Today, I disagreed with Human Rights Watch, disagreed with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and agreed with US ambassador to the UN John Bolton. It's rare that any of those things happen and almost unprecedented that they happen on the same issue. I knew then that it was going to be a very cold day indeed. Then I looked outside at my thermometer. Appropriately enough, it read -11 degrees F (-24 C).
The UN General Assembly is debating a plan to revamp the now discredited UN Human Rights Commission. The new Human Rights Council was supposed to be smaller and more effective and members were supposed to be subject to reviews of their own human rights record before being accepted to the Council. That's what human rights organizations wanted. The Bush administration wanted a Council that was more pliant to its will and uncritical of its actions.
However, the new proposal barely seems to make any progress in those directions.
The proposal calls for a council of 47 countries instead of the commission's 53, with new restrictions on membership, means for timely interventions in crises and a year-round presence with three meetings a year lasting a total of at least 10 weeks. The Geneva-based commission meets once a year for six weeks.
Some had called for a much smaller Council with 8-12 members, the smaller number making it easier to exclude human rights abusers.
The smaller Council would've also give it the means to respond more quickly to human rights crises. It's almost inconceivable that a 47 member Council will be significantly less unwieldy than the present 53 member Commisssion.
The General Assembly rejected Secretary General Annan's proposal that new members to the Council must be approved by 2/3 of current members.
Additionally, the resolution maintains the right of regional groups to put forward a slate of candidates which makes it easier for human rights abusers to sneak in (in much the same way Congressmen append unpopular proposals onto more popular, but unrelated, bills).
The compromise proposal stipulates that each country will also be subject to a review of its rights records at least once during its three-year term. But by whom? Presumably by the rest of the Council. If human rights abusers make up a significant portion of the Council, it will be much easier for the abusers to unite in order to protect each other. It will also be easier for the major powers to protect its allies privately while pretending to stand up for human rights publicly.
For once, Ambassador Bolton is actually right when he said the proposal had too many "deficiencies" and should be renegotiated.
"Based on conversations we've had with other governments, the strongest argument in favor of this draft is that it is not as bad as it could be," Mr. Bolton said.
I'm not sure he and I agree on what the right way forward is. I suspect his involves a proposal that reads, "The United States government shall be judge, jury and executioner in all matters of human rights and international law." But we both agree that the present proposal is basically no change to the lamentable status quo.
There should be a much smaller Human Rights Council. There should be one seat each for Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Europe and Oceania. And anywhere from two to six 'at-large' seats. That's it. There's no need for one-quarter of the UN's membership to sit on this Council. This would allow (though not guarantee) the Council to be accountable and to expeditiously address any situations that need attention. And it must have the authority to investigate all human rights violations brought to its attention, even those committed by member states, even those committed by powerful countries.
I was suprised that Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, who are on the right side of most human rights issues, decided to endorse this charade.
Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, said, "This is less than we hoped for, but it is clearly better than the Human Rights Commission, and we are supporting it."
How is this proposal significantly, or even moderately, better than the present Commission structure? I've seen no evidence that it is.
Yvonne Terlingen, United Nations representative of Amnesty International, called on governments to adopt the resolution without delay. "This is an historic opportunity that governments must not squander for selfish political interests," she said.
This is a historic opportunity, but one that the proposal wastes completely but putting the same old wine in a new bottle.
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