Deng, a former slave and Sudanese human rights activist living in the United States. Countries boycotting Durban III was boycotted by 14 countries: Australia, Austria, Bulgaria, Canada, the Czech Republic, France, Germany Italy, Israel, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, the United Kingdom and the United States. The precise reasons varied from country to country, but included concerns that the Durban process has been used to promote racism, intolerance, antisemitism and Holocaust denial, and to erode freedom of speech and Israel's right to exist. The countries are listed below in chronological order of their boycott declaration. Canada On 25 November 2010, shortly after the conference was declared, Canada announced that it would not be attending and that the country had lost faith in the United Nations' human rights process. Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said: "The original Durban Conference, and its declaration, as well as the non-governmental activities associated with it, proved to be a dangerous platform for racism, including antisemitism," also stating that "Canada is clearly committed to the fight against racism, but the Durban process commemorates an agenda that actually promotes racism rather than combats it," and "Canada will not participate in this charade. We will not lend our good name to this Durban hatefest." The boycott declaration was supported by the opposition. On 13 June 2011, Canada boycotted a General Assembly resolution setting out details for the conference. Canada had also been the first country to announce that it would boycott the Durban II conference, over similar concerns. At the time, it was followed by nine other western countries. Kenney said that his country's decision to boycott the earlier event was vindicated when Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad used it as a vehicle for Holocaust denial, racism, xenophobia and the promotion of hatred, saying: "Despite the fact that the Durban declaration and its follow-up have served, frankly, to fuel bigotry, the General Assembly has chosen to repeat and even augment the mistakes of the past." Members of the Canadian delegation to the original Durban Conference stayed to the end but said they did so only to decry the attempts to de-legitimize Israel, and issued a statement dissociating Canada from the final agreement. Israel On 25 December 2010, a day after the UN approved a resolution firmly linking the event to the 2001 Durban Conference, Israel's Foreign Ministry announced that the Jewish state intended to boycott the event. "The Durban Conference