GENEVA: The United States is set Tuesday to become the first country to fully shun a regular review of its human rights record at the UN\u2019s top rights body since it was created two decades ago.<\/p>\n
The Trump administration last year pulled the US out of the Human Rights Council, accusing it of an anti-US and anti-Israel bias, and alleging that it didn\u2019t uphold the very values it promotes.<\/p>\n
Supporters back the council\u2019s mandate to keep tabs on human rights in all UN member states including the US, which has drawn criticism for its policies including strong-arm deportations and targeted killings of alleged drug-runners in the Caribbean and Pacific \u2014 which the administration has said are designed to protect US workers and help keep the country safe.<\/p>\n
The Geneva-based council regularly examines the rights records of all 193 UN member states \u2014 generally about every four to five years \u2014 as part of a process known as the universal periodic review.<\/p>\n
The United States, under Trump, already skipped its appointment for its review a year ago. The scheduled November 2025 review was pushed back until Tuesday in hopes that the US government might change its mind.<\/p>\n
It did not.<\/p>\n
\u201c(W)e give no credibility to the agency,\u201d a State Department spokesperson said in an email to The Associated Press.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis irredeemable body makes a mockery of human rights through consistent failures to uphold its own \u2018values\u2019 as it pushes anti-American rhetoric,\u201d the spokesperson said, alleging the council\u2019s \u201cpersistent failure to condemn the most egregious human rights violators.\u201d<\/p>\n
The council says the process requires participation of the country in question, and in the case of an absence of any national representatives, the review cannot go forward.<\/p>\n
As part of such reviews, national delegations \u2014 which at times can include a dozen officials or more \u2014 make a presentation, face questions and hear recommendations from other national envoys. It\u2019s supposed to be a sweeping and constructive process, akin to holding up a mirror to governments to improve their human rights policies.<\/p>\n
Critics of the US snub warn that the walkout could encourage other countries \u2014 many of which bristle about intense scrutiny from human rights monitors \u2014 to follow suit.<\/p>\n
Jamil Dakwar, director of the American Civil Liberties Union\u2019s human rights program, said: \u201cThe administration is saying to the world, \u2018we don\u2019t care about whether you would review us or not, we\u2019re going to continue to violate human rights unabashed\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd we are saying: \u2018No, enough is enough. This council should hold the United States accountable\u2019,\u201d he told reporters Monday in Geneva, as part of a push by civil society to raise awareness about the US rights record.<\/p>\n
He said the ACLU and allies have called on the UN human rights chief to respond by presenting an update on rights in the United States early next year.<\/p>\n
Eric Tistounet, a visiting professor at the Geneva Graduate Institute who was the council\u2019s first secretary, said the US walkout could affect the credibility of the council\u2019s review system.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the predominant global power \u2014 which has always claimed to adhere to the human rights norms \u2014 doesn\u2019t show up and doesn\u2019t even justify why, then you are in big trouble,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
GENEVA: The United States is set Tuesday to become the first country to fully shun a regular review of its human rights record at the UN\u2019s top rights body since it was created two decades ago. The Trump administration last year pulled the US out of the Human Rights Council, accusing it of an anti-US …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":105704,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-105699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105699"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105699\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":105705,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105699\/revisions\/105705"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/105704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}