Human Rights Council: Fundamental or fundamentally flawed?

The Human Rights Council is convening in Geneva until July 13. This session is mired in US-China rivalry, while the Council also faces criticism from developing countries who feel they are often unfairly targeted for human rights abuses. SWI swissinfo looks at how this body works, what it has achieved and ongoing calls for its reform.

The workings of the Human Rights Council tend to reflect geopolitical tensions around the world.

On June 22, just a day into the session, the US joined more than 40 countries in a Canadian-led statement expressing “grave concern” about Chinese human rights abuses against Muslim minority Uighur people and urging Beijing to allow “immediate, meaningful and unfettered access to Xinjiang for independent observers”.

The US also backed a statement saying that “only democratic forms of governance are capable of providing an environment conducive to long-term peace and security”, but that some States were challenging the “fundamental pillars of democracy”.

With Washington’s return to the Council under US President Joe Biden we are seeing “a return to big power politics,” says Marc Limon, founder and director of independent human rights think tank Universal Rights Group. He says this was “encapsulated” by developments at the start of this session.

China and pro-China countries responded to the attacks with statements saying that national sovereignty should be respected, and that democracy should depend on local conditions. “China’s vision of ‘controlled democracy’ is very popular with some African and Asian leaders,” says Limon, “because it means they will stay in power for ever.” According to him, the current world struggle is not between capitalism and communism but between “democracy and autocracy” and this is reflected in the Human Rights Council.

‘The West versus the rest’

China’s pushback comes as developing countries, particularly in Africa, feel that the Human Rights Council’s “naming and shaming” policy is selective, politicised and targets them unfairly. While many of them deserve to have a finger pointed at them for human rights abuses, Limon says they do have a point to a certain extent.

A map included in his organisation’s annual report shows a “massive preponderance to focus on Israel/Palestine and on Africa”. Meanwhile, there have never been any resolutions on China or the US, for example. And despite the recent statement on Xinjiang, Limon thinks it unlikely there will be a resolution on China at this session because China is “too powerful” and has too many allies.

And then there is Israel. Former US president Donald Trump accused the Human Rights Council of being anti-Israel. He may have had a point to some extent, as the HRC’s “Agenda Item 7” focuses only on Israel and Palestine. This means that unlike any other country, Israel comes up in every Council session, with Muslim states in particular getting together to attack it. One result is that Israel has been the target of more than 70 resolutions for its human rights abuses in Palestine. Some, like Limon, argue that this situation is unfair, while others say Israel should be treated in a separate category because of its status as an occupying power.

Calls for reform

Announcing a pull-out three years ago, the former US administration of Donald Trump called the Human Rights Council “anti-Israel”, “hypocritical” and a “cesspool of political bias”. Trump pulled out halfway through a three-year US term on the Council and cut off funding. Now Washington has come back as an observer under Biden but is still looking for reforms. The observer status means it can take part in the proceedings but not vote.

Trump’s former ambassador to the UN, Nikki Hailey, even accused the HRC of being a “protector of human rights abusers”. This seems outrageous, but it is true that current HRC members include, for example, China, Russia, Cuba, Venezuela and Eritrea, not known for good human rights records.

Concern about gross human rights abusers on the Council is not new. Its predecessor, the UN Human Rights Commission, was set up after the Second World War with a mandate to uphold the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But concerns about the influence of human rights abusers on this Commission led to a Swiss-led reform and its replacement in 2006 with the current Human Rights Council. Oversight and selection of members is supposed to be more rigorous.

Achievements

The HRC is designed to serve as a talking as well as acting shop. As Jeremy Dear, Deputy General Secretary of the International Federation of Journalists, told SWI swissinfo in a previous interview, “having both the state allegedly responsible for the persecution and other states who might have influence with them all in the same UN building at the same time is a unique chance, not to get an immediate solution, but to start the process towards one”.

Of course, one of the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic has been to largely inhibit this face-to-face talking, as sessions went virtual. Like for other organisations in International Geneva and elsewhere, it remains to be seen if and when it will get back to “normal”. The current session is “hybrid”, meaning a mix of virtual and in-person.

Source: swiss info

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