Okay, I may be coming to this discussion a bit late. So bare with me really.
Yes, the world is still suffering from past mistakes, just look at Egypt and it's sole claim over the Nile river, given to them by Colonial Britain, which has lead to water poverty and drought in Sudan and Ethiopia. It's the responsibility of current generations to rectify these mistakes which still damage lives in order to improve the quality of lives and prevent further conflict.
Human rights are needed for a democratic nation, democracy cannot occur if one is murdered, tortured etc for voicing their opinions, that's all I can say. China does have some horrid human rights abuses under it's belt and still in it's hands, the torture and imprisonment of political dissidents and followers of Fulan Gong just being to name very few.
Yes, human rights do protect suspected terrorists, but they are suspected, and you can't hope to punish someone without a fair trial, yes, arrest them, charge them, don't put them in "Blacksites" and torture information out of them. Torture does not work, my father, who was trained to withstand torture, knows it doesn't work, you will admit to anything, like under Pinochet and Khmer Rogue, if you're being tortured just to make the pain stop. It adds hypocrisy, very much so, how can we claim to be civilized and democratic if we abduct people we say we suspect of being enemies of the state and then condone nations and organizations who do the same?
