Obama Administration to boycott UN Summit on Racism

The Obama administration quietly announced this weekend that it would boycott an international conference about racism and discrimination because of concerns that the conference unfairly singles out Israel for criticism and because the conference may set the stage for restrictions on free speech.

The United Nations conference is set to begin tomorrow in Geneva, Switzerland.Protesting what their leaders see as anti-Semitic and anti-Israel overtones to the conference, Australia, Canada, Israel, Italy and Sweden are also not sending delegations.

Acting U.S. State Department spokesman Robert Wood Saturday issued a statement saying that the 2009 Durban Review Conference draft outcome document "still contains language that reaffirms in toto the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action (DDPA) from 2001, which the United States has long said it is unable to support" because it "singles out one particular conflict and prejudges key issues that can only be resolved in negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians."

"Its inclusion in the review conference document has the same effect as inserting that original text into the current document and re-adopting it," Wood said. In addition, he added that the United States "also has serious concerns with relatively new additions to the text regarding 'incitement,' that run counter to the U.S. commitment to unfettered free speech."

Earlier drafts of the document expressed disapproval of any "defamation of religion."Wood said: "Therefore, with regret, the United States will not join the review conference."Human rights organizations expressed disappointment at the decision.“From the outset we have shared Washington’s deep concern about the efforts by some governments to use the racism meeting to single out Israel for criticism and to promote the idea that religions should be protected over rights, ” said Juliette de Rivero, Geneva advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “But governments have now excised troubling language about the Middle East and ‘defamation of religion’ from the meeting’s draft resolution.”

Congressional Black Caucus chair Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., said the CBC was "deeply dismayed" by the President's decision.``This decision is inconsistent with the administration's policy of engaging with those we agree with and those we disagree with,'' she said. "By boycotting Durban, the U.S. is making it more difficult for it to play a leadership role on U.N. Human Rights Council as it states it plans to do.

This is a missed opportunity, plain and simple.''The announcement was not unexpected.In February, Wood said that "the document being negotiated has gone from bad to worse, and the current text of the draft outcome document is not salvageable." United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice told Politico's Ben Smith that the document was "rife with anti-Israeli and other problematic substance" and "not a credible basis for a responsible outcome."

The Obama administration had worked with the Russian leaders chair the conference, as well as senior United Nations officials, on making changes to the document.Ultimately some changes were made -- and specific mentions of Israel were removed -- but not enough to satisfy American policymakers.The draft outcome document specifically "(r)eaffirms the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action (DDPA), as it was adopted at the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in 2001.

"Much of the debate at the 2001 conference focused on whether or not Zionism was inherently racism, prompting the US and Israeli delegations to withdraw from the conference. An early draft called Israel "a racist apartheid state" and referred to Israel's "systematic perpetration of racist crimes, including war crimes, acts of genocide and ethnic cleansing."The final language in the DDPA 2001 document, was much tamer, though no other country or struggle except for the Israel-Palestinian conflict was singled out for criticism."We are concerned about the plight of the Palestinian people under foreign occupation," it stated.

"We recognize the inalienable right of the Palestinian people to self-determination and to the establishment of an independent State and we recognize the right to security for all States in the region, including Israel, and call upon all States to support the peace process and bring it to an early conclusion."Calling the conference "a celebration of racism and vile anti-Semitic activity" and "further evidence of the U.N.'s inability to demonstrate any semblance of fairness or objectivity on these issues when it comes to the Jewish State," the American Israel Public Affairs Committee issued a statement applauding President Obama's decision as "the right thing to do and underscores America's unstinting commitment to combating intolerance and racism in all its forms and in all settings."

Jake Tapper is ABC News' Senior White House Correspondent based in the network's Washington bureau. He writes about politics and popular culture and covers a range of national stories. We thank you Jake for this blog posting.