UN seeks to mollify US over rights council

By Mark Turner
March 10, 2006
The Financial Times
Original Source: http://news.ft.com/cms/s/4aac1946-b06d-11da-a142-0000779e2340.html

The United Nations General Assembly has delayed until next week a decision to create a Human Rights Council, in a last-ditch attempt to overcome US objections and avoid a damaging vote that could unravel the project altogether.
The new council is meant to replace the widely discredited Human Rights Commission in Geneva, but the US says it would vote against it because its proposed form marks insufficient progress.
European and other UN members, as well as Kofi Annan, the secretary-general, agree the proposed council is not as strong as they hoped, but believe the current text is as good as they can get, and does mark a substantial step forward.
US opposition has focused on the mechanism by which the council’s members are chosen. Washington says any candidate should win two-thirds approval in the 191-member UN General Assembly, but that was opposed by more than 120 countries. The current proposal says an absolute majority is sufficient.
The US also wants to exclude any country under Security Council human rights sanctions, but many countries were wary of giving the Security Council, dominated by five powers, veto rights over a human rights body meant to represent the UN’s entire membership.
Supporters of the current text argue that the absolute majority still represents a substantive hurdle, and say compromise on that issue let them introduce another clause allowing the suspension of countries that commit human rights violations.
They also say the council will meet more often than the Geneva Commission, contains a mechanism to review the records of all members, and can hold special sessions with the support of only a third of its members.
In an effort to satisfy US demands, the European Union and associated countries, which could account for as many as 40 votes, have offered an assurance that they will not support the membership of countries under sanctions. There are efforts to convince other regional groups, and countries from the Community of Democracies, to make a similar pledge.
But Jan Eliasson, president of the General Assembly, is unwilling to reopen discussion on the text itself, saying this would open a Pandora’s box of changes to a finely wrought compromise. Mr Eliasson is also reluctant to put the text to a vote, which would offer Cuba and others the opportunity to table amendments.
Instead, he still hopes to adopt the text by consensus, in which all countries would allow the council to be created, but could make statements afterwards. The US has so far rejected that formula.
A group of 32 human rights and other lobby groups, including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, issued a strong appeal for governments to adopt the text.
While some expressed concerns over a watered-down council earlier in the process, they now say the text offers a “historic opportunity to create a better human rights protection system within the United Nations”.
Additional reporting by Frances Williams in Geneva