U.N., U.S. at odds over housing as a 'right

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U.N., U.S. at odds over housing as a 'right' Betsy Pisik THE WASHINGTON TIMES 6/8/01

     NEW YORK -- The United States is facing new criticism at the United Nations from officials who accuse the Bush administration of undermining an effort to define housing as a "human right."

     Miloon Kothari, the U.N. rapporteur on housing issues, fired the opening salvo at the beginning of a three-day housing conference this week, accusing the United States of watering down a draft declaration that initially defined housing as a legal entitlement.

     "Through negotiation, it was taken out," Mr. Kothari said. "It is not an innocent omission.

     "The United States in particular has been opposed to any mention to the right to adequate housing."

     Michael Southwick, a State Department human rights official, yesterday dismissed the criticism as "sloganeering."

      "We don´t like the sloganeering aspect of this rights debate, which everyone knows is very big in the U.N. system right now," said Mr. Southwick. "There´s the right to housing, the right to food, there´s a right to everything, sometimes, that you can think of," he said. "It tends to become an entitlement and a legally enforceable kind of thing."

     Instead, Mr. Southwick said, "an economy, good government, the rule of law, democracy -- those are the kinds of things that create housing."

     The Bush administration prefers the language that is now part of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which calls housing "a component to an adequate standard of living." The dispute within the housing conference reflects a pervasive anger at the United States that has marked the first four months of the Bush administration.

     Many, if not most, members of the world body are upset over the United States´ unpaid U.N. dues, its rejection of a treaty on global warming, and President Bush´s effort to develop a missile-defense system. The United Nations recently voted to kick the United States off the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Commission, where it was a frequent defender of Israel and critic of China. It also ousted the United States from the International Narcotics Control Board.

     In Washington, many members of Congress are equally angry at the United Nations, which is widely viewed by conservatives as a forum to bash the United States. Congress recently voted not to pay some dues to the United Nations next year unless the United States gets back its seat on the Human Rights Commission.

     The housing conference, which ends today is a follow-up to an international conference in Istanbul five years ago that attempted to improve access to adequate shelter for the world´s poorest urban dwellers.

     Seventy percent of the world´s governments recognize housing as a right, or entitlement, according to U.N. Habitat, the Kenya-based agency that is coordinating the conference.

     Several U.N. declarations also mention a "right" to housing. At one point, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Mel Martinez, yesterday appeared to diverge from the U.S. position when he told the U.N. General Assembly that in America, "there is a fundamental right to own property, including a home."

     When pressed by reporters at a subsequent news conference, Mr. Martinez declined to comment and directed reporters to Mr. Southwick.

     Nearly half the world´s population lives in urban areas, with more than 1.2 billion of those city-dwellers living in inadequate shelter. Slums of squatters sprawl throughout cities in the Third World, with houses typically consisting of a single room created from scraps of wood and metal, without running water or electricity. Meals are cooked on open fires and people relieve themselves on the ground outside.

     In Africa, fewer than one-third of houses are connected to potable water sources.

      In Asia and the Pacific, just 38 percent of urban households are connected to a sewerage system.      Government officials and housing-advocacy groups from around the world attended this week´s conference.

     Many came to explain successful experiments in providing affordable housing. Others came to demand assistance from the industrial world. Mr. Kothari was appointed to his three-year term by the U.N. Human Rights Commission the body from which the United States was recently expelled. His position has broad support within the world body. For example, the U.N. Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights urged governments attending this week´s conference to "reaffirm explicitly that the right to adequate housing is a fundamental human right."

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can you believe this crap?



-- Anonymous, June 09, 2001

Answers

I agree, it's crap. Life, Liberty, Pursuit of Happiness. That's it. Everything else is personal choice and fruits of your labor/lifestyle.

-- Anonymous, June 09, 2001

Actually those are only three among others, Gordon.

"Among them are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness..."

please don't limit my inalienable human rights. that's what .gov is for...at least, that's what they think.

-- Anonymous, June 09, 2001


Yep, Gordon, you hit it--crap. If the US agrees it's a right, the next thing will be the US, being "the richest country in the world," will be expected to provide that housing. Mexico City has a ring of squatter dwellings around it, must be five miles thick. Takes forever to get through it to the city itself. Multiply that by all the cities in "developing countries" and that's a lot of moolah.

-- Anonymous, June 09, 2001

Barefoot, you're right. We do have other inalienable rights, but I can't recall seeing housing listed as specifically one of them. So, now the debaters in politics can try to find a way to twist that simple guarantee of rights into many specific areas. Sort of like the anti-gun group who have tried to redefine the Constitution to eliminate the common citizen rights to bear arms, only this new group wants to expand the role that government will play in our daily life.

-- Anonymous, June 09, 2001

I thought communism had proven to be a flawed concept? Or by calling the same crap socialism, do they think that will finally make the pig fly?

-- Anonymous, June 10, 2001


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