http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=2176
By Patrick Goodenough
CNSNews.com International Editor
The Bush administration sees “no reason at this point” to participate in a U.N. http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=3779 on racism being planned for next year and will encourage other governments to stay away too, the State Department said Thursday.
This is the closest the administration has come to declaring it will boycott the event, but the comments fall short of an unequivocal refusal to go.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has come under increasing pressure in recent months to announce a boycott, because critics expect the conference to be a repeat of an earlier one marked by attacks on Israel and attempts to equate Zionism with apartheid.
The U.S. withdrew its delegation in protest from the 2001 gathering in Durban, http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=879. Advocacy groups say next year’s meeting, which is supposed to review progress made since 2001, promises more of the same.Although South Africa has again offered to host the gathering, no venue has been announced for the review conference. Those campaigning against it have labeled the meeting “Durban II,” and the shorthand has stuck.
On Thursday, ads running in four U.S. newspapers and signed by prominent figures including Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel and former CIA Director James Woolsey, called on Rice to announce that the U.S. will not go.
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