Perceptions of US plunge under Trump: Pew poll

UN rights boss criticizes May, Duterte and the US president

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump and his policies are broadly unpopular around the world — with the notable exceptions of Russia and Israel, according to a poll released Monday.

The Pew Research Center survey, which surveyed people in 37 nations, showed a sharp decline in the average trust for America’s leader to do the right thing when it comes to international affairs.

Twenty-two percent reported they had faith in Trump to guide America’s role in the world, compared with a 64 percent level of confidence in Barack Obama in the final years of his presidency, Pew Research said.

“In the eyes of most people surveyed around the world, the White House’s new occupant is arrogant, intolerant and even dangerous,” according to a statement released with the poll, which was carried out between Feb. 16 and May 8.

At home, a CBS poll released last week found that Trump’s overall approval rating in America was now down to 36 percent, the lowest level since he took power.

And under Trump, favorability ratings for the US have fallen in many countries, according to the Pew poll.

“The share of the public with a positive view of the US has plummeted in a diverse set of countries from Latin America, North America, Europe, Asia and Africa,” Pew said.

The fall in confidence in the US leader was especially pronounced among US allies in Europe and Asia, and in Canada and Mexico, the poll said.

Among the 37 countries polled, Russia and Israel were the only ones in which people said they trust Trump more than they did Obama.

On specific Trump policy initiatives, an average of 76 percent oppose his pledge to build a wall along the border with Mexico with the stated goal of keeping out criminals, unauthorized immigrants and drugs, Pew said.

The poll showed similar levels of opposition to Trump’s stance on pulling the US out of international trade accords and the Paris agreement on fighting global warming, and on barring people from six mainly Muslim nations from entering the US.

“Among the positive characteristics tested, his highest rating is for being a strong leader. Fewer believe he is charismatic, well qualified or cares about ordinary people,” it added.

Meanwhile, the UN’s top rights official Zeid Ra’ad Al-Hussein accused Trump of breaking taboos by suggesting bringing back torture, and warned world powers against undermining civil liberties in their fight against militants.

He also lambasted British Prime Minister Theresa May for threatening to change human rights laws if they got in the way of security operations, saying her words would give heart to authoritarian governments.

“Whatever the intention behind her remarks, they were highly regrettable, a gift from a major Western leader to every authoritarian figure around the world who shamelessly violates human rights under the pretext of fighting terrorism,” Al-Hussein said in a speech delivered on Monday night in London.

Al-Hussein said that Trump and Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte were “breaking long-held taboos” in their respective support for torture and extra-judicial killings. “The dangers to the entire system of international law are therefore very real,” he said.

He said that strident statements in the wake of attacks risked undermining international rights treaties.

“If other leaders start to follow the same rhetorical course, undermining the (UN Convention against Torture) with their words, the practice of torture is likely to broaden, and that would be fatal.

“The convention would be scuttled, and a central load-bearing pillar of international law removed.”

Trump said in late January that he thought the practice of waterboarding — a form of simulated drowning — worked as an intelligence-gathering tool. But he also said he would defer on the issue to Defense Secretary Jim Mattis who disagrees with him about the technique’s usefulness.

Zeid said he was worried by Trump’s “persistent flirtation” with a return to torture. There was little immediate danger of the US using torture, but that could change if there was an attack on US soil, he said.

“Mindful of how the American public has, over the last ten years, become far more accepting of torture, the balance could be tipped in favor of its practice,” he said.

After deadly militant attacks on London and Manchester, May told The Sun newspaper this month: “If human rights laws get in the way of doing these things, we will change those laws to make sure we can do them.”

Separately, Trump used the resignations of three CNN journalists involved in a retracted Russia-related story to resume his attack on the network’s credibility Tuesday.

The story was about a supposed investigation into a pre-inaugural meeting between a Trump associate and the head of a Russian investment fund. CNN accepted the journalists’ resignations Monday.

Trump wrote in a Tuesday morning tweet, “Wow, CNN had to retract big story on ‘Russia,’ with 3 employees forced to resign. What about all the other phony stories they do? FAKE NEWS!”