The main challenge is what to do in the face of double standards. Those who should be rendered accountable under international criminal law, the Kissingers of this world, enjoy de facto impunity, while those who come from countries that have long been targets of hegemonic abuse are used as poster children of accountability.

The UDHR has become an iconic document over the course of more than six decades, the starting point for discussions of whether or not the rights as set forth are truly universal or slanted to reflect the hegemony of Western values, especially those associated with liberal individualism.

International law in its counter-hegemonic uses is very important in any domain where issues of legitimacy are significant, but is rarely able to have a corresponding behavioural impact.

I think it is less the limited amount of information than the filters that information about the Middle East must pass through before being fairly addressed in the mainstream media. In more intellectual and geopolitical terms, the perceptions of the region are distorted by a combination of Orientalism and the priorities of the state of Israel, including the refusal to discuss the relevance of Israel's nuclear weapons arsenal in the context of addressing Iran on its nuclear program.

We live in a state-centric world faced with global-scale problems that cannot be met by the actions of single states, no matter how powerful, if assessed from the perspective of military capabilities.

The deliberate weakening of the labour movement by the machinations of market fundamentalists, gaining momentum during the periods when Margaret Thatcher led the United Kingdom and Ronald Reagan governed in the United States, contributed to the decline of human rights.

More recently the US has more accurately been viewed as a militarist 'empire' that fights destructive wars and intervenes in a variety of societies, especially in the Middle East to retain control over oil reserves, and lends crucial support to Israel that not only oppresses the Palestinian people but threatens to convert the entire region into a war zone.