IACHR prioritizes agendas sponsored by left-wing entities

The most important body for the defense of human rights in America has increasingly strayed from its original mission. And the injection of resources by foundations and governments in other parts of the world helps to explain the shift.

The mission of the IACHR (Inter-American Commission on Human Rights) is “the promotion and protection of human rights in the Americas”. The body, linked to the OAS (Organization of American States), has 35 member countries and was founded in 1959. Although it does not have the role of a court, the IACHR produces reports that support the decisions of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. This, in turn, has the power to punish countries on the grounds that they disrespect fundamental rights.

The commission bases its work on the American Convention on Human Rights, which was drafted in 1969 and came into force in 1978. The convention has, for example, an explicit protection for unborn babies by establishing that the right to life must be protected ” from the moment of conception”. Even so, in recent years, the IACHR has acted openly to expand the practice of abortion in the region. And this is not the only example of the changing profile of the commission.

The strength of the ideological agenda increased in the IACHR while the influence of external agents (foundations, companies and governments of non-member countries) grew. Not that this is the only reason for the radicalization of the commission’s discourse. The advance of the so-called identity agendas in the countries of the region would inevitably be reflected in the IACHR, which is managed by the member countries. But part of the explanation may be related to the influence of external agents. The new annual report of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, released a few weeks ago, provides further evidence of this relationship.

Ford Foundation, Google and Facebook on the list

According to the report, in 2022, the commission had a budget of 9.8 million dollars (not counting the 5 million for the Inter-American Court of Human Rights).

In addition to member countries, the court received contributions from France, Ireland, Italy, Monaco, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and Switzerland – totaling 2 million dollars. Donors include the Ford Foundation, Facebook, Google and the Arcus Foundation.

The value of the contributions of these external agents is sometimes modest. But, as the IACHR’s budget is also limited, they carry significant weight. The 2022 balance sheet lists 22 projects maintained with resources from these external donations.

Ignored lawsuits

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights does not bother to make recommendations on the internal politics of countries, even when the topic bears little relation to human rights. The latest IACHR report produced in 2021 on Brazil recommends, among other things, “establishing a coordinated fiscal policy that can contribute to the redistribution of wealth to reduce inequality gaps, correcting market deficiencies.”

The document also calls for “an inclusive education with a diverse gender perspective” and defends “alternative measures to the deprivation of liberty” and a drug policy without “repressive and criminalizing treatments.”

The report further promotes misinformation by distorting a statement given by a spokesperson for the São Paulo Military Police. In 2018, the São Paulo PM ombudsman said that 27% of people killed during police stops were in a situation of “founded suspicion” — that is: there were clear signs that they were committing crimes. The IACHR report, however, says that “founded suspicion” would be “the preconceived idea by police agents due to the socioeconomic and racial ethnic situation of the people”.

At the same time that it presents detailed recommendations on public policies in Brazil, the IACHR has ignored the petitions presented by Brazilian defenders who claim to have been victims of abuse by the STF (Federal Supreme Court) in the so-called investigations of fake news and anti-democratic acts.

For lawyer Renor Oliver Filho, who defends Free Tuesday, the financial contributions explain why the commission has set aside more urgent agendas to dedicate itself to promoting ideological agendas. “The intention is to guide the agendas using the commission and the court as instruments to promote party-political agendas”, he says. The lawyer has been unsuccessfully trying to convince the CIDH to analyze the case of Terça Livre — a digital communication vehicle that simply ceased to exist after its channels were overthrown by order of Minister Alexandre de Moraes, of the STF.

After a long silence, the IACHR was not convinced that there had been an “exhaustion of domestic remedies”. In other words, the lawyers still need to demonstrate that there is no one else to turn to within the Brazilian courts. “There are no appeals in Brazilian law and the STF’s own jurisprudence does not admit challenges to Moraes’ decisions. It is a case in which the impossibility of appealing the decisions is blatant”, says Oliver Filho.

growing influence

The growing influence of outside actors over the IACHR has come to the attention of the Global Center for Human Rights, a conservatively-inclined Washington-based think tank.

A report by the institution showed that, between 2009 and 2021, the volume of these contributions almost doubled, and exceeded 3 million dollars in 2021 – the highest value ever recorded. Based on the study, you can see that 2022 was no exception. Arcus, for example, has been making transfers to promote the LGBT cause since at least 2014. In the period, there were donations from the Open Society, commanded by billionaire George Soros, from the European Union and from governments such as those of Spain and Sweden.

The IACHR allows donors to decide the allocation of resources for specific projects. For example: an NGO or government can link your donation to the creation of an initiative to promote extrication. The IACHR cannot use the funds for another project. In 2011, about a third of the entity’s budget came through these “extraordinary contributions”.

The study by the Global Center for Human Rights talks about “cultural colonization” — the importation of agendas alien to member countries (especially Latin American ones). “The direct relationship between power and money becomes more delicate when it comes to judicial or quasi-judicial institutions, which should decide cases from a position free of conflicts of interest and focused only on the facts and legal arguments presented”, states the document.

The report also points out examples of these possible conflicts of interest. The Ford Foundation, which regularly contributes to the IACHR, has also funded a pro-abortion entity that appears among the petitioners in the Manuela case, which is being used by abortionist entities to try to force the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to establish abortion as a fundamental right.