SPEAKING TO NATAN SHARANSKY last month about the Conference on Democracy and Security currently wrapping up in Prague, one could almost hear the desperation in his voice. With progress in Iraq stalling and the American public turning against the war, Sharansky felt he had to show the world just what was at stake in the struggle for universal freedom. “To have a direct, open debate” was the only way to get the point across, Sharansky said. “If only the voice of the dissidents were heard, and more discussion was possible, we could change the world.”
To that end, Sharansky got in touch with two close allies in the ongoing push for freedom from tyrannical regimes: Jose Maria Aznar, the former prime minister of Spain, and Vaclav Havel, the prisoner-poet turned president of the Czech Republic. The three combined resources to put together a conference rounding up dissidents from across the globe. The hope was to put a face on the oppression that lives on in much of the developed world.
In order to give the conference a stamp of authenticity, Sharansky knew he had to land some big fish as speakers. When he suggested landing the biggest marlin in the free world, the president of the United States, some laughed. “When I raised the question of inviting President Bush, most people dismissed it by saying presidents never go to such things,” Sharansky said. “I decided the best way to check it was to speak with the president himself, and he seemed rather interested.
PRECEDING THE PRESIDENT in Prague this week was one of his staunchest allies on war-related issues in the Senate, Joseph Lieberman. Delivering a speech that has gotten little play in the American media, Lieberman reiterated the American commitment to freedom in Iraq and elsewhere, and used his location to take a historical perspective on events. “Here in Prague, especially, we should remember what happens when the democratic world does not stand united, when its leaders decide that there are places and people whose freedom is not worth defending, and abandon them to the forces of tyranny,” Lieberman told the crowd of dissidents.
Lieberman took his Democratic allies to task for urging Bush to cut and run from Iraq. “They will say that America’s foreign policy should be less principled and more pragmatic,” he sniffed, “less focused on honoring eternal, universal values and more focused on satisfying shifting national interests.” As if to underscore Lieberman’s point, on Sunday’s Face the Nation Democrat John Murtha had this to say about America’s foreign policy objectives: “The key in my estimation is to start redeployment, force them to change the constitution, force them to understand that America’s not going to step up; what we’ve got to do is what’s best for the American foreign policy, not what’s best for Iraq.”
Running from a fight is not the American way, Lieberman told the dissidents. “In your often lonely, always difficult quest, you are on the right side of history–and I am here to tell you that the United States of America must and will stand by your side as well. It is America’s responsibility and purpose as a nation to do so, inscribed for posterity by our founders, who proclaimed that the rights to life and liberty are the endowments of our Creator to every individual human being.”
PRESIDENT BUSH ECHOED many of those notes in his keynote address this afternoon. He reminded those in attendance of the Bush Doctrine set forth in his second inaugural and spoke of new efforts to promote dissent abroad. “In the eyes of America, the democratic dissidents today are the democratic leaders of tomorrow,” Bush claimed, drawing parallels to leaders like Sharansky and Havel who spent years in Soviet prisons. He pointed to the creation of the Human Rights Defenders Fund, a State Department organization providing funds for the legal defense and medical bills of dissidents persecuted by their governments. Additionally, Bush told the applauding crowd that he has “asked Secretary [of State Condoleezza] Rice to send a directive to every U.S. ambassador in an un-free nation: Seek out and meet activists for democracy. Seek out those who demand human rights.”
Much work is left to be done. Bush pointed to repressive regimes in North Korea, Iran, Cuba, Sudan, Venezuela, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam as places of change. In a slightly safer, more respectful tone, Bush also took Chinese and Russian leaders to task for recent human rights rollbacks. “China’s leaders believe that they can continue to open the nation’s economy without opening its political system. We disagree,” he said, adding, “In Russia, reforms that were once promised to empower citizens have been derailed, with troubling implications for democratic development. Part of a good relationship in the ability to talk openly about our disagreements. So the United States will continue to build our relationships with these counties–and we will do so without abandoning our values.”
Sharansky could hardly have hoped for more from the conference.
Sonny Bunch is assistant editor at THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
