Published August 08, 2012
FoxNews.com
The election of a Sudanese warlord accused of genocide to
the United Nations Human Rights Council is now virtually guaranteed, since he
has the full backing of the world body's African delegation.
The International Criminal Court has issued a warrant for
Omar Al-Bashir -- its first ever for a sitting head of state -- for crimes
against humanity he allegedly committed in Darfur. Yet, his regime is set to
take its place on the panel, in the latest bizarre appointment to make a
mockery of the UN's human rights credibility, according to critics.
It's like putting “Jack the Ripper in charge of a women’s
shelter,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch.
Neuer's Geneva-based group is calling on UN High
Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay to denounce election of the war-torn
North African nation to the 47-member body. Sudan is not technically on the
panel, but its election is a certainty because only five African nations are
vying for the continent's five seats.
Membership to the Council is open to all member states
and secret-ballot elections are held every year, according to a UN website.
Upon election, states serve three-year terms and are not eligible for immediate
re-election after serving two consecutive terms.
Candidates within the UN’s African Group, which has five
vacant seats, include Ethiopia, Gabon, Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone and Sudan. The
candidacies of Venezuela and Pakistan are also being protested by UN Watch and
other human rights groups.
U.S. officials also blasted the development.
"Sudan, a consistent human rights violator, does not
meet the Council’s own standards for membership," said Kurtis Cooper,
deputy spokesman for the United States Mission to the United Nations. "It
would be inappropriate for Sudan to have a seat on the Council while the
Sudanese head of State is under International Criminal Court indictment for war
crimes in Darfur and the government of Sudan continues to use violence to
inflame tensions along its border with South Sudan."
Mark Lagon, a visiting professor at Georgetown University
and a former U.S. State Department official, said Al-Bashir’s regime fomented
genocide in Darfur and has since returned to terrorizing innocent people in
South Sudan.
“It lacks credibility to judge others, and the Council
lacks it too with it as a Member,” Lagon told FoxNews.com in an email.
Neuer said Pillay, a South African, should be a “moral
voice” and urge other African nations to call for “unequivocal opposition to
Sudan’s scandalous” bid for the election that will add 18 member nations in
all.
“Just a year after the human rights council sought to
exorcise the ghosts of its past by suspending Col. Muammar Qaddafi’s Libya —
which infamously chaired the body in 2003, and was reelected a member in 2010 —
it is now set to replace him with a tyrant wanted for genocide by the
International Criminal Court. For how long must we have the inmates running the
asylum?”
Neuer said the reputation of the former human rights
commission “never recovered” from making Libya its chair in 2003.
“The UN and the cause of human rights will be severely
damaged if and when Al-Bashir’s Sudanese regime wins a seat,” he said.
In its first-ever arrest warrant issued for a sitting head
of state by the UN International Crimes Court (ICC) in 2009, al-Bashir was
accused of intentionally directing attacks in western Sudan’s Darfur region by
“murdering, exterminating, raping, torturing and forcibly transferring” large
numbers of civilians.
The “unlawful” campaign allegedly started soon after the
April 2003 attack on El Fasher airport — as a result of agreements between
Al-Bashir and other high-ranking Sudanese leaders — and lasted until at least
July 2008. The warrant of arrests lists seven counts, including five counts of
crimes against humanity and two counts of war crimes.
The recent UN process seemingly favors rogue states,
including Iran, Zimbabwe and Syria:
—Just last month, Iran was elected to the deputy
president role of a 15-member board aiming to thrash out a UN arms trade
treaty, despite multiple UN sanctions against the Islamic republic regarding
its nuclear defiance and human rights abuses.
—In May, Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe was appointed
as a UN tourism envoy for a major UN conference despite allegations of ethnic
cleansing and rigged elections by the 88-year-old who has led the southern
African nation for more than three decades.
—Syria was elected to a United Nations Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) human rights committee last fall,
despite the ongoing crackdown on opposition protests by Bashar al-Assad’s
regime that has reportedly claimed more than 21,000 lives in just 17 months.
When electing states to the council, members are asked to
consider the “contribution of candidates to the promotion and protection of
human rights” and voluntary pledges in that regard, according to a UN website.
“Upon election, new members commit themselves to
cooperating with the Council and to upholding the highest standards in the
promotion and protection of human rights,” the website reads. “Members of the
Council are reviewed under the Universal Periodic Review mechanism during their
term of membership.”
Any member that commits
“gross and systematic violations” of human rights can be suspended by a
two-thirds majority vote by the General Assembly.UN
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