Archive for September, 2008

UN Human Rights Council Eliminates Scrutiny of Liberia, Praises Sudan, Slams Israel

Published by
UN Watch
- at September 30, 2008 in Human Rights Council (UNHRC). 0 Comments

The UN Human Rights Council concluded its September 2008 session by eliminating the investigative mandate on human rights abuses in Liberia, praising Sudan, and censuring Israel for the twentieth time in two years. Apart from condemning Israel, the council has criticized North Korea once, and Myanmar four times. The UN’s other 189 countries have avoided any condemnation.  Click for chart of HRC resolutions

Despite Sudan’s massive atrocities in Darfur, the resolution expressed only weak and indirect criticism of the Khartoum regime, and, in an unprecedented move, refused to extend the Sudan expert’s mandate for longer than six months. Instead, the text “acknowledges the steps taken by the Government of the Sudan to strengthen the human rights legal and institutional framework, principally in law reform.”

Egypt’s Hisham Badr, introducing the resolution for the African Group, celebrated the fact that the council took note of “Sudan’s progress on the ground.” Similarly, Sudan’s Omer Dahab Fadol Mohamed praised the resolution for having “reflected the fact that Sudan was in total cooperation with the Human Rights Council and had shown sufficient flexibility for the Human Rights Council to continue cooperation on the basis of a positive dialogue.” Sudan commended the efforts by the African Group, “that had fully understood the position of Sudan.”

The council, dominated by repressive regimes, voted 32 to 9 to censure Israel for errant shells that in November 2006 claimed Palestinian civilian lives in Beit Hanun, Gaza, without mentioning that the artillery was aimed at Hamas terrorists firing Kassam rockets at Israeli civilians in Sderot. The resolution, a repeat of several previous censures, was designed to keep the episode on the UN agenda in perpetuity. The 9 opposing votes were cast by Canada, European Union members, and Japan, with Switzerland, South Korea, Ukraine, Bosnia and Cameroon all refusing to give their support and abstaining. Click for voting sheet

Other items from the September session:

  • Ukraine introduced but then withdrew a resolution commemorating “the victims of the Holodomor of 1932-1933 in Ukraine, an artificially created famine that took lives of millions of Ukrainians,” which was “caused by the cruel actions and policies of the totalitarian Stalinist regime.” Former Soviet-occupied states Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Georgia, Poland and Moldova were co-sponsors of the aborted text, as for some reason was Monaco.
  • The council renewed the mandate on Burundi for one year, but weakened its mandate on Cambodia by ending the expert’s former designation as a special envoy of the secretary-general, a title that gave access to higher levels of power.

Durban mayor asked UN Rights chief Navi Pillay “to rescue name of Durban”

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UN Watch
- at September 17, 2008 in Durban 2009. 0 Comments

When Navi Pillay was appointed this summer as the UN’s new high commissioner for human rights, the mayor of Durban, South Africa, her native city, gave Pillay a bouquet of flowers and asked her “to rescue the name of Durban,” a word that has become associated with the discredited UN conference on racism held there in 2001.

Ms. Pillay told the story today to a packed audience of NGO activists attending the current session of the UN Human Rights Council, as she urged NGOs to fully engage with the follow-up Durban conference to be held in Geneva in April 2009, of which she is secretary-general. (Libya is chair, Iran and Cuba among the vice-chairs.) The representatives of Human Rights Watch and certain other groups responded that they intended to actively participate in the process.

Earlier this year, a group of 97 NGOs, including UN Watch, published a joint statement that expressed serious concerns with the hatred and anti-Semitism that tainted the 2001 Durban conference, urging participants at Durban II not to repeat the same sins.

Participating in the NGO session with Pillay, UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer publicly welcomed her to Geneva, and saluted her personal and professional advocacy for equality, noting her heroic struggle against apartheid. UN Watch founder Morris Abram was a pioneer advocate for the cause of civil rights and headed the United Negro College Fund.

Swiss FM Calmy-Rey: All Must Consider “Sitting Down with Osama Bin Laden”

Published by
Hillel Neuer
- at September 8, 2008 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

In a speech delivered last week to the annual assembly of her diplomatic corps (see below), Swiss Foreign Minister Calmy-Rey, who for some reason takes pride in describing herself as a founder of the UN Human Rights Council, said that one of the questions that every country has to ask is, “[S]hould we seek dialogue without discrimination — even if it means sitting down with Osama Bin Laden?”

You’ll recall this is the same woman who signed the gas deal with Ahmadinejad, and posed with him smiling, as she donned the Islamic headscarf. She once proposed inviting the Iranian leader to Switzerland to debate the Holocaust. Really.

Instead of apologizing to the free world for what even the Swiss now recognize to be not only inane but dangerous remarks — political figures there are finally beginning to question her fitness for office — Calmy-Rey has been trying to shoot the messenger.

Unhappy with how Agence France-Press reported the story, journalists say that Calmy-Rey’s staff threw a fit, calling every reporter in the country to save her career from self-destruction. The Swiss issued a public rebuttal of AFP’s story, but that wasn’t enough.

Now, Geneva newspapers report, Calmy-Rey’s office has filed a formal complaint with the Paris headquarters of AFP, a letter that may have even suggested that the Geneva bureau chief be fired. Calmy-Rey further alienated political allies and the normally sympathetic press corps when she boycotted the 80th anniversary celebration of the Swiss foreign press association, reneging on her promised appearance.

Boycott? Funny, and we thought she was against that stuff.

Below is the relevant section of FM Calmy-Rey’s speech.

Continue reading ‘Swiss FM Calmy-Rey: All Must Consider “Sitting Down with Osama Bin Laden”’

Sri Lanka to Oversee Asian Declaration for UN Durban II Racism Conference

Published by
UN Watch
- at September 1, 2008 in Sri Lanka and Durban 2009. 0 Comments

The UN originally intended to organize major regional meetings around the world in advance of the Durban Review Conference, set for April in Geneva. In the end, however, it seems there will be no Asian, West or East European conferences.

The UN had spoken of an Asian meeting in September in Bangkok but it seems that won’t happen. Instead, the Asian ambassadors in Geneva are reportedly preparing their own “outcome document” — see report below from Sri Lanka, which will facilitate drafting of the text– to feed into the final declaration in April. Such texts are called “outcome documents” for being the outcome of a particular conference. Yet now we will an outcome without there ever having been a conference.

Sounds odd, but in a way it’s more honest: the African declaration was all cooked up in Geneva beforehand, with the brief meeting in Abuja, mostly held behind closed doors, entirely dominated by Geneva-based diplomats and UN officials, who flew in to Nigeria merely to create the pretense of holding an African event.

If you thought the African text was bad — it failed to hold a single African country accountable for performance on racism, thereby failing the stated mission of the conference — the Asian one threatens to be worse. Recall that in 2001, after meeting in Tehran, the Asian outcome document singled out Israel for “ethnic cleansing” and of a “new kind of apartheid, a crime against humanity.”

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News report from pro-government Sri Lankan newspaper: 

http://www.island.lk/2008/09/01/news3.html

Run-Up to UN Anti-Racism Conference

Upon recommendation by the Ambassador/Permanent Representative of China, the Asian Group Co-ordinator, the Asian Group of the United Nations Human Rights Council has appointed Sri Lanka’s Ambassador Dr. Dayan Jayatilleka as the facilitator to negotiate an outcome document of the Asian Region, as a contribution to the preparatory process of the Durban Review Conference.

The World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance was held in Durban, South Africa in 2001 and produced the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action, which provided an important new framework for combating racism and intolerance with a wide range of action-oriented measures.

The Review Conference of the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action has been scheduled to be held in Geneva, Switzerland from 20-24 April 2009 to evaluate progress towards the goals set by the 2001 World Conference. For this purpose Regional Groups are requested to contribute by providing inputs to the above Review Conference.

Against this backdrop Ambassador Jayatilleka has been appointed as Facilitator by the Asian Group to negotiate an outcome document of the Asian Region in order to provide inputs from the Asian Region to the above Review Conference.

Latin America and African Regions already had their Regional Meetings in Brasilia and Abuja respectively and have prepared their inputs to the above Review Conference.