WASHINGTON – The United States branded strategic rivals China and Russia“forces of instability” on Friday, grouping them with Iran and North Koreaas countries whose rights abuses amount to a global threat.

The charge was made by acting secretary of state John Sullivan as helaunched Washington s annual global human rights report, which this year isfocused on destabilizing abuses by state actors.

Human rights groups were quick to criticize the report, noting that it hadbeen stripped of much of the reporting on women s and reproductive rightsthat it had contained in recent years.

Instead, President Donald Trump s administration has refocused the reporton government-led crackdowns on a narrower range of human rights recognizedunder US and international law.

And Sullivan, in a preface to the report, underlined the importance ofrights reporting for US interests and security.

“Some governments are unable to maintain security and meet the basic needsof their people, while others are simply unwilling,” Sullivan wrote,introducing the country-by-country reporting.

“States that restrict freedoms of expression and peaceful assembly; thatallow and commit violence against members of religious, ethnic, and otherminority groups; or that undermine the fundamental dignity of persons aremorally reprehensible and undermine our interests,” he wrote.

“The governments of China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea, for example,violate the human rights of those within their borders on a daily basis andare forces of instability as a result.”

Global watchdog Human Rights Watch was quick to criticize the report schange of direction, lamenting the loss in coverage of “societal” limits onrights, in particular for women.

“This year s US State Department human rights report guts the analysis ofsexual and reproductive rights, reflecting the Trump administration shostility toward these issues,” the group s Washington director AndreaPrasow told AFP.

“In doing so, the administration is undermining a document that has longbeen relied upon by the Congress, foreign governments and activists aliketo assess human rights conditions around the world.

“This is unfortunately only one facet of the administration s efforts todownplay human rights as an element of US foreign policy.”

One of the authors of the report, senior diplomat Ambassador Michael Kozak,acknowledged the report s methodology on reporting reproductive rights hadreverted to an earlier US standard.

China, North Korea and Belarus are called out for various forms of coercedabortions and sterilizations, but access to abortions and contraception isnot considered a universal right.

“This is supposed to be internationally recognized human rights,” he said,emphasizing that the report was aimed at recording abuses by governmentpolicy not through “societal” issues.

Last year s “Country Reports on Human Rights Practices” was prepared fromresearch conducted by US embassies around the world under the previous USadministration of president Barack Obama.

Trump s first secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, was much criticized forrefusing to publicly present this earlier document himself, as hispredecessors had traditionally done.

Tillerson has since been sacked, despite championing Trump s “AmericaFirst” agenda and warning that sometimes America s interests trump itsvalues when dealing with foreign powers.

His nominated successor, CIA director and foreign policy hawk Mike Pompeo,has yet to be confirmed in office by the Senate but rights advocates havealready raised the alarm about his views.

The former congressman has socially conservative views, was an opponent ofgay marriage and refused to say during his confirmation hearing whether heconsiders homosexuality a “perversion.”

Trump, meanwhile, is an unlikely leader for a government that sees itselfas a world leader on human rights.

During his 2016 campaign for office, Trump repeatedly said he favored thetorture of terror suspects by waterboarding “or much worse” and hasendorsed the killing of the suspects families.

As president he has courted leaders like the Philippines President RodrigoDuterte, despite what Friday s report recorded as hundreds of extrajudicialkillings in his war on drugs.

The annual Country Reports on Human Rights does not in itself trigger anycompulsory US action against alleged abusers, but serves as a backgroundreport for policy-makers.

It is one of the most consulted documents on the State Department websiteand is often cited as evidence in congressional debates, asylum hearingsand foreign policy discussions. -APP/AFP