Speaking up for human rights is now "working against the US"

American Republicans are claiming that the Red Cross has lost its impartiality and is working against the USA by (for example) advocating that prisoners of war be treated humanely and according to the Geneva Conventions and that civilian populations not be targetted in times of war. According to Dan Fata, a prominent Republican policy advisor, these actions are "activism" and go beyond the Red Cross' mandate for emergency relief. Which really makes you wonder whether he actually knows anything about the organisation he is criticising. The "activism" that Fata condemns stems from the Red Cross's role as the guarantor of the Geneva Conventions and guardian of international humanitarian law. In fact, we owe the existence of the Conventions themselves to the Red Cross's "activism" - they were established in response to advocacy from the Red Cross' founders. Since then they've pushed for more general human rights protections, as well as bans on weapons from chemical and biological weapons to landmines, as part of their basic, humanitarian mission.

For the Republicans to condemn the Red Cross as "biased" shows exactly what sort of people they have become and what sort of place they are turning America into. They are seriously beginning to sound like a third-world torturing despotism. The Red Cross' "problem" is not bias, but its absence - like Amnesty International they will advocate for human rights and criticise human rights violations even when they are perpetrated by the USA. And I guess to a certain type of American, who believes that America Can Do No Wrong, that is simply intolerable.