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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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 Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 11:40 am Post subject: US walking away from U.N. rights forum |
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GENEVA, June 6 (Reuters) - The United States has quietly informed Western allies of its intention to walk away from the U.N. Human Rights Council, diplomatic sources said on Friday.
The U.S. delegation has observer status, with the right to speak, in the 47-member state forum, which meets in Geneva, and has never stood for election to the Council since it was set up two years ago.
Diplomatic sources and rights activists said that U.S. officials had informed the European Union on Friday morning of its intention to halt its involvement in the Council.
"They said they were going to disengage totally," said one representative of a rights watchdog group.
In a Council debate on Friday on the situation in Myanmar, the United States failed to take the floor on a topic on which until now it has always been vocal, a possible sign that it had little further interest in the body. The Council replaced the widely discredited U.N. Commission on Human Rights.
But it is seen by critics as having fallen under control of a bloc of Islamic and African countries, which have a majority when backed by their frequent allies Russia, China and Cuba.
There was no immediate comment from the U.S. diplomatic mission in Geneva, home to the U.N. European headquarters. (Reporting by Stephanie Nebehay; Editing by Robert Evans) |
http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSL06927371
Human rights at the UN dominated by African and Islamic states. Such a joke. Why do Western states even play along anymore?
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UN Human Rights Council Under Fire From Newspaper Body
By Patrick Goodenough
CNSNews.com International Editor
June 06, 2008
(CNSNews.com) - A campaign by Islamic states to use the U.N. Human Rights Council as a tool to limit free expression when Islam is criticized is drawing fresh condemnation.
An international newspaper industry conference, meeting in Sweden this week, passed a resolution saying that the council's "role is to defend freedom of expression and not to support the censorship of opinion at the request of autocracies."
The criticism by the World Association of Newspapers (WAM) board, representing 18,000 newspapers, focused on a measure passed by the Human Rights Council in late March.
The Geneva-based council was considering the work of a special rapporteur (investigator-reporter) whose role has focused on the restrictions some governments have placed on free expression.
Pakistan, on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), introduced a resolution amending the rapporteur's mandate, so that he is now required to investigate and report on cases "in which the abuse of the right of freedom of expression constitutes an act of racial or religious discrimination."
The resolution, which passed with the support of 32 of the council's 47 members, was the latest bid by Islamic states to prevent a recurrence of incidents such as the publication of newspaper cartoons depicting Mohammed, and the release of a documentary film linking the Koran to terrorism.
Muslim critics argue that those responsible -- and the governments that defend them -- are abusing the right of free expression to offend the religious rights of others.
The OIC wields considerable influence at the Human Rights Council, because more than half of its seats are earmarked for the African and Asian regional groups, home to most Islamic states.
The WAM resolution, passed at the 61st World Newspaper Congress in Goteborg, urged the U.N. to ensure that international standards of free expression were upheld, and not undermined, by the council.
It expressed concern about "what appears to be the emergence of a negative trend against freedom of expression" in the council, noting an earlier resolution - also introduced by Pakistan for the OIC - on the "defamation of religion."
That resolution, which cited only Islam by name, passed in March 2007 by a 24-14 vote, with nine abstentions.
The Human Rights Council was established in 2006 to replace the 60-year-old U.N. Commission on Human Rights, which was discredited by the presence and conduct of rights-abusing countries
Many of the Islamic states in the council - and some non-Islamic allies like China, Russia and Cuba - have some of the world's poorest records on freedom of expression and the press, according to assessments by the U.S. State Department and human rights watchdogs.
In the two years that the council has been operating, 214 journalists have been killed around the world, according to a Geneva-based non-governmental organization, the Press Emblem Campaign. Of the six countries with the highest number of journalist deaths this year, four -- Mexico, Pakistan, Russia and India -- are members of the Human Rights Council. The other two are Iraq and Colombia. |
http://www.cnsnews.com/
There is no human right to not be offended. |
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Joo Rip Gwa Rhhee
Joined: 25 May 2003
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| Posted: Fri Jun 06, 2008 3:56 pm Post subject: |
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| It is about time |
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ontheway
Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Location: Somewhere under the rainbow...
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| Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 1:27 am Post subject: |
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| The US should withdraw from the UN completely. |
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nautilus
Joined: 26 Nov 2005
Location: Je jump, Tu jump, oui jump!
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| Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 1:53 am Post subject: |
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| ontheway wrote: |
| The US should withdraw from the UN completely. |
Wouldn't that just allow the monkeys to run the madhouse? |
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traveler81
Joined: 18 Mar 2008
Location: Byeongjeom, Gyeonggi-do
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| Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 3:40 am Post subject: |
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| Not if when the US pulled out they also 1) stopped paying the lion's share of the UN's yearly revenue and 2) evicted them from the UN Building in NY. |
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Khenan
Joined: 25 Dec 2007
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| Posted: Sat Jun 07, 2008 9:53 am Post subject: |
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| Fans of Civ will note how rediculous it sounds to expel the international community when you built the U.N. I say: let's cash in and get ourselves elected Secretary General. |
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Temporary
Joined: 13 Jan 2008
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| Posted: Sun Jun 08, 2008 4:02 pm Post subject: |
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| UN has been a complete failure. Just like the league of nations. |
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