posted on Jul, 6 2003 @ 02:07 AM
Friday May 11 2001
President George W Bush said today that it was outrageous that the United States had been voted off the United Nations Human Rights Commission while
Sudan was voted on. While Mr Bush disagreed with the decision, he said that he disagreed with a move by the House of Representatives to freeze the
final payment of US arrears to the UN until the United States regains its lost seat on the rights commission.
The US, a member of the UN human rights body since its creation in 1947, was voted off the panel last week, with the three seats reserved for western
nations going to France, Austria and Sweden. The US House of Representatives yesterday voted to withhold nearly $250m owed to the UN. They have made
the reinstating of the United States as a member of a key human rights body a precondition of handing over the money.
Impact
(from Human Rights Watch)
"The move has important symbolic significance. The U.S. has been on the Commission continuously since its inception in 1947.
In practice however, it really is not as significant. The U.S. can do everything except vote. The U.S. can participate in Commission meetings, it just
has a shorter speaking time and must speak in a different order.
While it is not on the Commission, the U.S. can not sponsor resolutions alone, but it can still initiate resolutions if it finds a co-sponsor. The
U.S. can and should be as active as ever.
Also - the UN Narcotics (drug control) Committee
The vote (by secret ballot, though suspected to have been influenced by European and South American delegates concerned with US drug policy) comes
shortly after the World's Leading Nation lost its seat on the UN Human Rights Commission, not to mention its unilateral tearing up of the Kyoto
treaty and the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. The question is: is this more likely to marginalise the US as a cowboy state, or to lead to the wane of
the UN as a body of real influence?
I don't think the UN is going to be any less powerful with the US ignoring it. But it does need to be more effective.