Comment du Jour

Human Rights Council Merry- go-Round


United Nations—It’s one of the traditional Rites of Spring at the United Nations, the election of new members to the Human Rights Council, the 47 member deliberative body viewing and monitoring the pulse of civil and political rights the world over. The full 192 member General Assembly votes for new members within regional groups to serve three year terms. As in the past, most slates presented candidates who went unopposed

Ironically given the composition of some of the Geneva-based Council membership, with countries like China, Cuba, Russia and Saudi Arabia sitting in judgment of global human rights issues is like having Tony Soprano sit on a Senate sub-committee on organized crime.

Balloting for the Asian Group, though uncontested, saw India, followed by Indonesia, Philippines and Kuwait. Again good for multi-ethnic India, a working sectarian democracy, which despite the still terrible undertow of poverty, has been able to keep its democratic structures.

Originally Syria was going to run for the Asian Group. Yet political backlash to the current crackdown on civilian protesters put the Assad regime out of the running.

The United States, and European countries such as France, Germany and the Netherlands strongly lobbied against Syria’s bid for the council seat.
The prospect of electing Syria, a serial persecutor of its own people, was a political bridge too far even for the majority of the UN General Assembly’s voting members.

In the Eastern European state category, competition became more interesting as three countries ran for two seats. The Czech Republic handily won with 148 votes while Romania gained 131. Georgia however lost with 89 votes, largely due to Russian vigorously lobbying against her candidacy.

For the Western European state category, the two seats were unchallenged and handedly won by Austria and Italy. Bravo, both are good choices as Austria and Italy remain sterling democracies and positive examples of human rights .

The Latin American and Caribbean state selection saw four countries contesting three seats. Chile, Costa Rica and Peru were elected. Nicaragua lost its bid. Given the eroding human rights situation in that country, this poses no great loss.

The newly elected Council members will serve for three years.

In fact, fewer than half of the 47 member council can be characterized as democracies. They nonetheless present another flawed reflection of the world.