Will Sudan Really Get Elected to the Human Rights Council?
It’s a story all too familiar.
A government responsible for mass murder, crushing democratic dissent, or engaging in nuclear, chemical, or biological shenanigans gets elected to the U.N. institution responsible for policing just that — whether upholding human rights, democracy, or disarmament.
Sudan’s President Omar al-Bashir stands charged by the International Criminal Court with orchestrating a campaign of genocide in Darfur. So what better place to defend oneself than with a seat on the Geneva-based Human Rights Council?
A couple of months back, Sudan was quietly included on a slate of five African countries — the others are Ethiopia, Gabon, Ivory Coast, and Sierra Leone — due to run unchallenged for seats on the 47-member council this November.
The selection of Sudan as a candidate has provided U.N. critics with another example of the U.N.’s abject moral state. In Washington, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), the chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs committee issued a statement Monday, saying Sudan’s candidacy shows the U.N. is broken. “As Sudan appears poised to win a seat on the UN Human Rights Council, the UN has hit a new low,” she said. “The UN has surrendered to despots and rogue regimes as it allows the likes of Iran’s Ahmadinejad, Venezuela’s Chavez, and now Sudan’s Omar al-Bashir to corrupt the system and use it to further their own oppressive and despotic schemes.”
Human Rights groups agree that Sudan’s election would be disastrous but they have focused their efforts on persuading African government to drop Sudan. Previous campaigns by Western governments and human rights advocates have succeeded in preventing Azerbaijan, Belarus, Iran, and Syria from getting seats on the council.