A complicated stance on human rights
9 May 2024, 09:00 h, by Andrea Byt
Foreign politics is a complicated affair as there are stakeholders inside and outside the country looking at a parliament’s and government’s decisions as well as rhetoric to then react to that country. It is a constant argument, which one calls “diplomacy”, and during arguments the line of debate should normally not suddenly change. To be viewed as an equal in an argument, to be taken seriously means, your argumentation, your foreign policy doctrine, must stay steadfast and logical.
With Pelinai recently filing a case at the International Court (WFIC) due to human rights breaches by Vrigny, a member only recently joining the ranks of the World Forum, a debate on several countries’ lines of argumentation, no less the one of Gianatla, has started. The elephant in the room must be addressed: With most countries being secular nowadays and with Vrigny not having had organised religion in any shape or form even after the end of the right-suppressing dictatorship a few years ago, how far must the support for the Pelinese complaint at the WFIC go?
The laws are clear
Legally speaking, Pelinai has all the necessary cards in their hands. The declaration of human rights of 1956 as well as several treaties since then and also a majority of the democratic countries’ constitutions clearly established, that no person should be discriminated against because of their religion and that there is a fundamental right to hold a conscience, belief or religion that may be practiced “either alone or in community with others and in public or private”. The Purple Article, the Pelinese complaint is bemoaning, is keeping this freedom of religion away from the people and as such a fundamental human right. At the same time, the representatives of the people of Vrigny were only recently deciding against an amendment of the criticised provision in Vrigny’s constitution and the public support in general to amend the constitution in a way, democratic countries should desire, does not seem to be strong and fierce either.
Gianatla’s recently established ranking of foreign nations through the Lock-and-Key-inspired Außenbeziehungsgesetz does not reflect any criticism of the Vrignyan abuse of human rights at the moment. Perhaps due to Gianlucian foreign policy being based in both, the freedom of letting another country decide for themselves on how to govern itself, but also the defence of human rights in general. Still, the implied decision by the Sanddorn cabinet to not sanction Vrigny in any way for this legal breach, does beg the question, whether freedom of religion is simply considered an afterthought.
Opposition attacks Sanddorn
KPHA’s party leader, Archduke Ikaros VIII, has called for the Gianlucian government to condemn the Vrignyan parliament’s decision to not amend the Purple Article and to officially support Pelinai’s complaint at the International Court. During a parliamentary debate, he called Sanddorn’s cabinet hyprocritical, “if the foreign policy agenda remains to focus around human rights, but yet accepts a country like Vrigny as one’s trading partner”. He also warned of especially the Green’s accepting stance towards Valkyria: “And with Vrigny we don’t even call out the biggest problem of this cabinet’s foreign policy. The biggest problem is accepting, how an ally like Valkyria can slowly and steadily, under the guise of direct democracy, work on abolishing human rights such as the right to own property (OOC note: Article 17 of the UDHR) and even have a nuclear arsenal, that we normally stand so ardenly against, without any repercussions. Mrs. Chancellor, please find a plausible line or be forced to hand over this part of government to someone with more expertise.”
Chancellor Sanddorn lashed back, commenting that Vrigny’s political climate is changing and that some fundamental political changes take time. She also noted, Gianatla can have relations to nations, the government does not see eye-to-eye with, nodding at agreements made with the VPRB, much to some allies’ contempt. She continued on to explain, that human rights are universal and Gianatla stands on the side of other defenders of those rights like Sedunn or the Frost Empire. At the same time, she wouldn’t see a blatant problem existing either in Vrigny or in Valkyria considering the public support for the cited political decisions. Those comments were overall not met as well as she thought by the members of the Königspalast and triggered some booing especially from the right wing of the chamber.