I have a piece up on The New Republic’s website arguing that the Obama administration’s response to the Sri Lanka crisis augurs well for the place of human rights in American foreign policy.
Over the past four months an estimated 6,500 ethnic-Tamil civilians in Sri Lanka have died at the hands of their own government. Tens of thousands more have been injured. Unlike humanitarian crises in places like Darfur, Somalia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, this outbreak of violence occurred almost entirely during President Obama’s first 100 days. It is the first man-made humanitarian crisis of the Obama era. So far, the Obama administration’s response to the crisis in Sri Lanka is encouraging to those who believe that human rights–in name and deed–should enjoy a prominent place in American foreign policy.