Brussels, 01/02/2006 (Agence Europe) - On 18 January, Human Rights Watch (HRW) published a very severe report in which the EU and its Member Sates are accused of having closed their eyes on considerable abuse committed by third countries. “In matters such as migration and asylum, and counter-terrorism, common EU approaches as well as policy and practice in individual EU states continue to reflect a tendency to circumvent international human rights obligations”, HRW stresses. This partly hangs on the EU's “institutional disarray”, HRW Director Kenneth Roth analyses, saying the French and Dutch rejection of the European Constitution was bad news for human rights. The United Kingdom is mainly accused of having contributed to this leadership deficiency in human rights and of having sought, on the basis of assurances about good treatment devoid of all credibility, to deliver suspects to places where they were likely to be tortured. Furthermore, the EU is said to have continued to minimise the importance of human rights in its relations with States considered useful in the fight against terrorism, like Russia, China and Saudi Arabia. France and Germany are blamed for having recommended lifting the embargo on arms sales to China. There are, however, also some things that the EU has done well. Thus, enlargement policy plays a positive role in candidate countries, HRW stresses, recognising that the Union did well in taking a firm approach against the Uzbek regime after the massacre in May 2005, and for having played a role on the way the situation has evolved in Turkey. The EU, however, “continues to fight in a category that is well below its weight”, HRW states, saying “the European Union could have filled this gap” left by the American leadership but “it did not do so”.