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US envoy slams election of China to UN Human Rights Council

蘋果日報 2020/12/15 17:24


Kelly Craft, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said it is outrageous that China is among the 15 countries elected to the U.N. Human Rights Council in October. The country responsible for “egregious examples of human rights abuses” stands in stark contrast to Taiwan, said the envoy, who also called the self-governed island “a true force for good in the world.”
Speaking at a dialogue held by Heritage Foundation on “How to fix the broken U.N. Human Rights Council,” Craft called for comprehensive reforms to the council. “There must be means to deny such countries membership unless their human rights practices improve,” she appealed, citing the growing network of mass detention camps targeting Uyghurs in Xinjiang.
“I cannot turn away from the mistreatment of the Taiwanese, the Hongkongers, the Tibetans, the Uyghurs and the Rohingyas and many more,” said the diplomat.
China, Russia and Cuba are among the non-democratic countries elected to the council in October. The United States withdrew in 2018, protesting a chronic bias against Israel and dubious human rights record of its member countries. U.N. Watch described the election results as “making a gang of arsonists responsible for the fire brigade.”
Craft proposed a series of reforms, including stricter membership criteria, a higher threshold for election to the council and the elimination of bias against countries like Israel. She suggested that any member state currently under investigation or sanctioned by bodies such as the security council, international labor organizations should be prevented from running for council seats.
She also raised the option of increasing the threshold of election from absolute majority to a two-thirds supermajority, “making it harder for human rights abusers to win seats on the council.”
“Responsible nations of this world must come together and fix the U.N. human rights council,” said Craft. Further delay of the reform would betray the victims of torture in Venezuela and millions of religious minorities facing detention in China, who have to endure “the bitter irony of having to watch the government that abused them sit on the human rights council,” she added.
The Trump administration withdrew the U.S. from the council in 2018, but presidential-elect Joe Biden has pledged to rejoin and “work to ensure that the body truly lives up to its values.”
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