Katrina report to UN
U.S. violated international laws
Published Mar 16, 2006 10:01 PM
The following is from a Hurricane Katrina Human Rights
Violations Summary of Concerns to be brought to the United Nations Human Rights
Committee Meetings March 13, 2006 in New York prepared by Rev. Daniel A. Buford
and retired Judge Claudia Morcom.
The U.S. government’s
response to Hurricane Katrina failed to comply with the International Covenant
on Civil and Political Rights; the Convention on Elimination of Racial
Discrimination; and the Convention on Torture. Widespread human rights
violations against displaced African-American residents in New Orleans and
against displaced poor people of all races in the Gulf Coast region continue to
be systemic and pervasive. The continued displacement of African-Americans from
states like Louisiana and Mississippi (covered by the enforcement provisions of
the 1965 Voting Rights Act) undermines years of civil rights legislation and
court decisions (Chisom v. Roemer). 111 S. Ct. 2354, June 20, 1991.
The
U.S. government has shown depraved indifference to the human and civil rights of
displaced African-Americans in New Orleans and has neglected its
responsibilities for all poor people living in the region. The U.S. government
delayed decisions and cut critical funding from the federal government’s
responsibility to maintain a safe levee system around the Greater New Orleans
metropolis.
Prior to the catastrophe the U.S. government ignored
up-to-the- minute warnings from FEMA about the impending disaster and made no
concerted effort to protect or evacuate citizens or support state and city
evacuation plans with federal assets. The U.S. government has ignored its own
laws, regulations, responsibilities and has failed to meet the United Nations
treaty obligations to protect the lives of displaced persons.
The U.S.
government ignored its treaty obligations to protect the inherent right to life
and to take action to preserve the lives of its own citizens. The Congress of
the U.S. Government has ratified three treaties with the United Nations that
protect poor people from human rights violations. The United Nations guiding
principles on internally displaced persons apply to all persons in the gulf
coast region who were forced from their homes as a result of Hurricane
Katrina.
The United States House of Representatives has published a report
on Feb. 15, 2006 entitled “A Failure of Initiative” that details the
state government’s handling of the disaster as well as systemic problems
within the government’s bureaucracy. The Black Congressional Caucus has
expressed concern over the slow federal response in bringing aid and support
before and after the storm made landfall and the levees were destroyed by the
storms surge.
The Government Accounting Office (GAO) has published a
report in Feb. 1, 2006 entitled “Preliminary Observations Regarding
Hurricane Preparedness, Response” that cites a fragmented government
response that slowed down the evacuation, rescue and recovery process. The U.S.
government failed to implement the recommendations of a 1993 GAO report
regarding FEMA’s role in disaster preparedness. The mandates of the U.S.
government’s bipartisan 9/11 Committee were not integrated into
preparedness or recovery activities for displaced persons in the Gulf Coast
region.
Aid, volunteers and donations from the international community
and domestic NGOs were not integrated into the response and recovery process at
times of critical need. All these failures to take initiative resulted in the
loss of life and violations of human rights and civil rights for all displaced
persons in the region. The report of the GAO released after an independent
investigation found that despite ample warning of an impending catastrophe, the
federal government bungled its response to Hurricane Katrina, because of a void
in leadership and confusion about who was in charge, and faulted both Homeland
Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and his designee former FEMA Chief Michael
Brown for not filling a crucial leadership role during “Hurricane
Katrina”. The report of the GAO and its findings were consistent with, and
gave added credibility to the earlier report given by this representative of the
Meiklejohn Institute to this U.N. Committee on Oct. 17, 2005 in Geneva,
Switzerland, and the “Resolution on U.S. Government Violations of Human
Rights of Katrina Victims, adopted by the National Lawyers Guild Convention in
Portland Oregon on Oct. 29, 2005. (Both documents are attached to this
report.)
The lack of a well known, enforceable evacuation plan created
thousands of displaced persons and led to a continually mounting death toll six
months after the initial disaster. Displaced persons were left injured on
rooftops, trees and were stranded on public highways with no food, water, or
transportation. Children were separated from parents and guardians, senior
citizens were airlifted to other states without prior family notification.
Families were not allowed to stay together in transportation out of the flood.
Displaced persons were forced from their homes at gunpoint only to be corralled
into the convention center and athletic stadium and left for days without
support, aid, or transportation provided by the U.S. Government.
Displaced
persons who were peacefully assembled to carry out the mandated evacuation order
were turned back at gunpoint by Gretna police with gunshots fired on the
Crescent City Bridge between Gretna, LA and New Orleans, LA. The U.S. government
failed to protect the civil rights, human rights and lives of everyone on the
Gretna Bridge who were forced to return to New Orleans at gunpoint. White
supremacist vigilante groups offered rewards and bounties on the internet for
‘confirmed kills of black looters.’
Wards of the state
including juvenile and adult jail inmates were abandoned behind bars and left in
water. Elderly residents of numerous senior care facilities and hospitals were
abandoned, left to die, or euthanized prompting criminal charges and
investigations. The U.S. government has demonstrated consistent negligence in
protecting the human dignity of persons deceased in the Ninth Ward of New
Orleans regarding dead body removal and
identification.
Conclusion
Prior to Hurricane Katrina
structural racism could be seen in the U.S. government’s public policies
toward internally displaced poor people from the African-American community.
Institutional practices and cultural representations that negatively stereotype
have created a permissive climate of discrimination. Many lives have been lost;
all races and classes have suffered. The U.S. government has failed to eliminate
actions or policies that have historically had a discriminatory impact. The
lives of poor people were not considered worth saving by the U.S. government as
no evacuation plan was envisioned with them in mind. Race and poverty continue
to be intertwined in that displaced persons do not have equal protection of law
and continue to be discriminated against in post-Katrina funding in the areas of
housing, education, employment, insurance, and health care access.
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