US urged to uphold rule of law: Hillary Clinton

Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, right, speaks during a conversation session at the Doha Forum in Qatar, Sunday. AFP-Yonhap

DOHA — The world is witnessing an erosion of international norms and laws, and the United States under the Donald Trump administration is no exception, according to Hillary Clinton, former U.S. secretary of state.

She aired her concerns Sunday during her one-on-one conversation with Ravi Agrawal, editor-in-chief of Foreign Policy, at the Doha Forum 2025 in the Qatari capital.

She said global norms and laws have been well-established since World War II. “When you talk about how the rule of law, how the expectations of militaries in combat are supposed to be judged, all of that was an effort to try to construct a system that could rein in bad leaders,” she said.

Citing some world leaders who want to dominate neighbors without being restrained, she said moving away from international norms and laws “will only benefit the worst actors in the international system.”

“So I really believe it's a mistake for the United States not to be upholding all of those rules,” the former secretary of state said. “The world will be much worse off if the United States retreats from that position.”

In this context, Clinton expressed concern over how Trump’s second term is impacting the world.

“I am quite concerned about the impact because there has been a very heavy emphasis on moving away from what I think are core American values in a number of ways,” she said. “So I think that there's a lot that needs to be reviewed and looked at from the perspective of what are the long-term consequences … I've seen a lot of disruption, but we're still not yet at the point where we see what the actual effects will be.”

As for the diplomatic side, she said the U.S. is “taking a very big turn away from the kind of alliances that have been the hallmark of our foreign policy.”

Adding that some policies create unnecessary divisions between America and countries which share a lot of common values and are important for its security, she said, “I worry that we are, you know, shutting a lot of doors, cutting off a lot of our allies.”

Former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, right, smiles during a conversation session at the Doha Forum in Qatar, Sunday. AFP-Yonhap

'Women’s rights are human rights'

Clinton took part in a United Nations World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995, where 189 countries adopted the Beijing Declaration and the Platform for Action that called for equal and fair treatment of women. In a speech at the event, she declared that “women’s rights are human rights,” significantly raising the prominence of the phrase.

She said there has since been a lot of progress, like countries adopting laws against domestic violence and child marriage. However, there has been pushback since the COVID-19 pandemic when families suffered financially.

Women are the first to be picked on, she explained, "because they're more vulnerable and they can be pointed to as the problems in society or because of what women are doing or failing to do.”

But Clinton said she’s optimistic because that attitude is out of step with reality. “I still believe that women's rights are human rights and that women's equality is the unfinished business of the 21st century and every nation will do better.”