Opinion

State Dep’t says it is ‘not consistent’ on human rights violations involving Israel and neighbors

The press briefing at State Department on Tuesday, a dialogue between spokesperson Victoria Nuland and AP reporter Matt Lee. Thanks to Idrees Ahmad.

VICTORIA NULAND, spokesperson for State Department:

Listen, before we leave Syria, I just want to take the opportunity, if you didn’t see it, to draw your attention to the Human Rights Watch report that was released today that identifies some 27 detention centers that Human Rights Watch says Syrian Government intelligence agencies have been using since the Assad crackdown on pro-democracy protestors. The report found that tens of thousands of Syrians are in detention by regime security and intelligence agencies and that the regime is carrying out inexplicable, horrific acts of torture, including – well, I’m not going to repeat them here, but I’ll leave it to you to read the report. And in many cases, the Human Rights Watch asserts that even children have been subject to torture by the Assad regime.

MATT LEE: Do you see that report as credible and solid, and you’re putting – you’re endorsing it? I mean, you’re saying —

MS. NULAND: We have no reason to believe that it is not credible. It’s based on eyewitness accounts, and they’re reporting from a broad cross-section of human rights figures inside Syria.

QUESTION: So the next time Human Rights Watch comes out with a report that’s critical of Israel for its treatment of the Palestinians, I’ll assume that you’re going to be saying the same thing, correct; that you think that the report is credible, it’s based on eyewitness accounts?

MS. NULAND: As —

QUESTION: And you’re not going to say that it’s politically motivated and should be dismissed?

MS. NULAND: Matt, as you have made clear again and again in this room, we are not always consistent.

Goyal.

QUESTION: So, in other words, anything that Human Rights Watch says that is critical of someone you don’t like, that’s okay; but once they criticize someone that you do like, then it’s not worth the paper it’s printed on?

MS. NULAND: Matt, I’m not going to get into colloquy on this one.

Goyal.

RAGHUBIR GOYAL (India Globe): India.

MS. NULAND: Yeah.

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No working American journalist would be so persistent a questioner. That would guarantee not being recognized at future press conferences.

I am amazed that Matt Lee still has a job after all this time. That man has balls of steel. If only the rest of the press corps were like him!

HAHAHA!!! Man, that was awesome. “As you have made clear, Matt, we’re generally full of poo around here.”

I love seeing these interchanges between Matt Lee and Victoria Nuland. She always gets her arse handed to her.

Ha!

Nuland, ” state not always consistent ” well hush my mouth, Nuland and her husband Robert Kagan are full of consistency, well they are full of something.