/article/15677

 2022.8.30.

At the ongoing 107th Meeting of the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination in Geneva, issues of extreme racism and racial discrimination in the U.S. are now under serious discussion.

At the meeting, the UN human rights experts unanimously called upon the U.S. administration to take immediate countermeasures for eradicating its deep-seated racism, saying that the racial discrimination in the U.S. is becoming institutional phenomenon and  nonwhite people are the most victims of violence and gun-related crimes.

It can be seen as the undisputed assessment of the international society on the ever-worsening human rights situation of the U.S.

More than 20 years have passed since the accession of the U.S. to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination in October 1994. But so far, no further improvement was made in ensuring the human rights of nonwhite people at home.

In recent years alone, shooting incidents against nonwhite people including the murder cases of George Floyd, Patrick Lyoya, Jayland Walker by the white police have taken place one after another, much to the consternation of the world.

Besides, 1 145 innocent black people lost their lives in 2021 due to the excessive violence of the police. The number of the persons killed by the police since 2020 amounts up to 2 563. Thus, it created a new world record beyond imagination which does not go well with its reputation as a “law-governed state”.

Within less than two years since the outbreak of COVID-19, the number of hatred crimes against the Asian-Americans surged to over 11 000 cases from 6 600.

Moreover, nonwhite people and other minority communities of the U.S. society are living in extreme anxiety and fear as the number of all sorts of crimes rooted in racism are annually increasing at an exponential rate.

For a single reason that they differ in race, they are being treated as the targets of violence and excluded from benefits of social services including education and public health. This cannot but be negation of intrinsic dignity of human being and gross violation of human rights.

Being a daily happening under the “Statue of Liberty” of the U.S., the self-proclaimed “model state of human rights”, this is an inevitable outcome caused by the structure of racism based on white supremacy which persists in the U.S. since its birth.

All these facts clearly prove that the U.S. is indeed the barren land of human rights and main culprit of human rights violation where all sorts of incurable social evils including deeply-rooted racism, gun-related crimes and police violence are rife.

 

Kim In Guk

Researcher of Korean Association for Human Rights Studies