SITTING DOWN WITH BLOODY DESPOTS

NY Post ^ | May 7, 2009 | Daniel Mandel

[Scanian]

IF the Obama administration really wants to improve human rights, it's taking the wrong approach in seeking a seat on the seriously flawed United Nations Human Rights Council.

The best thing now, ironically, would be for the HRC to show its true colors and reject Washington's application in the vote it plans for Tuesday -- although don't count on it.

The administration says it's aiming to "promote universality, transparency and objectivity" in the council, but more likely its presence simply would legitimize a body hostile to democracy and human rights.

The Human Rights Council was created in 2006 to supersede its corrupt predecessor, the UN Human Rights Commission, which at its end counted six of the most politically repressive regimes -- Cuba, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Libya, China and Vietnam -- as members. Iran, a country known for "honor-killings" of wives and daughters, headed its women's rights committee; Saddam Hussein's representative once presided over its disarmament panel.

A satirist could scarcely conceive so perverse a record, but its successor has equaled it.

Because the new body's membership has been reduced to 47 from 54 countries and a greater emphasis is placed on geographical distribution, fewer democracies and more autocracies are represented.

True, the council can suspend members for human-rights abuses, but that requires approval by a two-thirds majority of the UN General Assembly -- which has been unable to muster a simple majority merely to condemn the genocide in Sudan. It's a worthless measure.

[Proud_USA_Republican]

The UNHRC is nothing but a tool to ban any justified criticism of Islam and all the human rights abuses and racism that occur within muslim ruled countries. It kills free speech, rather than promotes it.
Its a corrupt joke, just like the UN General Assembly is.