A country's strategic position means turning a blind eye

How politics intrude into and collide with human rights and plain basic decency. Forget about a country engaged in wide-spread human rights abuses - if that country borders Afghanistan. This piece in The Independent explains.

"The West is turning a blind eye to a worsening human rights situation in one of the world's most repressive dictatorships, according to a report released yesterday.

Human Rights Watch says torture continues to be widespread in the jails of Uzbekistan, but the US and EU have given the brutal regime of Islam Karimov an easy ride, due to the country's strategic location bordering Afghanistan.

The report makes for difficult reading, detailing a litany of torture cases including beatings, electric shocks, asphyxiation and threats of sexual violence. In one case, a detainee had cold water poured over his naked body and was then left with two high-speed fans pointed at him so that he would freeze. In another case, a prisoner was doused in boiling water, reminiscent of the infamous cases in 2002 when an international investigation found that two detainees suspected of terrorism had been boiled alive."

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