‘Free’ Countries Once Again a Minority on U.N. Human Rights Council
NEW YORK - This year’s election for the U.N. Human Rights Council has, once again, produced a body that has fewer “free” countries – 21 of a total of 47 – and has more than one-third of the seats held by members of the Islamic bloc.
Among the 15 countries to win seats on the Geneva-based HRC on Friday was Congo, which joins 11 other countries ranked “not free” by the democracy advocacy group, Freedom House, based on an annual assessment of political freedoms and civil liberties.
Nonetheless, rights advocates did find some cause for cheer: In the only two regional groups to see any contest, Latin America and Eastern Europe, countries ranked “free” by Freedom House defeated candidates scoring a “partly free” grade.
In Latin America, Nicaragua’s leftist regime was edged out in a four-way race for three seats, won by Peru, Chile and Costa Rica; the Czech Republic and Romania beat Georgia in a three-way contest for two seats for the Eastern Europe group.
As expected, Kuwait secured the seat that Syria had been in line to win until President Bashar Assad withdrew his bid last week, after initially supportive Arab and Asian states bowed to pressure from Western governments and non-governmental activists. (Even though Syria was not standing, five countries still voted for it on Friday.)
Every May for the past six years the U.N. General Assembly has held an “election” to fill a proportion of seats on the 47-member HRC, the world body’s foremost human rights watchdog.
With the exception of the inaugural vote in 2006, the procedure has been marred by “closed slates,” where regional groups endorse the same number of countries as there are seats available, thus precluding any contest.
Despite the requirement that governments take into account candidates’ human rights records, the General Assembly – voting under secret ballot – has ushered onto the council a total of 19 “not free” countries, some more than once.
In most cases, they obtained votes well in excess of the 97 required in the 192-member General Assembly.
The 19, along with the number of votes they scored, are: China (won two elections, with vote counts of 146 and 167), Russia (137, 146), Cuba (135, 163), Saudi Arabia (126, 154), Libya (155), Egypt (168), Pakistan (149, 114), Algeria (168), Tunisia (171), Mauritania (167), Bahrain (172), Qatar (170, 177), Jordan (178), Angola (172, 170), Cameroon (171, 142), Gabon (178), Kyrgyzstan (174), Azerbaijan (103) and newcomer Congo (176).
http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/free-countries-once-again-minority-un-huWhat a sick, pathetic joke of an organization dedicated to world peace. Anytime someone questions something like this these pieces of shit play deaf, blind and dumb. Go ahead and keep pouring billions of dollars a year into this, USA! At least Bush had the common sense to keep the US off this embarrassment whereas Obama was all too eager to hop on board with the world's worst violators of human rights.
Congrats, dictators, despots and tyrants!
