UN Human Rights Council elects 15 members in uncontested vote

Human rights groups have sharply criticised the uncontested election of 15 members of the United Nations’ premier human rights body, saying it let countries with poor rights records win seats.

The 193-member General Assembly held the vote on Tuesday.

Positions on the 47-nation Human Rights Council are allocated to the UN’s regional groups to ensure geographical representation. And for the second year in a row, all regional groups put forward the exact number of candidates for available seats for the three-year term, resulting in uncontested races.

“This uncompetitive vote makes a mockery of the word ‘election’,” said Louis Charbonneau, UN director at Human Rights Watch.

“No one should have a seat on this crucial body handed to them on a silver platter”, Charbonneau said.

He called on UN member nations to “insist on competitive slates so they can reject candidates with poor human rights records”.

In Tuesday’s vote, the Africa group’s Zambia, Ghana, Nigeria and Burundi were elected.

The Asia-Pacific group’s Kuwait, Nepal, Jordan and Japan won seats, as did Brazil, the Dominican Republic and Uruguay from the Latin America and Caribbean group.

Ireland and Germany from the mainly Western group, and Moldova and Ukraine from the Central and East European group, will also join the Human Rights Council.

The Geneva-based council reviews the human rights records of all countries periodically, appoints independent investigators to report on issues such as torture and situations in countries such as North Korea, Iran and Myanmar, and sends fact-finding missions to investigate rights violations. These include missions in Ukraine, the occupied Palestinian territories and Israel, and Sudan.

The council was created in 2006 to replace a human rights commission discredited because some members had poor rights records. But the new council soon faced similar criticism, including that countries sought seats to protect themselves and their allies.

Soon after starting his second term, US President Donald Trump announced the withdrawal of Washington from the Human Rights Council, accusing it of anti-Israel bias. He also pulled the US out in his first term.

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric, responding to a question about the UN position on the uncontested vote, said it was a matter for the 193 member nations.

“But what we’ve always said is that member states who are elected to this organisation’s highest human rights body have an added responsibility to protect human rights,” he said.

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