nine reports were mandated by the united states congress one of the most important actions congress has ever taken in support of human rights in addition to the creation of the bureau of human rights the state department and the creation of the assistant secretary for human rights originally the reports were mandated to assess the human rights situation in those countries that we receive u s assistance but since then the mandate has been broadened to include all members of the united nations two thousand and i reports continue the proud tradition of providing congress with detailed and comprehensive reporting on how one hundred ninety four countries getting with human rights i want to thank secretary of state hillary clinton secretary michael pos and all the hard working men and women in the bureau of democracy human rights and labor as well as all of human rights officers at our embassies around the world for their extraordinary work in compiling these reports needless to say no report of this length  traditions deeply depended on the quality of the environment significantly and adversely affected by decades of reckless environmental destruction by oil companies the degradation they suffer is hard to put into words the water and soil  domesticated farm animals wildlife that indigenous peoples want the fish in the rivers the plant life are all compromised and threat the very survival of these communities and yet countries reports do not at this point examine these realities from a human rights perspective i think this is something that you in the bureau the to reexamine i believe in the universal declaration of human rights i believe in one body of rights i believe the deference deprivations suffered by these families communities and peoples are violations article twenty five of the universal declaration of human rights which states and i quote everyone has a right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well being of himself and his family and  i believe that the state department needs to evaluate how best to report all right ensuring the universe declaration and i would also point out that as a country reports were initiated the international community has adopted an international convention on the rights of indigenous peoples which we should also be incorporating into our country for the suffering of these people deserve to be recognized it evaluated from a human rights perspective and when i mention these rights i do not suggest that they should come at the expense of our traditional reporting on civil and political rights nor should they those traditional goals as we formulate our foreign policy rather i think it's important to understand the universal declaration as one body of rights individual guarantees of all these rights to every individual and to all and all peoples no one knows better than you mr secretary on how destructive to the protection of promotion of human rights was a cold war tug of war the divided human rights watch says i strongly believe that just as we in congress tried to repair our country for the humanitarian security challenges of the twenty first century we also need twenty first century information on new and emerging challenges whether that is looking at sophisticated technologies like access the internet and social networking or what happens when people are deliberately deprived of access to food or water and their traditional territories  by exploitation and climate change in the past i was told that we cannot report on these types of human rights because we never have in the past and so we're not going to change that's not a good enough reason we need to be looking ahead and receive twenty first century human rights information let me conclude by noting that the annual state department has become one of the from here human rights reports in the world everyone waits for it to come out everyone immediately reads it in one and one way you can tell all this is by how quickly governments around the world read the report respond to it and quite frankly denounce i notice on friday that colombia venezuela and ecuador all denounce the report report on their respective countries countries their reports if you put them all together would be over seven thousand pages it's a major undertaking it's the most comprehensive review of human rights done by any any entity in the world  and it is animated by three broad principles which i think were like the obama administration and secretary clinton's approach to human rights  the president keeps talking about we keep talking about is a sense of engagement but a principled engage where we're involved in the world we're dealing with governments we're dealing with the united nations in a different way we joined the human rights council over some objections to messick labor with a sense that it's better to be in an engaged than to stand on the sidelines engagement doesn't mean that we accept the world as it is and part of the purpose of doing these reports  as you mentioned chairman mcgovern is to give us an realistic assessment of the world that we face so that we can make intelligent policy decisions the second thing that's critical  think it's a challenge always but in doing these reports a particular challenge is that we apply a single universal standard to every country including ourselves we are determined and secretary clinton said this last we've held in our hearing is holding a series of informal hearings for non governmental rights activists we've held one in louisiana looking at some of the issues in new orleans around breena we held one last week in el paso we held another in new york and other here in washington there's several more to come but we really do believe that every country ought to be held to the same standards and it's important we lead by example the third thing that animates all that we do is a sense of to develop and nothing challenges us probably more and governments in producing a seven thousand page report on human rights to get the facts right to be honest in our assessment of countries including ours is a challenge but one that we undertake with a great deal of the report doesn't make policy it simply is a foundation which we  ce we are in this report trying to simply report honestly and accurately what's happening in the world trends and then i'm going to say there is a sense in the world that  many parts of the world conflicts internal conflicts and wars are fueling human rights abuses we cite over thirty examples in the room or where ethnic racial or religious disproportionate share of the suffering and we need to be aware of that and we need to address those underlying conflicts as a way of reducing and addressing human rights abuses  we also see a greater opportunity and challenge and congressman mcgovern you mentioned relating to the new media and the use of the internet and new communications technology human rights activists around the world and others are using these new technologies and because they are and because they're becoming more effective governments are cracking down the chinese certainly are a prime example of that a huge amount of time and energy spent trying to control access to information and trying to shut down people's ability to communicate internally and with the world but that is even part of a broader concern we have in more than twenty five countries in the last several years governments of new laws designed to impede civil society to crackdown on n g o s activism  to restrict the ability of organizations to associate or to function and or to receive foreign funding so there's a brand and one we really feel we need to address more aggressively and then finally the balance between national security and human rights is a challenge to all of us including in this country and we face a range of difficult choices in our own society but in places like egypt or russia or sri lanka we see governments using in misusing the language of national security and emergency as a way of undermining human exhaustive look at the past violence their own model and i think president ellen johnson sirleaf is the kind of model leader for some other examples places like georgia where there are some reforms in criminal procedure the ukraine  which is done some interesting work on anti corruption transition to a constitutional parliamentary monarchy in good times but lots of also very troubling developments in places like china where the record remain poor and worse and in some areas we can get into that in the questioning but it's a place i want to highlight iran where an already poor human rights situation rapidly deteriorated after the elections last june  cuba where political prisoner orlando's about it to my on a hunger strike others have now gone on hunger strike and more recently the violence in nigeria which has resulted in more than three hundred  had the honor and pleasure of having breakfast with secretary clinton talking about international women's rights about once against women about how great has become a effective and low cost and low tech weapon of war how those women then become outcasts victims of suffering from sister law around the world and in general the status of women  being as low as it is in so many ways means that societies are poorer in in so many respects and all the data is in that when fact that investment in women really pays off in terms of national security health care education you are children in every way and yet we don't really see that even  result in changing in cultures and so the importance of the status of women when we consider human rights and those ratings i think is  very very important and the higher that can be on the agenda the better i also wanted to raise the more specific issue of honduras i traveled there last november to meet with human rights defenders and victims of abuses and i'm really concerned to hear that human rights violations continue under the new regime i recently sent a letter to secretary clinton which was signed by chairman mcgovern and several other members asking her to look into allegations of serious human rights abuses  honduras since the government of the law of all took control these alleged ongoing abuses have been documented by both domestic human rights groups and under us and major international organizations such as human rights watch so i political process i think the jury is still out as to whether or not it's going to work but whether or not you know we will certainly be watching those elections closely and seeing if that leads to a political resolution of the north south question but i think we cannot keep our eye off the ball in terms of what's happening in daraa for the suffering is on a daily basis again women and children disproportionately affected both in those refugee camps and those that are internally displaced in their huge numbers so i think we've got to be very resolute in saying this is part of what we hear about you mentioned arms sales you know there's still a massive amount of arms and small arms coming into was paroled this week but on humanitarian grounds because else i don't regard that as a big but it's certainly something we push very hard for and the second thing is that i think we need to be stronger up by the chinese security forces and is in detention somewhere his family doesn't even know where to find it the fact that lawyers who are bringing human rights environmental cases are now fearing for their safety is something of great concern we much animated her thinking and informed thinking she then comes back and says let's figure out what one of the things we're doing on that issue is to be a leader at the security council in promoting but not least and i regard this is a undervalued the reports are now translated in multiple languages they are available on the web they are available in multiple forms or pushing it out more aggressively than targeting of journalists in the philippines i've read them on the committee to protect journalists and others about that and it's an area of great concern and the extra judicial killings you know we're very aware of the  political violence and extrajudicial killings that are going on in the philippines there is a growing concern as you point out in your question about the lack of accountability or prosecution for violations that are occurring in various parts of the country we do report on that and we certainly raised it on a regular basis with the with the government of the philippines this is one of the places  where we are you know struck by the i was with copious twenty five years ago and so many of the same pattern where we're still in a place unfortunately where there's there's too much political violence and not enough accountability so we're going to keep probably dozens of countries that have reacted negatively board including some of our very close allies and that's to me is a reflection that we are simply here documenting the fact here's what's happening in the world then have a more complicated set of discussions about what do we do with these facts and how do we balance or inject human rights into the relation ships where there are strategic or military or economic interests that's the china example in the large but there are many places where we face that most we have other things going on or trying to balance those relationships what makes these reports important is that it gives us a basis this is n the last couple of days and weeks about the situation in turkey and i wonder if you would comment about i mean you know the report talks about continuing concerns about abuses by the security forces hindrances trials constraints on freedom of expression including blocking of internet restrictions on religious minorities we don't hold back it's a pretty it's again our effort to have a straightforward report on what's going on we have a set of important relationships with the turkish government and part of the challenge we face as a government is how do we address the issues raised in this report the long list of ambassador lawrence met with president love one march or raise concern and we continue to pay very close attention to what's happening in these we are not going back to who violence really looking at what's one of the things we are looking at now that i feel quite strongly needs to be part of our will by a look at the effects of the minerals in the ground and how those men are how you know called on and other  mario global undersecretary to try to develop a plan for really and listing and pushing american companies and european companies to be much more mindful of the effects of have a more ardent advocate or women's rights around the world than secretary clinton and it really is home for any to hear her speak with such continuing to work on my understanding is that there's going to be more scrutiny of ourselves as we as we go forward i wonder if that includes looking at the criminal justice often longer once again women are incarcerated for nonviolent crimes more often than their male counterparts women by the way are still shackled during un what's called the universal which every country is now subject to the united states will submit a report and the ember can have it reviewed by other countries later in the fall in preparation for that report we are in the office of the civil rights division the justice department are coordinating a series of public meetings public hearings  ere we're bringing in experts on criminal justice system immigration and a whole range of issues we had one in washington about a month ago convened by the way to henderson the leadership conference on civil rights there were people in that meeting who are very focused on the criminal justice system we had a meeting last month last week in el paso focused on immigration we had another meeting in new orleans we're having another meeting in dearborn to look at some of the muslim american relations so we're going to look we're look at asho security and we're going to do a soup to nuts look at human rights in the united states we want to report to be a model we want to do as good a job as anybody and as  secretary clinton keeps saying we want to lead by exam doesn't mean our system is perfect we have to be honest about it we have to put forth here's our own assessment of what we are what our challenges are other countries comment and then try to make changes in the job we have out of the white house now an interagency group on human rights which brings together the justice department and the department of homeland security and the and the state department and others to try to figure out also how we implement changes when we get the recommendations from this report we're going to come back and say what have we learned the things we can be doing better that we're not just going through the motions to we're trying to do this in a serious way and the response has been very gratifying people in the advocacy community are quite forthcoming they're not shy and part of that community and they are very engaged in this and i think that's a good thing and i hope that this there are a number of advocacy organizations that have been working for some period of time with the international community ask us for this kind of self examination and particularly around those areas just before we leave i do particularly focused on going forward is trying to deal with the dilemma we face in terms of detention and how you know on the one hand the united states is now detaining people and we're trying to figure out how to deal with those cases of those cases and when i add one option and i think it's the preferred option is to hand all those cases over to a government of afghanistan and we want to do that with some confidence that there's a system that can handle it and the reality is it's a broken system it's not a system that has the kinds of due process and protections that we want to see so that's an area where there's a lot of work that is being done needs to be done it's very hard to do that in the middle of a war and so the reality and again i'm giving you the reality of where we are but it seems to me that's an area that needs great attention treatment of women historically is it isn't huge women's role in the society but there is still a pattern of discrimination and and targeting of women that is intolerable that we need to address pakistan is also a very fragile place right now and my concern over the long term there are a range of human rights abuses again i'm not going to give you the litany but there is a civil society there that's existed for a long time it has been ordinary people and i think it's critical that we also not in addition to the our own military and security concerns that we be mindful of the things we need to do in the here and now this is staying and amplify the voices of those advocates within pakistan who over the long term are going to be the people that are going to make the difference and that's the challenge but it is there are people again like you know july and i was magellan here with the human rights commission that have been at it for a long time we need to be figuring out ways to give them both the space and the protection but also amplify their voice and the situation in iraq christian in particular has been a er what conditions they can come back and reintegrate into the society not at all clear at this point we just had an election the election results still being tabulated and what we're obviously trying to figure out what are the next steps in iraq