UN human rights commission: US loses seat, Sudan elected African nominee
Financial Times, May 3
By Michael Littlejohns at the United Nations
The US, a vigorous critic of alleged human rights violations by governments in China, Cuba, Iraq, Iran and other states, on Thursday lost its seat on the United Nations Human Rights Commission.
The defeat was widely interpreted as a backlash against the Bush administration - not so much over its rights policy as on several other questions.
Kishore Mahbubahni, the chief delegate of Singapore, a UN Security Council member, called the results of the secret ballots in the economic and social council "a stunning development".
But James Cunningham, the US ambassador pending Senate confirmation of a replacement for Richard Holbrooke and president of the Security Council, dismissed it as a case of "too many candidates for too few seats". France, Austria and Sweden, the other western contenders, were elected for a three-year term on the 53-nation commission, a subsidiary body of the economic council.
Until now, the US had served on the panel since its creation in 1947 and was expected to win easy re-election. "It's a surprise, given their power to twist arms," a western European diplomat said privately.
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In Thursday's balloting, Sudan was elected as one of the African nominees despite what many regarded as its lamentable rights record, but Iran, a "rogue state" in the Washington vernacular, was rejected for an Asian seat. |
