UN: The United Nations General Assembly yesterday created a new UN human rights body by an overwhelming majority, ignoring objections from the United States.
Ambassadors applauded when the vote was announced: 170-4 with three abstentions. Joining the US in a "no" vote were Israel, Marshall Islands and Palau - but not American allies in Europe or Canada. Belarus, Iran and Venezuela abstained.
As the pre-eminent international rights watchdog, the 47-seat UN Human Rights Council is to expose human rights abusers and help nations draw up rights legislation. It will replace the 53-country Geneva-based UN Human Rights Commission which, in recent years, has included some of the world's most notorious rights violators.
US ambassador John Bolton told the assembly the rules for the new council were not strong enough to prevent rights violators from getting a seat. But he said the US would co-operate.
"We did not have sufficient confidence in this text to be able to say that the Human Rights Council will be better than its predecessor," Mr Bolton said. "The United States will work co-operatively with other member states to make the council as strong and effective as it can be."
Cuba, which had distributed four amendments, voted in favour, but it stated many objections and called the council a creation of the West, which would be used to "unjustly condemn Third World countries". Its ambassador, Rodrigo Malierca, said, "We were never deceived by the loud-mouthed objections of the Washington representatives." The text, he said, was "conceived and negotiated behind the scenes to accommodate its demands, sacrificing vital interests of the countries of the south".Mr Bolton told the assembly he could exercise his right of reply, "but on the other hand, why bother?"
Many nations, including Canada and members of the European Union, as well as major human rights groups, share American misgivings. But they rejected Mr Bolton's earlier proposal to postpone or renegotiate the council, fearing the final result would doom the entire effort.
UN secretary general Kofi Annan first proposed the new council last year. But his blueprint was watered down in the resolution.
Assembly president Jan Eliasson, who negotiated the text, acknowledged his resolution was a compromise. But he called the council "a body that would advance the founding principles that were initiated by the General Assembly with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights" of 1948.
Members will be elected by the 191-member General Assembly by a majority vote of all nations, not just those present and voting. The seats would be distributed among regional groups: 13 for Africa, 13 for Asia, six for eastern Europe, eight for Latin America and the Caribbean, and seven for a block of mainly western countries, including the US and Canada.